John Bolton - Keith Wilson & Dennis Kalma - Alberta Transition Council - Alberta's Path Forward

00:00:00.000 good morning everybody and welcome to a special episode of the levine show and i'm very excited

00:00:07.360 about this because we get to go through the alberta transition council white paper which

00:00:12.240 was launched just yesterday i don't expect you all to have downloaded and read the entire thing

00:00:16.560 just yet it's over 200 pages of goodness 28 chapters but it's definitely a good start to

00:00:23.760 start thinking about where are we headed with this transition i had a couple people reach out to me

00:00:28.960 after it came out and we announced this episode with John Bolton, Dennis Kelma, and soon Keith

00:00:34.020 Wilson to ask why, why do we need something like this at this stage? It's a good question because

00:00:39.820 some people have already made up their minds and they want to just focus on the referendum.

00:00:43.280 But the bigger, broader question is we need a lot of support to win that referendum. And there's a

00:00:47.760 lot of people who are undecided and they want more information. This is for them. They want to see if

00:00:52.660 there's thought behind this or people really giving this consideration. What happens to the

00:00:57.220 airplanes what happens to the borders what happens to the police that's what this is about this isn't

00:01:02.500 the official definitive plan this is a proposal made by the community and the citizens of Alberta

00:01:08.560 to go ahead and have that conversation John Bolton one of my best friends now we've had a couple

00:01:14.200 dinners so that makes us official we're besties um hey we're gonna have uh Keith Wilson and Dennis

00:01:21.760 calma on so i pulled out my best suit and i thought why not let's do this so john good morning

00:01:27.460 nice to see you do you have your big blue mug with you i do of course and thank you very much

00:01:31.920 jason i was glad to have you along i forgot to turn on my on-air light so i'll have to leave

00:01:35.780 that off for the hour but no i'm glad it's nice to be here and i was talking with keith the other

00:01:39.800 night i had an opportunity to read um some of this document because it is it is very long it's over

00:01:45.960 200 pages and i went through i read the first 40 pages in its entirety and then i went through

00:01:51.020 different sections of this. And I've been really excited about seeing this. But I'll tell you,

00:01:55.100 I wrote an email the other night to Keith and I said, it is amazing in its complexity and its

00:02:02.860 specificity. And that's how I described it because it is very complex. It is very specific. But I

00:02:09.560 know there's other things that have to come with this as well. And I think a lot of this

00:02:13.000 will have to be cited after we gain our independence, which we'll talk about with

00:02:17.480 Dennis and when we get Keith logged in in just a moment. I was just talking to him a moment ago.

00:02:21.020 And he'll be logging in shortly. Over the time, since I think the beginning of the year in January, I had people talking to me, but how are you going to transition to a new country? And I've heard this a lot. As a matter of fact, it was back in Mirror at Chris Scott's place at the Whistle Stop a few weeks ago, the event that you put on along with Chris and a number of the third party advertisers.

00:02:45.800 We had a guy there who had worked through the canvassing. He had been out on the front lines talking to people about this transition. And he was very animated saying, people are saying, well, what happens to the planes and what happens to our military? You can't do this. You haven't got a plan. And that's why this is so important.

00:03:02.980 Now, I didn't download the whole thing. This is sort of the cover. It is 214 pages long, but it's nice to have Dennis here. Dennis, thanks so much for being here. And we'll get Keith in as soon as he comes here. Thanks for being part of this. You're part of the Alberta Transition Council, the co-lead, along with Keith Wilson. We really appreciate the work you've done on this.

00:03:21.000 well thanks so much it's been a fair bit of a journey and I think it's important

00:03:26.520 to note that in many respects what you're seeing in the plan that was

00:03:30.780 published was almost the tip of the iceberg there's a very large body of

00:03:35.640 work almost a thousand pages 350,000 words that was put together by over 40

00:03:42.120 volunteers who are subject matter experts reviewers and so forth who went

00:03:48.240 through the plans, improve them, thought through approaches for how best to do transition and

00:03:56.500 what it means and of course any issues that might pop up as far as well how do we handle

00:04:01.060 this, how do we handle that.

00:04:02.580 The main thing to note is that there is no unknowns here.

00:04:07.640 There is nothing here that's new to world.

00:04:10.360 There are the unknowns of if you're dealing with a counterparty, whether it be a government

00:04:14.820 of Canada or a foreign government let's say yeah how they respond of course is up to them and and

00:04:20.820 and so forth but we've actually walked through how exactly we would deal with various approach

00:04:26.340 and feedback and uh make sure that we um we we got them covered in a reasonable way

00:04:33.460 so that's where we're at that's the the uh document as it stands and the part you're seeing

00:04:38.900 of course is not including the budget figures that will come later we want to do a very careful

00:04:44.020 review and very thorough and think quality is better than is is more important than timing

00:04:52.180 and one thing that i really like dennis as you were going through this process and sorry keith

00:04:56.100 i had to mute you because we're getting a little bit of echo there uh i'll meet you in a short

00:05:00.020 second here um was that you're looking for the holes or the problems you didn't present this

00:05:04.660 at a review stage and said hey here's the plan uh this is what we're doing you said where are

00:05:09.300 are the problems because we want to make sure we cover of many bases and you even use the term

00:05:13.500 to make it kind of like bulletproof because it's going to be criticized uh once it's released so

00:05:18.760 oh we lost uh dennis now i will go to keith so keith as we're talking about this was that

00:05:23.560 intentional uh that you decided to kind of focus on where are the holes in this the whole the holes

00:05:29.540 and what the uh what do you mean by that during your review stage when you're checking out the

00:05:34.280 plan, you guys were focusing

00:05:36.640 on where are the challenges with this instead

00:05:38.660 of just presenting it.

00:05:40.880 Yeah, I mean, we tried to take a realistic

00:05:42.920 look. You know, one

00:05:44.800 of my motivations, and can you hear me okay?

00:05:46.700 Is the audio better?

00:05:48.640 I hear you. Okay, thanks.

00:05:51.900 Well, first of all,

00:05:52.900 thanks for having me on, guys. Sorry I was a little bit late.

00:05:54.840 I had some technical issues with one of my

00:05:56.780 mics, and

00:05:58.160 I did something last night that I haven't

00:06:00.680 done for a very long time.

00:06:02.940 Sleep.

00:06:04.280 So, good to be here and feeling somewhat refreshed.

00:06:09.660 You know, the whole motivation of this, Jason, was that by every objective measure, you know my view and those of many and hopefully an increasing number of Albertans, is that it makes sense for us to change our constitutional relationship with Ottawa.

00:06:29.380 it makes sense for Alberta to become independent and follow the legal pathway and everybody's

00:06:35.340 running into this mental barrier understandably well how like not the first how was well is there

00:06:41.000 a legal pathway you know yes there is Supreme Court of Canada we could all say it right it's

00:06:45.680 amazing the knowledge level that's come forward again an echo now or is it just a minor

00:06:53.200 keep going okay thank you so but the other question became more technically of how right

00:07:02.280 well okay so we know we have a legal pathway but let's say albertans actually do vote to use that

00:07:08.120 legal pathway clear majority vote in a referendum on a clear question for independence what then

00:07:14.820 how does it work from there so the more i looked at it and the more i talked to people like dennis

00:07:21.340 and other experts in various subfields it was clear to us that it can be done there is a pathway

00:07:28.460 it's realistic it's achievable and we're like all right but we need to lay that out for people

00:07:34.500 and at times it's going to be painfully boring it's going to feel i i knew that when we wrote this

00:07:42.400 that at times it will feel for people like they're reading the terms and condition on their apple's

00:07:49.140 iTunes license. Oh my God, make this end, please. But it's dry stuff in places. In other places,

00:08:01.060 I think it's kind of interesting how we can deal with monetary policy and how we can provide so

00:08:09.700 much choice to First Nations. So that's what this was all about. Well, the quick question I'd like

00:08:17.860 to kind of put on the table for you keith is what is this not this is not a draft constitution

00:08:22.680 correct and this is not an authoritative document meaning this is how it's going to be

00:08:27.740 this is to start a conversation do i have that correct sorry i got too many comms going off here

00:08:33.900 uh one second let me get control of my screens again you're right you know what is this and

00:08:39.660 what is it not? There we go. So I don't think it's, you know, this is not, and we also knew

00:08:50.620 we were going to have a problem where people are like, have a strong view on how Veterans Affairs

00:08:56.200 can be, needs to be badly reformed. And I agree with that. But this wasn't the place for that.

