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VANCOUVER- British Columbia's minority Green Party on Monday struck a deal with the left-leaning New Democrats to govern Canada's western-most province, a move that casts doubt on the future of key energy projects from firms such as Kinder Morgan Inc.

Announcement of the partnership ends a stalemate that emerged last week when the final tally of votes from a May 9 election stripped Liberal premier ChristyClarkof her majority. She will now leave office.

The two parties said they will disclose details of their plans on Tuesday.

Green leader Andrew Weaver did not reveal what the pact says about Kinder Morgan's plans to twin its Trans Mountain crude oil pipeline from Alberta to the Pacific coast. Both parties oppose the $7.4 billion project.

"This issue of Kinder Morgan is one that was critical to us and I think you'll see that reflected in tomorrow's announcement," Weaver told a news conference with NDP leader John Horgan.

Clarkhad backed Trans Mountain as well as liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects.

Kinder Morgan's Canadian unit is expected to debut on Tuesday on the Toronto Stock Exchange in an initial public offering to part-finance Trans Mountain. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment, although it acknowledged last week the political climate was "not ideal."

Any move by the new government to block Kinder Morgan will be a blow to federal Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whose government approved the project last November.Clark's Liberals are unrelated to Trudeau's party.

Trudeau's spokeswoman Andree-Lyne Halle said the federal government would continue to "work constructively with provincial and territorial governments on the issues that matter to Canadians."

Trudeau says the Alberta energy industry needs the pipeline to boost exports to Asia and reduce reliance on the U.S. market. Opponents say the risks of a spill are too large.

"We will continue to do what we have done all the way, which is standing up for Alberta's best interests. That includes Kinder Morgan and making sure we have access to tidewater for our products," said Alberta Deputy Premier Sarah Hoffman.

Hoffman said Alberta would intervene in lawsuits against the project.

While there is some dispute over whether British Columbia can actually formally block a pipeline project, it can raise multiple hurdles like denying local construction permits that could effectively make it impossible to build.

FIRST MINORITY GOVT SINCE 1952

Horgan has also expressed reservations about a $27 billion liquefied natural gas terminal that Malaysia's Petronas wants to build in northern British Columbia. Petronas was not immediately available for comment.

The political agreement reached between the Greens and New Democrats still needs to be voted on by the NDP caucus on Tuesday. If they agree to create a minority government, it would be the province's first in 65 years.

The Greens and the New Democrats together have 44 of the 87 seats in the provincial legislature. Under the terms of the deal the Greens promise not to defeat the New Democrats for the full four-year term of the new parliament.

Richard Johnston, a professor of political science at the University of British Columbia, said the announcement was "a revolutionary moment in B.C.'s politics. This would be the first minority that lasts more than a year."

The Liberals have ruled the province for 16 years.

Clarkissued a statement saying the government had "a responsibility to carefully consider our next steps" and would have more to say on Tuesday.

Her obvious options include resigning, or hanging onto power until she presents her formal agenda to the new legislature. The Greens and NDP would then immediately vote to bring her down.

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Future of energy projects uncertain as BC Liberals lose majority - BNN

NewsBusters (blog)

USA Today: Trump Driving Liberals to Yoga NewsBusters (blog) This news comes to us by way of the May 29 USA Today in which Paul Singer reports that the election of Donald Trump has driven many liberals to take up yoga as a means of escape or to energize themselves for the "resistance" ahead. So perhaps those ...

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USA Today: Trump Driving Liberals to Yoga - NewsBusters (blog)

"The word liberal in this context has nothing to do with today's partisan language, but refers instead to the Latin root, pertaining to liberty. And at the heart of liberty in the Western world has been freedom of speech. From the beginning, people understood that this meant protecting and listening to speech with which you disagreed," Zakaria argued.

That means, he said, not drowning out "the ideas that we find offensive."

In addition, Zakaria noted what he called "an anti-intellectualism" on the left.

"It's an attitude of self-righteousness that says we are so pure, we're so morally superior, we cannot bear to hear an idea with which we disagree," he said.

"Liberals think they are tolerant but often they aren't," he added.

No one, he continued, "has a monopoly on right or virtue."

