Crumbled

Hard-times natural gas prices crumbled an Alberta political pillar by prompting the province’s Conservative government to discard a popular home-heating subsidy, saying it no longer has money to burn.

Siding with prior-day futures weakness instead of sticking to the week’s flip-flopping trend, cash points unanimously crumbled on Friday with most points declining by more than a half-dollar and a number of points out west shedding more than a dollar.