00:09:03.840 It wasn't the place for us to do those sorts of things.

00:09:07.880 People have varying views on how we can improve the immigration system and what an ideal immigration system would look like in an independent Alberta.

00:09:18.000 People have views on how to reform our justice system and move it back to where Lady Justice has a blindfold on instead of a two-tier justice system.

00:09:26.600 And I could keep going.

00:09:27.540 But our view was, no, that's the job of the government in the new country of Alberta working with the people of Alberta in a democratic process.

00:09:37.400 This plan is the transition as to how Alberta moves from a province to a country.

00:09:46.020 And then once it's a country, we set out processes, particularly for constitutional development, so that the people of Alberta with their government of the new country of Alberta can work on developing the new constitution and work on improving veterans affairs and work on an improved immigration system and so on.

00:10:06.800 So this is not a document where we purport to have that democratic authority to make those types of decisions.

00:10:16.520 I'd like to maybe, I'd like to maybe ask about this because I read over the document.

00:10:20.480 I read the first about 40 pages in their entirety.

00:10:23.620 And then you get into a lot of information.

00:10:26.100 You're talking about constitution and indigenous and money and all of these things.

00:10:30.300 But something I got out of this, maybe I can ask Dennis about this and Keith, if you want to expand on it.

00:10:35.600 there were a couple of words that popped up that really stuck in my head, a guiding principle. And

00:10:40.980 it said, continuity first, change only what needs to change, build what Alberta does not already

00:10:46.960 have, leave long-term policy choices to Albertans after the transition is secure. And there were

00:10:52.780 two words that I really liked, and it was deliberate normality. And maybe you can tell

00:10:58.100 us what that's about, because it seems like you're trying to say to people, a lot of what we do here

00:11:02.360 in Alberta will be done in the new country that we have in the future. We don't really have to,

00:11:06.660 you know, reinvent the wheel here. The core element is continuity and keep it as simple

00:11:15.440 as possible. We know we don't have the authority to set things up for the long-term policy changes

00:11:21.720 might happen. So I think we're more like scaffolding to keep the country operating

00:11:25.720 with at least the smallest amount of disruption possible, the smallest number of changes possible

00:11:32.340 and certainly not adjusting policies long term, except in those very small number of cases where

00:11:39.200 we have to do some tweaks to make it all work. So the goal, of course, is that when Albertans wake

00:11:44.020 up on the first morning of an independent country, everything works the same. Your bank account is

00:11:49.500 still there. You're still paying your mortgage. If you want to get on your flight and go to Hawaii,

00:11:54.300 that still works the same. Everything's exactly the same as far as we could possibly make it.

00:11:59.480 And the idea is, of course, no one wants to drive the population of the people of Alberta into a situation where everything's new, everything's changing, no one has to do anything, knows how to do anything anymore, and we just want to say keep it normal.

00:12:12.660 And that's the thing we're driving for, and that's the thing we would suggest to the government of Alberta that they pursue during their transition.

00:12:21.060 so the plan is to hand this over during the transition plan like during the transition

00:12:27.620 stage or maybe before then so that the government itself alberta government has access to this and

00:12:33.400 maybe look at it uh dennis i think that's certainly something we think is a good idea

00:12:39.080 but the guts of it they are the only elected authority they are the only ones that have a

00:12:44.300 mandate to operate the the country of alberta and the province of alberta before that so the

00:12:49.040 core of it is we're going to suggest we're going to get a lot of expertise built in those documents

00:12:54.460 and the people that wrote them that we think this is useful for you guys to think through

00:12:59.940 approaches and we'd like to work with them on that and I think it's a wise thing for them to do.

00:13:06.840 Okay and Keith we kind of look at this as an authoritative thing because it's not it's a

00:13:12.040 proposal it's a plan that other people can look at that maybe the authority in the future can look at

00:13:17.320 This is why you highlighted there's things aren't being fixed.

00:13:20.100 And there's a lot of people that are concerned about that.

00:13:21.840 So as they're reading through this and they have ideas of what could be improved

00:13:25.640 on like veterans affairs, this is something that should come at a different stage.

00:13:28.920 Yes.

00:13:30.320 Yeah.

00:13:30.660 And remember that the core.

00:13:34.660 So at the risk of people thinking there's a contradiction, I want to show

00:13:38.940 there's not what's wrong with Alberta's place in Canada.

00:13:45.160 is not that an aspect of the Calgary and international airports is regulated by the

00:13:52.940 federal government. That's not what motivates me for independence. What's wrong with Canada and

00:13:58.740 our place in it is that the big decisions that affect our lives, our budgets, our future,

00:14:05.040 our children's future are made by officials that we can never elect, that will always be made by

00:14:13.180 politicians elected by Ontario and Quebec. And that immediately creates a risk that the lower

00:14:21.500 population areas will be exploited and treated as colonies and taken advantage of. And that's

00:14:26.000 exactly what's happened. So the fundamental change with independence is changing the constitutional

00:14:32.760 order so that the politicians who make the decisions that affect our lives are elected

00:14:38.600 by Albertans and accountable to Albertans. And so we don't, you know, independence doesn't mean

00:14:48.500 cancelling out every single function of the federal government. And then from a practical

00:14:53.980 point of view, it's fascinating watching these reports come out. The one yesterday from the

00:15:02.080 Canada West Foundation or the Canada West Group, I don't know if you saw that, Gary Mars Group.

00:15:07.740 and it's really a collection of essays op-ed pieces but one of the fellows wrote that

00:15:15.020 alberta would would not be able to maintain its economy and grow its economy uh if it became

00:15:20.540 independent because this guy assumed that all the workers that come here from other provinces

00:15:26.860 will will be forced to leave and we won't let any workers in like what a preposterous notion

00:15:33.740 of course an independent alberta is going to want to have people from the maritimes come here like 1.00

00:15:39.340 they do now and work on in construction and other industries and be able to go back home

00:15:45.260 you know come work here for four months and go back home and support their family

00:15:48.860 why would we want to change that so there's all this doom and gloom assumption that everything

00:15:55.500 will come to a stop whereas that's not the case at all the people who work at the border crossing at

00:16:01.900 coots probably live close to coots and have a family and their kids are probably in hockey

00:16:08.860 right they want to keep their job and we want them to keep their job too the only thing that

00:16:14.540 will change is their boss their boss's boss won't be in ottawa he'll be in edmonton

00:16:23.580 go ahead jason okay okay i got it so actually we were talking about that canada west foundation

00:16:28.300 report um you know a couple of months ago they said it was going to cost 400 billion dollars

00:16:32.480 it's down to 200 now jason was joking this morning if we just wait a little bit longer

00:16:36.200 they're going to owe us some money here because it keeps going down but but my question is this

00:16:41.620 i did i did read through this document and there aren't a lot of numbers in here i mean it is very

00:16:46.120 complex and certainly all the numbers and how much money is involved here i think i remember

00:16:51.320 reading the other night that that might be integrated into this in the future dennis you've

00:16:55.800 you've done, you know, a report on how much money this is going to cost and things like that.