In fact, it is only by being open to hearing opposing views that people on both sides of the political spectrum can learn something, Zakaria said.

"By talking seriously and respectfully about agreements and disagreements, we can come together in a common conversation," he said.

"Recognizing that while we seem so far apart, we do actually have a common destiny."

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Fareed Zakaria: Liberals think they're tolerant, but they're not - CNN

Michael MacDonald, The Canadian Press

HALIFAX -- When the Nova Scotia election campaign started 30 days ago, Liberal Premier Stephen McNeil set the tone of the race by warning supporters that his tight-fisted approach may have turned off some voters.

"We had to make tough choices, choices that weren't always popular," the Liberal premier said on April 30, acknowledging a frugal style of governing that has allowed him to deliver balanced budgets in the past two years despite weak economic growth.

As voters head to the polls today, many will likely be recalling how McNeil's majority government was defined by its decision to rein in spending by limiting wage increases within the public sector. That led to ugly standoffs with the province's nurses and public school teachers, culminating in protests at the legislature, brief strikes and back-to-work legislation that the unions said was draconian.

There was also a series of cuts to seniors' long-term care and public service organizations, including cutbacks to non-profit groups serving those with hearing loss, eating disorders and epilepsy. And in 2015, thousands of people working the province's film industry took to the streets to protest the government's decision to eliminate a film tax credit.

Despite McNeil's hard-nosed approach, the Liberals maintained a strong lead in decided voter support throughout their mandate, with the Progressive Conservatives under Jamie Baillie well behind in second place, and

Gary Burrill's New Democrats a distant third.

Still, a closer look at the polls showed there was a cost to McNeil's approach. Though his party has remained in first place among decided voters, his own popularity lagged behind that of his party.

In the two months before the election campaign, the Liberals attempted to soften their image by spending tens of millions of dollars in a flurry of daily announcements. The party then tabled a budget last month that included a modest tax cut for about 500,000 Nova Scotians.

Three days later, McNeil pulled the trigger on an election, an announcement that reminded Canadians that Nova Scotia is the only province that does not have fixed election dates.

At dissolution, the Liberals held 34 seats in the 51-seat legislature, the Progressive Conservatives had 10 and the NDP 5. There was one Independent and one seat was vacant.

By the end of the campaign, some polls suggested the Liberals and Progressive Conservatives found themselves in a tightened race, with Baillie repeatedly hammering McNeil for what Baillie describes as a health-care crisis.

On Monday, Baillie again returned to a theme that he said was resonating with voters.

"Everywhere I go in Nova Scotia, people tell me that they are frustrated and afraid because of the state of our health-care system," Baillie told a rally in Dartmouth. "Everyone acknowledges there is a crisis in health care -- everyone except Stephen McNeil."

In particular, Baillie has made a point of telling voters McNeil had failed to deliver on a 2013 promise to make sure every Nova Scotian had access to a family doctor. About 100,000 Nova Scotians are still looking for a doctor.

The health issue is crucial to the Tories' success because there is little else to distinguish their platform from that of the Liberals, especially when it comes to fiscal policy.

Baillie, who is contesting his second election as leader, is promising four years of balanced budgets if elected. McNeil is promising the same. And both men are promising to keep public sector wages in line.

By contrast, NDP Leader Gary Burrill campaigned on a platform that calls for adding close to $1 billion to the province's accumulated debt over the next four years if he becomes premier.

Burrill, elected leader just over a year ago, has said his party was inspired by Justin Trudeau, whose Liberal party won the 2015 election by, among other things, pledging to spur the economy by using deficit financing.

The Liberals have described the NDP's leader as "anti-capitalist," while a Tory spokesman called his platform a "reckless spending orgy."

The NDP's commitment to deficit financing stands in contrast to the approach taken by the province's first NDP government, which won the general election in 2009 by promising to table three consecutive balanced budgets -- a promise they eventually broke.

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Nova Scotia election day: Penny-pinching Liberals seeking second term - BNN

A Gumatj dancer from East Arnhem Land performs at the opening ceremony of last weeks convention on constitutional recognition in Mutitjulu, near Uluru. Photograph: Calla Wahlquist for the Guardian

A constitutionally enshrined Indigenous voice in parliament is unlikely to ever be accepted by the majority in the Liberal party, the Institute of Public Affairs executive director has warned.