00:17:00.840 Do you plan on kind of integrating that into this or is that something we'll wait until after

00:17:06.680 independence? The transition plan was always built with an associated budget. And so that

00:17:16.360 is fully integrated now. And because of course, it's critical, people got to know what it's going

00:17:21.400 the cost than to operate. I would also point out again that many of our adversaries or people

00:17:27.260 who disagree with us frequently conflate things like one-time costs, increased operating costs

00:17:34.760 for functions currently done by Canada, and of course disbursements to citizens. That's how they

00:17:39.980 get these outlandish numbers of 400 billion a year or something like that. So we have kept that

00:17:45.800 strictly separate so when when the budget comes out and it will and it will be associated with

00:17:52.840 the white papers very clearly it'll show what's the one time cost to stand up the function how

00:18:00.120 many more people and costs do you need to operate it and of course what are the disbursements which

00:18:05.000 are intended in terms of continuity to continue as they are today the money you get from canada

00:18:11.000 pension the money you get from oas the money you get for ei the money you get for h all those

00:18:16.520 social supports will be as they are today and the amounts they are today and that's the intention now

00:18:23.640 we are very very careful with our numbers and you can imagine why because obviously we have

00:18:30.600 some different points of view from our people disagree with us we want to make sure our numbers

00:18:35.880 are correct and valid and that's why we're having them checked and rechecked the other thing i would

00:18:40.840 add is that the load we we put out yesterday the heavy document we think that's enough for people

00:18:48.280 to chew on for a while just the how of these things are being done i mean i've been immersed

00:18:54.520 in it for several months and there's some days i read stuff and go oh yeah dude oh yeah okay that's

00:18:59.480 the way we had that worked out so there's a big load already you don't want to overload folks

00:19:04.520 we'll give them the next shot which is the budgetary aspect fairly soon and then people can

00:19:09.480 integrate it and say oh okay it's nowhere near as bad as our adversaries say it is not even close

00:19:18.200 and then keith as um we're setting some more of this foundation down some of the naysayers say

00:19:24.200 um you're gonna have to completely scrap the entire government and start all over and i think

00:19:28.760 you can address that one and another one is alberta can't do this but as you pointed out recently

00:19:34.040 100 countries since 1905 has stepped up and became a country so uh you want to touch on those two

00:19:39.880 things yeah let's say you know it's the reality is is that the geopolitical boundaries of the

00:19:46.360 globe are in constant flux and uh since alberta's been a province over 100 new countries have come

00:19:53.000 into existence so uh everybody needs to be clear in their mind that this is this is the normal

00:19:59.480 a normal evolution um and you know was fascinating for me with the people that i

00:20:06.920 have been honored to work with on this project a lot of them senior executives senior either

00:20:14.840 active executives or retired executives that had been responsible including dennis and his roles

00:20:21.560 in past projects for transitioning existing companies to acquire another company and keep

00:20:28.600 you know literally changing the wheels on the bus as it travels down the highway without the

00:20:34.360 passengers noticing right and so whenever i would try and get vague about something like no no we

00:20:40.840 need to know precisely who's going to do what where when and how right and so the whole idea is

00:20:49.960 you know why as i was mentioning earlier the people the most common question that current

00:20:57.720 federal employees who live and work in Alberta have is, will I keep my job? Well, of course you

00:21:04.540 will. When one company, to use a commercial example, when an oil field service company

00:21:10.180 acquires another company, they acquire it and grow their company. Take two companies and make

00:21:16.940 it into one big company. They acquire it because they want those employees. They want those

00:21:21.900 functions continue. So it'd be absolutely the same here. And what's fascinating is we know these

00:21:29.520 things with precision. What I mean by that is we know exactly for planning purposes, for budgeting

00:21:36.940 purposes, for transitional purposes, we know exactly how many Customs and Border Services

00:21:43.440 employees work at the Calgary International Airport. We know exactly how many office chairs

00:21:50.100 they have we know what their shifts are we know what their benefits packages are in other words

00:21:56.100 we don't i don't know that personally but that information is all knowable so the alberta

00:22:01.860 government can say to the federal government look we will transition your border services

00:22:08.980 employees who currently work at the calgary international airport on to our payroll on

00:22:13.860 x day there we will take over their their um uh their benefits packages we will work with their

00:22:22.980 union too so it's a smooth transition so if the if the transition occurs on a wednesday and someone

00:22:30.100 scheduled to work from monday to friday their week will be exactly the same as the previous week

00:22:35.780 right and that's why the whole the whole idea of this report and you'll notice it in the intro in

00:22:41.460 the close is normality we have figured out how you can do this transition without disturbing

00:22:49.780 normal life without disturbing commercial activities without disrupting the economy

00:22:55.860 and that's the critical piece of it was to show that this actually can be done and to get into

00:23:01.060 the weeds as to how and sometimes those weeds and details are a little on the boring side

00:23:06.660 Maybe if I can ask you this, I mean, this might seem like a really basic question, but it was something I was thinking about.

00:23:16.860 This is a transition. So what is day one of independence for people?

00:23:21.480 And the question I was thinking about, who is going to be negotiating on behalf of Alberta when we have to sit down with Canada and Indigenous groups here?

00:23:30.080 And I'm thinking about the current government we have right now, which is Danielle Smith. 0.56

00:23:33.680 We do have an election coming up in October next year, God forbid, and she gets in.

00:23:38.020 But right now, a lot of people in the Alberta independence movement aren't trusting them very much.

00:23:43.160 They're both on the opposite side here.

00:23:45.300 So who's going to do this negotiating for us?

00:23:47.420 Will it be the government that wins next October?

00:23:51.360 Well, there's a couple of different phases, right?

00:23:53.420 And that's what we also identify in the report and tried to have some graphics to help make it more digestible, which is, and let's just sit here and sort of look down the road.

00:24:02.320 so we know in about six weeks now we're going to thank you in six weeks we're going to have

00:24:10.480 the uh the vote on october 19th and let's assume for argument's sake as this analysis does because

00:24:17.580 it had to that there's a majority that vote in favor of option two so that's when phase one

00:24:24.120 begins phase one begins with a successful vote on the 19th which gives the alberta government

00:24:29.120 the mandate to now call a formal standalone up-down vote on independence in the spring of

00:24:37.880 2027. The most logical time frame to hold that vote is the spring of 2027. If you do the math,

00:24:46.320 if you look at all the permutations, that's the most logical time to hold it. So that means by

00:24:51.900 the end of October, because this is all now knowable, the Alberta government should strike

00:24:56.740 a task force, probably with some MLAs and the various experts and senior government officials

00:25:03.180 to begin working on what a transition to independence would look like in case in the

00:25:12.820 spring of 2027, that standalone referendum, a clear majority vote for independence. Now,

00:25:18.900 you shouldn't be waiting. You should be getting ready. Arguably, the government should have

00:25:23.880 prepared this transition plan already. And that's why we went ahead and did it. Instead of

00:25:27.600 complaining that they weren't, we just did it. So that task force would work between October

00:25:33.500 and the spring to finalize and implement and refresh and revise and go into even more detail

00:25:42.840 this transition plan. Because that transition plan becomes the negotiating position

00:25:47.740 of the federal government. Because remember, if in the spring of

00:25:51.620 2027, a clear majority vote on a clear question, that

00:25:55.740 creates a positive legal duty for good faith negotiations

00:25:59.720 to commence in the spring of next year between

00:26:03.620 the federal government and the federal

00:26:07.640 government, the provinces, and First Nations. So

00:26:11.500 because we have all that lead time,

00:26:15.560 Over the next six months, the government of Alberta can now formulate its negotiating position. Here's what we're prepared to pay for the various asset. Here's how much you owe us back because of the $300 billion we've sent in equalization payments that we never got benefit for.

00:26:36.220 here's here's the details of how we would propose to transition all of your employees

00:26:42.580 um here's a proposed um uh trade and mobility agreement with the rest of the country

00:26:50.440 you know have get all get their ducks in a row so they can go into those negotiations promptly

00:26:56.140 right after the vote if the vote is up and go into intensive negotiation similarly the federal

00:27:04.820 government in the provinces will also know after october 19th that this is coming so they can get

00:27:10.820 ready um and what this proposes is an 100-day intensive negotiation period after everybody's

00:27:18.580 had at least seven months to get ready um and then we go into the mandatory provident provincial

00:27:27.620 election in october so it proposes and that those election campaigns uh the last five elections in

00:27:34.420 alberta are 28 days the 28 day writ period um so that would put us to september of next year

00:27:41.860 so um september october of 2027 is when the campaigning will go whichever government is

00:27:50.500 in power after that election would complete the negotiations and complete the implementation

00:27:56.900 uh to transition day which is the day of independent and that's going to be in the

00:28:00.980 the hands of the people of alberta the voters okay if i could just follow with this up uh jason just

00:28:06.600 with a question because you know you brought up you brought up a clear question uh we talk about

00:28:11.200 a a clear question uh we talk about a clear majority here are you concerned about this

00:28:16.680 because it's something i'm still concerned about and whether it's in the transition plan or not

00:28:20.120 we're getting caught up in some kind of a constitutional battle over this and who decides

00:28:24.160 on this i know keith you've brought to the attention of a lot of people the clarity act

00:28:28.020 isn't really what we should go by i think it was 1998 there was a supreme court decision here maybe

00:28:33.140 you could uh address that yeah there's a brief discussion of it in the transition plan uh in two

00:28:40.100 places and you know we need to be mindful of quebec's approach uh the day after the clarity

00:28:47.300 act was brought in in 2000 the quick government is like what's this you know the fed the supreme

00:28:52.980 court of canada in 1998 lays out this roadway this map right and then in 2000 the federal government

00:29:01.140 comes in and says well let's put a big barricade here and let's put a gate over here and let's put

00:29:06.420 a drawbridge here and the quebec government said you can't do that so for example the federal

00:29:12.500 government says and carney recently repeated it uh that under the clarity act before we hold our

00:29:19.300 spring vote on independence that the parliament's going to have to approve that no they're not

00:29:26.500 they have no constitutional authority to do that they've got as much authority to do that as the

00:29:31.380 boy scouts of canada saying they get to approve it okay because the supreme court of canada did

00:29:36.900 not say that they did not say a province can secede and become independent as a clear question

00:29:43.460 a clear clear majority on a clear question and the question is first approved by parliament

00:29:47.300 They didn't say those words. They didn't say anything about, oh, it would entitle the Government of Canada to review citizenship. That's absolute fear-mongering politics. In any event, the Quebec government passed the day after the Clarity Act came in in the year 2000, Bill 99, that said, Ottawa, stay in your lane, stop the overreach.

00:30:11.240 you don't get to decide whether it's a clear question you don't get to decide whether it's

00:30:17.620 a clear majority we're following the supreme court of canada decision we're ignoring your

00:30:22.420 clarity act it's unconstitutional have a nice day so i really think it would be appropriate

00:30:28.660 for the alberta government the smith government to take the same approach i mean we have our

00:30:34.460 sovereignty within canada act which danielle smith brought in as a piece of flagship legislation

00:30:40.420 to lay down markers whenever the federal government

00:30:44.260 was intruding into provincial jurisdiction.

00:30:47.000 And the Quebec government and even the Quebec MPs

00:30:49.660 have been absolutely clear.

00:30:51.020 Even recently, when Carnies mused about,

00:30:53.800 oh, well, Parliament will do this, Parliament will do that.

00:30:55.320 They come right out and defended Alberta, Albertans,

00:30:58.480 and said, don't listen to this guy.

00:31:00.120 That's authoritarian overreach is how they described it.

00:31:03.100 So I'm not concerned about that that much

00:31:07.680 Because if the federal government refuses to negotiate on an unconstitutional basis, that would be bad faith bargaining.

00:31:18.020 And the Supreme Court of Canada was clear that the parties must engage in good faith negotiations.

00:31:25.040 And the Supreme Court of Canada was also clear about what happens if they don't.

00:31:29.260 And if the federal government chooses to engage in bad faith and not follow the constitutional framework, that would create an opportunity for Alberta to do a unilateral declaration of independence, seeking international recognition.

00:31:44.340 Okay, thank you.

00:31:45.680 Now, there are some people who are saying, you know, Canada's never done anything like this before.

00:31:51.340 We don't know what to do.

00:31:52.360 What's going to happen with the courts?

00:31:54.340 And here's one of the pages that you address this.

00:31:56.480 What do laws and courts still work?

00:31:58.760 But let's remind everybody that in 1982, Canada transitioned to a new constitution, which also changed how the judicial system worked.

00:32:07.600 There was grandfathering, there was a transition period, and Canada just continued on.

00:32:12.100 So we have gone through something like this, especially when it comes to the courts, when the Canadian constitution itself was brought into power and into effect.

00:32:19.340 uh short memories maybe maybe some people don't remember that but there was no stop light still

00:32:24.520 worked and you know tickets still were issued and court matters still continued but how it

00:32:30.280 fundamentally worked did transition and there was a grandfathering at that point uh keith want to

00:32:35.040 address that oh let me uh give you the power to talk yeah you remember the year 2000 flip over

00:32:44.140 and they had the military on standby and we all thought like we're all standing out in yards and

00:32:50.060 neighborhood watch parties at midnight like the a meteor is going to come from the sky and

00:32:56.300 nothing happened the light didn't even flicker balance was still there it would be the same thing

00:33:04.220 you know this is all the those who are saying you should vote for option one

00:33:11.980 those who are saying Alberta should stay in Canada

00:33:15.340 offer no solution

00:33:17.640 they offer no pathway

00:33:19.420 they admit the grievances are real

00:33:21.640 they acknowledge that we disproportionately pay

00:33:24.380 they acknowledge the democratic deficit

00:33:26.640 that we have no say

00:33:27.820 they acknowledge all of these things

00:33:30.160 and they offer no plan

00:33:32.020 to how to have fairness for Alberta

00:33:35.000 within confederation

00:33:36.300 and they resort to fear mongering

00:33:38.780 and uncertainty

00:33:39.500 that's all they've got

00:33:41.100 Right. And you're seeing now they're basically saying a vote for option two is a vote for Donald Trump. It's like, what? You know, so they got nothing. And all they have is fear and uncertainty. And part of the purpose of this plan is to allow someone who has a very specific question.

00:34:02.860 What happens to my pension? You know, I'm on social assistant. What happens to my social assistant? I'm a startup pharmaceutical company, and I'm currently going to be applying to have my new drug approved. Right now, Ottawa does that. How is that going to work in Alberta if Alberta goes towards independence?