John Roskam, the head of the influential libertarian thinktank, rejected the proposal put forward by the Referendum Council at a meeting of more than 250 community leaders at Uluru, labelling it an attempt to enshrine racial division in the constitution.

Conservative Coalition MPs including Craig Kelly and George Christensen have lined up to criticise the proposal, but it was supported by MP Julian Leeser, suggesting the issue will be highly divisive in the party room.

In a statement on Friday the Uluru conference said Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders were the sovereign first peoples of Australia and a significant practical change was needed, not a symbolic reform. In addition to the proposed Indigenous voice in parliament, it called for a commission that would lead to a treaty.

In 2015 the IPA campaigned against constitutional recognition, arguing instead that all references to race should be removed from the constitution to assert the principle of equality.

On Monday Roskam told Guardian Australia parliament represented all Australians and the suggestion of a separate Indigenous voice was just as offensive as to give people a special say due to their religion, or gender or anything else.

In reality, all policy decisions are Indigenous policy decisions, because Indigenous Australians are Australians.

Roskam said that the moral force [of the Indigenous body] would be very significant, in effect making it difficult to override it, describing it as an effective veto on matters of policy such as the Northern Territory intervention.

On the proposed treaty, Roskam argued it was impossible for the crown representing all Australians to make an agreement with a subset of Australians, the Indigenous nations.

The idea of a treaty is radical identity politics. In any case a country cannot have a treaty with itself.

He said the point of the 1967 referendum, in which Australia resolved to count Indigenous people in the census, was to make us all the same but the recognition proposal would do the opposite.

All parties should focus on what unites Australians and brings us together. These proposals are unlikely to ever be accepted by the majority of the Liberal party.

The IPA is highly influential in the Coalition, leading campaigns against superannuation reform that resulted in major changes to the governments election policy and forcing reform of section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act back on to the agenda.

On Monday Ken Wyatt, the commonwealths first Indigenous minister, told ABC AM he was extremely confident the Uluru talks would lead to a referendum on recognition next year.

Wyatt said scare campaigns had the potential to derail the process and advocated an awareness program that informs all Australians of the intent behind the set of words what it means and that its not in enshrining special privileges.

But it is in fact recognising the reality that Aboriginal and Torres Islander people lived on this continent long before settlement, and that Australias history should be reflected in that statement within the constitution.

Leeser, a Sydney Liberal MP and constitutional conservative, welcomed the Indigenous delegates strong rejection of earlier proposals for purely symbolic recognition or anti-discrimination reforms which he characterised as a one-clause bill of rights.

Leeser said the government should consider a representative body if it did not have voting rights or a right of veto. He said the Liberal party traditionally had been opposed to a treaty but a settlement could be contemplated.

The conservative Liberal backbencher Craig Kelly said the Indigenous body in parliament would be very divisive in the community and many in the Coalition party room would be very reluctant to pursue the full recommendations agreed at Uluru.

He said there were now a number of Indigenous MPs and they were a strong voice for their community.

Influential backbench MP George Christensen told Sky News it was dangerous to give one group special privileges that no other group in the country has.

Christensen said he would vote against the proposal in both the lower house and in any referendum, saying recognition was segregating us.

He said the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, which was abolished by the Howard government, was a demonstrable failure ... [that] elevated one section of our society to a special basis where there were special policies in place for them.

Christensen said that government should work for practical outcomes for Indigenous Australians, such as jobs, health and education rather than the academic, elitist issue of recognition.

Cape York Institute senior policy adviser, Shireen Morris, said the proposal was not about dividing Australians but creating a fairer relationship between Indigenous peoples and the Australian government.

Morris said parliament already makes Indigenous-specific laws and could do so without the race power, as it had done for the Northern Territory intervention.

All this proposal says is: of course Indigenous should have a fair say and a fair voice in policies that affect them.

Morris said the objection to the crown making a treaty with itself were philosophical but in practice the government enters agreements all the time, including native title agreements.

The Referendum Council has been contacted for comment.

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Liberals won't accept Indigenous recognition model, Institute of Public Affairs warns - The Guardian