00:34:26.960 it addresses all of those types of questions to remove the uncertainty, to allow people to focus

00:34:33.760 on the bigger question, which is, does it make sense? What makes more sense? To continue to be

00:34:40.420 in a confederation where we have no say, we're exploited, our voice doesn't matter, or to

00:34:46.260 redefine our relationship with the rest of the country, where we elect our officials here and

00:34:51.860 hold them accountable here i was wondering dennis if i could ask you this you know i've got i printed

00:34:57.080 off about the first four pages i've got the index here and um i was wondering what what the most

00:35:02.800 difficult part of this was you have to know that there's people on the other side they've downloaded

00:35:07.080 this they're going over this with a fine tooth comb right now they've got a magnifying glass to

00:35:12.140 try to pick you know pick uh problems in it uh if you look at the index you've got a number of

00:35:18.380 different things, and I have kind of edited this a bit, a transition framework, constitutional

00:35:22.800 implementation. You talk about money, you talk about rights, social programs, the Indigenous,

00:35:27.800 economy, resources, security, external relations, transition implementation. Was there any part of

00:35:33.740 this that was the most challenging for you that you had to go back on and say, we have to get

00:35:38.080 this right? Actually, the biggest challenge we had through the development of the papers

00:35:44.500 papers was actually integration. So for example, many groups, many of those areas need to have

00:35:54.660 discussions with the Americans, let's say. You don't want to have 10 different groups

00:35:58.940 approaching the Americans with different agendas and different timelines. So a lot of the work was

00:36:04.780 always trying to synchronize across all the papers and see where, what fit, what sequence did they

00:36:12.000 need to occur in which were critical path items have to be done early and trying to make sure

00:36:17.600 that they all aligned i mean there was some challenge in many of the individual papers

00:36:22.560 where you think through for example on on the taxation and revenue collection side

00:36:27.680 well how would we do this would we in fact replicate the federal tax calculation

00:36:34.400 and it keep that structure during transition or would we take the simpler approach which was no

00:36:40.240 no no we'll just use the existing provincial engine it's simpler we'll set the rate accordingly

00:36:47.200 to what we need and we just use what we have today so there's challenges of both those types

00:36:52.240 but for me integration was the biggest challenge the other thing throughout and now very visible

00:36:59.360 to us is the need for records we need good information about people what they get much

00:37:05.600 of that information is already in our hands we have to focus on that very early in the game to

00:37:10.560 make sure that in fact we know this person deserves this particular social benefit this one gets a

00:37:17.200 different one whatever the case might be so those kinds of things are what cause the challenge and

00:37:22.000 of course you're dealing with 40 plus people they all have day jobs they all are working hard they

00:37:28.320 have different ideas a lot of people struggle with the idea for only dealing with transitional terms

00:37:34.080 And that is from the time we win the referendum until a new government sits.

00:37:39.320 And we're not going out and buying F-35s on day one because we need a military.

00:37:44.720 So package that together.

00:37:46.380 That's been some of the challenges.

00:37:48.140 Okay.

00:37:48.520 Thank you.

00:37:50.020 Now, Dennis, your background is you walk into businesses that are messed up.

00:37:54.580 So if you show up at a business, there's probably a problem that needs to be addressed.

00:37:58.680 And did you leverage some of those skills?

00:38:01.040 And what do you think about the current setup and systems in place as you're going through this, you know, probably with a fine-tooth comb for the first time?

00:38:11.700 It's actually a really good question because I looked in horror at some of the ways we do things today.

00:38:19.480 And I sort of had to bite my lip a few times and say, you know, I'd love to redesign this and improve it, streamline it.

00:38:26.400 But that's not the purpose of transition.

00:38:28.520 The purpose of transition is to keep us running, keep people getting paid, keep the money flowing, keep the airplanes taking off and all that good stuff.

00:38:38.060 So I think there are great improvements we can make for how we operate in no small part because Alberta is a smaller country.

00:38:47.860 It's going to have simpler needs.

00:38:50.060 It doesn't need the overheads of managing multiple jurisdictions across a vast land.

00:38:55.540 It can focus on what's good for Alberta.

00:38:58.520 so be truthful i would look forward to post the constitution being decided and the new

00:39:05.480 legislation be in place i'd love to get involved with tuning up some of these things

00:39:09.880 simplifying and making them more or at least less costly and keith one of the key points to this

00:39:17.640 planning is it highlights where the conversations with canada are going to need to happen

00:39:21.800 and there's a lot of people saying well they're just going to not cooperate they're not going to

00:39:26.760 negotiate they're just going to retaliate and make things very difficult for you what do you

00:39:31.160 think the odds are because i know you guys kind of broke it down to three scenarios what do you

00:39:35.240 think the odds are that canada is just going to be a really disgruntled unhappy ex in this whole

00:39:40.220 entire situation well i've thought about that a lot and um that could happen for sure but let's

00:39:50.200 let's think about if it does so first of all let's pause and reflect on what's happening around

00:39:56.620 us right at this very moment, which is the Canadian economy is dependent upon its unique

00:40:02.880 position and placement geographically, culturally, and infrastructure-wise to supplying the largest

00:40:10.040 economy in the world. We are absolutely blessed to be where we are, to be beside the economy

00:40:15.680 that every other economy wants access to, right? What's happening? We have a trade war.

00:40:21.840 We have tariffs coming in, retaliatory tariffs on Monday or Tuesday or whatever next week.

00:40:30.040 And what's the pitch from the prime minister and others?

00:40:33.500 We need to buy more Canadian as though we could somehow eat our way out of this.

00:40:38.600 Like, there's no way we'd all be eating steak four times a day if we if Alberta, if Canadians consumed all the beef and cattle that are shipped across the border every single day to the United States.

00:40:51.140 We have this massive herd for a massive supplier.

00:40:54.460 Anyway, the fact of the matter is that there are portions of other economies, the rest of Canada, that are dependent upon selling goods and services to Alberta.

00:41:06.860 Alberta is an incredibly large purchaser of goods and services from the rest of Canada, particularly Ontario.

00:41:15.240 So if Ontario says, yeah, we're not going to negotiate with you,

00:41:19.440 we're not going to those meetings, it's like, well, you want to keep,

00:41:23.780 you can't sell to the U.S. right now or your sales to the U.S. are plummeting.

00:41:27.820 You want to maintain your sales to us and presumably increase them,

00:41:32.320 but you don't want to have a discussion with us?

00:41:34.680 Really?

00:41:35.480 Okay.

00:41:36.140 Oh, and by the way, hey, have you heard of Line 9 and Line 5?

00:41:41.160 Could we talk about that for just a minute?

00:41:42.700 but just a minute right now you can see how concerned that ford premier ford is because

00:41:50.040 remarkably until recently he didn't understand that their energy products that go and just

00:41:57.080 understand how important this is it's not just that they get oil they get oil refined products

00:42:03.100 propane natural gas because they can put different plugs or segments in a pipeline it's not just one

00:42:10.900 thing forever. They can fill it and then they switch it over with a new product. So that goes

00:42:16.160 to their refineries and their petrochemical facilities that make plastics and all kinds

00:42:20.560 of other products. It gets turned into jet fuel that goes to Pearson Airport and airports in

00:42:25.260 Quebec. All of those diesel trucks that run car parts and manufacturers good to the United States,

00:42:33.240 all of the commuter traffic, their buses, everything, their economy comes to a reaching

00:42:39.200 halt if Alberta were to exercise the full might of its economic power same with British Columbia

00:42:47.680 and British Columbia has a more serious problem they're continentally landlocked British Columbia

00:42:54.080 is continentally landlocked a huge portion of their economy 80 percent of the the containers

00:43:01.120 that are unloaded at Prince Rupert in the port of Vancouver that come from from Asia manufacturers

00:43:07.760 those containers we see on trains and trucks all the time the 80 of them travel eastward through

00:43:13.760 alberta i could keep going the economic dependence they have for their goods their agricultural

00:43:19.520 products their wines their fruits their pulp paper mines minerals and other products that

00:43:24.240 have to flow to eastern market in other words we are in an incredibly strong leveraging position

00:43:31.040 and our opening position is we're going to be fair and reasonable in our dealing

00:43:34.640 and if they choose to be unreasonable they're not in a dominant position here they're not in a

00:43:42.040 position of power they're inherently fundamentally structurally weak compared to us and they're

00:43:48.700 ultra vulnerable right now because their economy is extremely dependent upon access to the united

00:43:56.480 states and it's not resource-based central canada it's manufacturing based and the american

00:44:02.620 administration, even under Democrats, it's not just a Trump issue, have always wanted more

00:44:09.260 manufacturing to return to the United States, whereas they cannot physically move our potash,

00:44:15.160 our oil and gas, our forestry products, our cattle, etc. Alberta's relationship is fundamentally

00:44:22.360 different. They do need us, and we're in a position of strength. So I assume that there

00:44:28.780 might be bad faith negotiations. I assume there'll be political rhetoric, but the fact of the matter

00:44:34.860 is Alberta is incredibly strong economically, and we're prepared to approach those provinces

00:44:42.160 and the rest of Canada with fairness, and we have leverage if they choose not to.

00:44:47.780 And we do a majority of our trading with the United States anyway, if I remember correctly,

00:44:52.280 more than the rest of the country.

00:44:55.720 There's a graph in the report that shows our trade with the United States,

00:45:02.380 and then the most important next one is the rest of Canada.

00:45:10.240 And just as a footnote here, years ago, I worked for some ag industries,

00:45:16.060 ag commodity groups that were trying to branch out beyond the United States

00:45:20.660 and other markets and move into europe and central america and south america and asia

00:45:26.180 and a lot of these markets or a lot of these commodities and things we produce here in canada

00:45:31.780 are margin businesses in other words they they don't make 30 40 profit on when they produce

00:45:39.380 something it's three four five six percent and as soon as you add in the cost of shipping that

00:45:46.980 their margin gets razor thin they can't lower their price they there's there's a desire to

00:45:52.980 lower their price so that the new market they're in buys their product because they're a competitive

00:45:58.500 price in the market they're going into in other words this notion where carney talks every day

00:46:03.060 oh we're just going to start selling into these other places is absolute fairy tale stuff you know

00:46:08.980 it may work in certain sectors but it's decades away if it even does work or years at a minimum

00:46:14.800 The reality is markets are local, geography matters, we're beside the largest economy

00:46:22.240 in the world, we're blessed to be there, we're in a unique position, and all of these global

00:46:30.000 events and geopolitical events in Canada and in North America and in the world, as each

00:46:36.140 day goes by, Alberta's position doesn't get weaker for negotiation on independence, it

00:46:41.360 gets stronger.

00:46:42.840 Maybe if I can just jump here, Jason, I want to ask Dennis something, because I've had a personal discussion with Dennis about this.

00:46:48.240 And, you know, if you do look at this document, it deals with a lot of things.

00:46:51.200 You're dealing with the federal government. You're dealing with the provincial government.

00:46:54.660 You're dealing with indigenous groups. You're dealing with banks. You're dealing with all of these layers.

00:46:59.680 But there is a layer in there I like to discuss and see if it comes up in the transition.

00:47:03.820 It's all these people that right now are watching us on this live stream. It's the people out there.

00:47:08.720 Does this document take into account what people should be planning to do, what kind of transition they should think about moving forward?

00:47:17.300 What should Albertans do to prepare themselves for this transition when it comes to things like banks and investments and concerns like that?

00:47:26.160 Well, our intention is as little as necessary, as little as possible.

00:47:32.080 We don't envision any, I mean, I think banking and mortgages and that kind of thing important to most people.

00:47:37.680 yeah yeah the canadian banks want to keep on doing business we'd like to maintain the canadian

00:47:43.300 dollar uh the branch your tv branch down the road will still be there yeah there may be some

00:47:48.840 legislation and some contracting to do with them to work under the new system that's a little longer

00:47:54.980 term so most of those things just operate fine you go to the airport for your vacation well

00:48:00.680 it's still nav canada which is a private corporation that we would contract to maintain

00:48:06.220 the air traffic control as they do today so you wouldn't notice a difference the CBSA people that

00:48:12.400 are there as Keith mentioned they in fact are probably going to be the same people doing much

00:48:18.020 the same stuff in much the same way and so again there's no changes so there is some things that

00:48:25.240 people have to pay attention to is we will ultimately be a separate country there will be

00:48:31.740 border probably not a hard one we're not building walls but it is a different country there are

00:48:36.620 relationships to be established and i could imagine that we need to make an arrangement with

00:48:41.900 canada on what that transit looks like the kind of things we think of is things more like the

00:48:47.580 canadian border as it used to be where yeah you had to show some id but effectively you drove across

00:48:54.220 the border and went down to great falls wherever you go and come back the other way so we're there

00:48:59.660 will be some changes but we're not envisioning and planning or wanting any of the changes to be

00:49:06.380 material or difficult or problematic we want them to be simple and that was the thinking

00:49:12.300 through the entire plan that's the thinking we think needs to continue and that's the way i

00:49:17.260 think it is more than possible to be thank you uh keith you actually brought up something interesting

00:49:24.620 I didn't consider until just now.

00:49:26.840 If you pay close attention to what Carney's up to recently,

00:49:30.480 it's to transition the Canadian economy away from the U.S.

00:49:34.060 over to Europe and China,

00:49:35.780 and he's actually trying to sell all Canadians that,

00:49:38.120 hey, we can do this.

00:49:38.920 We can create new trade agreements

00:49:40.600 and really move from one market to another.

00:49:43.300 What a perfect time for Alberta to go ahead

00:49:44.980 and go down the same path on its own

00:49:46.460 if Canada's already looking at that transition

00:49:49.540 to other economies and markets.

00:49:51.960 yeah i mean well it just shows everything's in flux nothing's forever um but this idea that

00:50:00.840 you can the european market man they have so much red tape you know why did brexit occur 0.60

00:50:07.500 because they were so sick of the bureaucrats in brussels and in europe imposing these ridiculous

00:50:15.340 requirements on all of their import products right uh it's a tough market to get into they're

00:50:21.320 highly protectionist they will look to some unique production method we use here in agriculture that

00:50:29.100 they don't use in europe and they'll say oh well no you're not allowed to use if your product has

00:50:33.540 this this chemical or this pesticide or whatever it's not allowed in right so then we've got to

00:50:39.060 retool on our end it's it's not easy they're not it's like sure displace our current manufacturing

00:50:46.160 jobs and our production people yeah put our people out of work canada we love you so much

00:50:50.240 we want more of your stuff. That is just, it's so naive. But back to that question that Dennis

00:50:56.340 just answered, the whole, one of the things for anybody who's courageous enough to read through

00:51:02.700 the whole report will come to the conclusion that one of the repetitive messages is that

00:51:10.520 the actual day of independence. So remember, the first phase is referendum on October 19th

00:51:18.580 to the big referendum in the spring and that's a get ready period for the government

00:51:23.380 if the referendum goes ahead and albertas choose independence and then it's negotiate and get

00:51:30.640 ready to implement that's phase two and the actual day of independence when the uniforms

00:51:37.240 change when the flag changes up from the border guard at the calgary airport or the edmonton

00:51:42.520 airport from a Canadian flag to an Alberta flag is should be determined by the date upon which

00:51:49.300 everything's in place and ready for this transition to occur smoothly okay so that's why we say

00:51:56.500 you won't notice the difference and for example to use banking right now the five chartered main

00:52:05.340 banks um they currently provide banking services across international borders in different countries

00:52:13.660 the major banks provide banking services to americans in the united states to many uh

00:52:20.700 residents and citizens of the caribbean island so they're perfectly conversant on providing

00:52:27.260 banking services under their same brand their same logos in different countries they know how

00:52:33.660 to do it now some of these naysayers will say well all the banks are going to leave alberta

00:52:40.060 excuse me according to the bank of canada's statistic the five chartered banks currently

00:52:46.620 have the most current data is 253 billion dollars of deposits held by albertans and alberta businesses

00:52:56.300 in their those banks accounts that's critical business for these banks they are absolutely

00:53:03.660 going to want to stay here and provide banking services the only thing that will change for rbc

00:53:09.820 td and so on is who regulates them right now they're regulated by regulators in ottawa there

00:53:18.140 will be a transition agreement where that regulation will move to a regulator based in

00:53:24.380 alberta the other thing they do is there's the deposit securities corporation or system where

00:53:30.940 your deposits are guaranteed up to a limit that's a federal institution but we have expertise in

00:53:37.340 those areas already in alberta we have alberta treasury branch we have credit unions we have

00:53:42.220 financial services providers here we have a regulator that regulates them here and we have

00:53:48.060 deposit insurance um your deposits actually your money's more secure right now in a credit union

00:53:56.140 than it is in the federal banking system the federal banking system has limits as to how much

00:54:01.020 they'll guarantee of your savings and your investment the uh the alberta one is unlimited

00:54:06.540 it's far safer so we have expertise in these areas so what would happen is you would probably get an

00:54:13.260 email prior to transition from your bank. You know how occasionally you'll get in the mail or

00:54:19.740 an email from your bank or Visa or MasterCard saying, we've updated our terms of service,

00:54:24.340 here they are. And they may even make you click on an acknowledged receipt and therefore you've

00:54:29.300 agreed to everything. And of course, all of us slowly read through pages and pages of small

00:54:33.460 font. No, we don't. My point is, is you'd probably get an email advising you that the contract you

00:54:39.560 have with the bank there's a new contract that will be replacing it on x day the independence

00:54:45.200 day and it'll just basically sub out all the words for ottawa and federal government and put edmonton

00:54:51.080 and alberta in place and that's all it will be so you might get an email everything else will carry

00:54:56.420 on uh it's all detailed in the transition plan you know you're reading reading the document right at

00:55:02.160 the top here you've got part one transition framework and constitutional implementation

00:55:06.360 I did get a question. I wanted to ask you this, and it's been something that's been discussed quite a bit. I know that Jason has been out on the road talking about this issue.

00:55:14.380 Dennis has been there as part of this, but unacceptable CEPI wanted to know with a successful vote, how soon could we see a transition to a non-Westminster system?

00:55:24.120 And has anyone considered the system that would be best? And how long would that take, say, after day one of independence here? Dennis, if you could answer that.

00:55:31.820 yeah the first first of all there's no intent in the transition plan to make that selection

00:55:43.100 that is for the people of alberta right right what we are setting up is a process whereby that

00:55:49.740 uh decision is taken again by the people of alberta the process we're envisioning is

00:55:57.260 basically have citizens largely but also government legal profession experts and so forth be involved

00:56:05.500 that they would walk through after being properly trained so they understand the law and what

00:56:11.340 constitutions are and are not to walk through proposed constitutions you've heard the three

00:56:17.180 models by matt rowley and myself and dr party around here's three approaches to walk through

00:56:24.380 that group would walk through and debate decide and vote and ultimately that would be put to the

00:56:32.300 people of Alberta for ratification. We do see that being time boxed at about 12 months

00:56:40.380 probably starting off I'd say six months after the referendum vote because we have to have

00:56:45.900 the negotiations with Canada at least structurally more or less in place and it's not necessary for

00:56:55.020 Independence Day. That's why we have the transition plan. That's why we have

00:56:59.420 transitional operations. It's an interim government that covers that period of time

00:57:04.380 until such time as the constitution is decided and ratified and that new government is finally

00:57:10.780 sitting and taking control. Each of the transition functions continue on until they're turned off

00:57:17.340 by that new government so that interim structure continues the constitution whatever selected goes

00:57:26.040 in place we have elections against it and ultimately that government takes control

00:57:30.420 okay and there's a couple of people asking where can you get this so you can go to the

00:57:38.620 albertatransitioncouncil.com the pdf is available there for a free download so you can grab that as

00:57:44.800 well and keith i'm going to throw this question to you maybe dennis can tack on at the end there's

00:57:49.620 some people out there that are saying things like well you guys are just positioning this to be a

00:57:53.580 painless it's going to be super easy there's going to be no headaches no problems i'm not seeing that

00:57:57.900 when i read it uh you're actually highlighting a lot of concerns places for negotiations and things

00:58:02.740 that need to be addressed you want to kind of touch on that if anybody's saying that you guys

00:58:06.120 are positioned this to be a painless transition well i actually do believe that if you do the

00:58:13.760 proper planning um you know when you will have in your life been receiving services from a company

00:58:23.120 um and then that company got bought by another company and you didn't notice all that noticed

00:58:31.840 was the logo i was used to be with elta gas you know that's maybe not the best example because

00:58:36.820 it was someone else but and it changed its name to apex but that's the whole idea you know that's

00:58:42.120 why it was tremendously challenging for me to deal with real world business people who have actually

00:58:47.940 done this, where their customers could not be disrupted, where services had to be continued,

00:58:54.680 where refineries had to continue to operate the day before and the day after. If you do the proper

00:59:00.420 planning here, you can actually make this relatively painless. You can anticipate where

00:59:07.500 the frictions will be. And then say, okay, well, how do we solve them? That's the whole idea of

00:59:12.860 planning and preparing. And to the extent there is any cost, the cost of the status quo and the

00:59:21.760 cost of lost opportunity and the cost of the increasing debt, the cost of inflation, the cost

00:59:28.160 of lost investment, the cost of lost freedom is something we need to compare it with as we weigh

00:59:34.320 things as we go forward i'm gonna have to jump guys i've it's because i got a crazy day i've got

00:59:40.720 going live back to back here cbc global ctv non-stop or till one o'clock so i'm gonna have

00:59:49.200 to jump you guys can keep going my apologies for that sorry my paul you guys keep going but

00:59:55.920 my apologies for me having to step out and jump into another interview here okay okay yeah if you

01:00:01.360 If you have to run your run, but just make sure you say, I was just on the Levine show with John Bolton and Jason Levine.

01:00:06.240 Then we're all good, right?

01:00:07.720 Okay.

01:00:08.160 Take care, Keith.

01:00:08.920 Great job.

01:00:09.520 Thanks, Keith.

01:00:11.220 Maybe we'll wrap up here shortly, but I did want you, Keith did bring up the word friction here.

01:00:16.480 And part of the friction we may run into here, Dennis, and it's part of the document as well, is Indigenous people as well.

01:00:24.580 And that is certainly going to be something that's going to be discussed a lot.

01:00:27.720 And I have no doubt that the other side is going to try to use that as something against the plan you've got here.

01:00:33.420 What's in this document to address Indigenous people?

01:00:36.240 We've had a number who have come out in favour of this, saying it's the only way forward for Indigenous people.

01:00:42.820 We've heard as much as almost 50% of Indigenous people in this province are in favour of voting for option two.

01:00:49.700 They'd like to see Alberta become independent.

01:00:52.480 But was that a huge consideration when you're writing this paper?

01:00:57.720 Absolutely. It is one of the critical issues and certainly one of the more difficult ones.

01:01:02.720 Am I being heard? Just want to check?

01:01:07.720 Yeah, you're good. I can hear you.

01:01:09.720 Good. So we laid out the three options. We spelled them out to a fair degree.

01:01:15.720 We did review them with Indigenous people, people who have skill and expertise in this area.

01:01:21.720 They came back and liked the plan. And I'm not going to go through it in the interest of time,

01:01:25.720 of time but the guts of it is they have to decide we have to come to reasonable terms with them

01:01:31.380 they can stay in canada if they wish they can join us if they wish and that is a subject of

01:01:38.800 negotiation and ultimately ratification by first nations so uh it's something that needs to be done

01:01:46.320 it's a critical factor and we will get it done yeah and just to kind of clarify to everybody

01:01:52.020 this is an open document so dennis correct me if i'm wrong but you're open to feedback

01:01:58.580 you do want to hear from people naysayers and all um and this could evolve this document itself

01:02:04.580 could evolve this is version one of a proposal it's not in stone you're not moses on this one right

01:02:13.300 no i mean the the guts of it is i mean the mental image we used is that so let's say we win the

01:02:20.660 referendum or in that preparatory phase that keith mentioned we imagine sitting down with

01:02:26.340 the government officials and other people will be working on this and say guys here's the starter kit

01:02:31.220 here's what we think we've researched a bunch we've costed a bunch let's walk through each of

01:02:36.020 these papers one by one with the relevant teams and work it it's a place to start it's a plausible

01:02:42.580 approach and but it will require working and then the next level of detail i run enough large

01:02:48.500 projects in my life to know that you know no plan survives first contact with the enemy

01:02:54.580 so you go into it saying here's a reasonable approach and you learn and that learning is

01:02:59.940 what will change the plan over time similarly between now and october 19th we are looking

01:03:05.540 for feedback and ideas what did we miss that's why we had 20 plus reviewers go through the papers

01:03:12.180 and say ah what about this what about that so it's been reviewed several times already

01:03:17.140 It'll continue to be reviewed, and ultimately, it'll be the hands of a group that actually has to execute each one of those functions.

01:03:26.460 Sorry, quick, I'll throw it to you, John.

01:03:28.100 That reminds me of a quote from Mike Tyson.

01:03:30.120 Everybody has a plan until they're punched in the face.

01:03:32.520 So we'll see where we go after that.

01:03:34.780 Go ahead, John.

01:03:35.940 Yeah, maybe just a final question for Dennis.

01:03:38.940 I won't keep him much longer.

01:03:39.760 We could go on forever.

01:03:40.780 I mean, it's a long document.

01:03:41.980 It's 214 pages.

01:03:43.240 We could go through it line by line.

01:03:44.960 um and then and i'll let you wrap it up jason and we'll let the debt let dennis have some final

01:03:49.460 thoughts but um you know i was i was talking with keith yesterday i think he was pretty tired i mean

01:03:54.520 this document right up until the last minute before it was released they were still working

01:03:58.860 on it and trying to get it up online so people could download it i think when i talked to you

01:04:03.300 dennis i think you said you were relieved among other adjectives you were using uh because it was

01:04:08.480 such a it was such a long laborious task here are you pleased with this overall are you really

01:04:13.660 pleased with what turned out in this document i i'm really happy uh i mean i i had the document

01:04:21.660 that uh that is published i think is a good public facing version of this it does read sometimes

01:04:29.660 like the fine print on a contract but it is solid and whenever i walk through any of the domains i

01:04:36.300 go yep i can see that working if i were put in charge of this i can see operating it uh the

01:04:42.620 problems that are there none of them are insurmountable uh the costing is reasonable and

01:04:48.620 doable and all these things do make sense to me so for me the ask i would have of people

01:04:54.380 is read it with an open mind uh consider each area do your homework if you need to

01:05:01.020 and then say okay we can in fact go from being a province to an independent nation and not have

01:05:08.460 have an impossible job to get there. It's more than possible. It's more than practical and it's

01:05:15.440 more than doable. Excellent. And as we can see in the comments, so if you're on YouTube or any

01:05:22.080 other platforms, there's a mix of responses here and feedback. There's definitely going to be a

01:05:26.880 group that no matter what you write here, they're just going to dismiss it. There's definitely a

01:05:31.220 group here that's going to promote it and read it and talk about it and make infographics and

01:05:36.000 stuff like that but there's that middle group the undecided group i think this is going to be very

01:05:40.460 valuable to them was this written specifically for that group are you trying to reach out to

01:05:46.120 the people who are undecided don't know how this is going to work and that's what this is for or

01:05:50.600 were you trying to just for all albertans i think the gut that is for all albertans because even

01:05:56.220 strong independent supporters want to you know be satisfied that this is a doable thing so

01:06:01.700 they're just going to be more receptive and go, oh, okay, I get it, I get it, I get it.

01:06:06.180 It's also aimed at those people that disagree with independence, because sometimes the

01:06:11.740 disagreement is, I fear the change. It's an impossible change. My life will be destroyed

01:06:18.900 if this happens. And you want them to hopefully read with an open mind and say, no, no, this is

01:06:25.480 workable. This can be made to work. And for that group in the middle that are perhaps unhappy with

01:06:31.680 canada unhappy with ottawa that are just nervous about this if they read it they'll see that no

01:06:41.280 area is impossible no negotiation is totally undoable everything that needs to be done has

01:06:49.920 been done can be done and done by mere humans so i think all three groups can see it and given that

01:06:57.600 they enter with a bit of an open mind i think they'll see it as a plausible plan all right

01:07:05.760 yeah i just wanted to say uh thanks to dennis to keith for leading this up for being the

01:07:10.000 co-leads of this i i know how long you've been working on it thanks to all the people that have

01:07:14.000 been involved um some of them want to remain anonymous and we know why but we thank them for

01:07:19.040 what they've done here uh i know there's a lot of a lot of long hours in this and late nights put

01:07:24.080 into a document like this just picking it up or just scrolling through it shows you there is a lot

01:07:29.360 of work here and nothing is perfect and um and i'm glad that you know you there's an open mind here

01:07:35.760 things can change in this document but it's good to have this plan people have brought this up with

01:07:39.920 me i need to know what the transition plan is well folks you got it right here so thanks dennis and

01:07:45.840 keith and everybody involved appreciate it and john thank you very much for putting this together

01:07:51.120 talking to Keith and Dennis to get this going.

01:07:53.800 And this is just the beginning.

01:07:55.060 This is one of the first conversations about this.

01:07:57.000 So you can expect a lot more of these conversations.

01:07:59.640 Might even get out on a tour or something,

01:08:01.700 maybe get out to the public to do some Q&A.

01:08:04.040 We'll see where this goes.

01:08:05.060 But this is one of the documents

01:08:06.180 a lot of people were waiting for.

01:08:08.140 And I think it was well done.

01:08:09.900 I know you guys worked really hard on it, Dennis.

01:08:11.800 And Keith, if you're watching this later,

01:08:13.620 get some more rest.

01:08:14.600 I know how much you've been working on this.

01:08:16.780 So John, thanks a lot for putting this together.

01:08:19.060 and to the audience, keep those questions coming.

01:08:21.520 The whole point of this phase of it is to poke holes in it,

01:08:24.600 see where there's challenges, and see how we can address it.

01:08:27.180 And remember, this is a citizen document,

01:08:29.620 which is meant to bring the conversation forward.

01:08:32.420 The government, at some point, when we reach that stage,

01:08:34.820 is going to have to help and consider what the transition looks like,

01:08:38.040 and then we'll see where we go with that.

01:08:39.660 But everybody, have yourself a wonderful day.

01:08:41.140 Thanks for being here today.

01:08:42.140 Share this out.

01:08:42.820 Make sure you like it, and keep the conversation going.

01:08:45.900 God bless you all.

John Bolton - September 04, 2026

Keith Wilson & Dennis Kalma - Alberta Transition Council - Alberta's Path Forward

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