Juno News - Danielle Smith's stand against Ottawa

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show. This is the Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:10.920 Hello and welcome to you all. This is another edition of Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show here on True North.

00:00:19.060 It is Thursday, November 2nd, 2023. Great to have you aboard the program here.

00:00:24.960 As I mentioned yesterday, I'm doing the show this week from London in the United Kingdom, not London, Ontario, or London, Kentucky, or London, Kiribati, none of those inferior Londons.

00:00:37.920 I realize I'm like sliding my own city there, but nevertheless, London, England's kind of a cool place, although it's a bit of a weird place in a bunch of ways.

00:00:47.280 Anyway, going off on a London-related tangent here, but I've been covering this week the ARC Forum, which took place here and was really a fantastic time.

00:00:58.280 And I'm working on kind of a written piece that sums up a lot of my thoughts and observations about it, which you'll, well, depending on if I can get my act together and get it done, you'll be able to read over the weekend or early next week.

00:01:10.620 But nevertheless, I am going to do things a little bit differently on this show.

00:01:14.760 This is pre-recorded. Normally, we try to do things live. It's more exciting and enjoyable, and we don't get outdated necessarily by news that breaks while the show is in editing.

00:01:24.200 So we love doing it live, but in this particular case, I am literally on a plane at this moment that you're watching this, unless something like terrible has happened,

00:01:33.420 on my way to Calgary, Alberta for the United Conservative Party AGM.

00:01:38.340 So I thought it was a good opportunity to share with you a discussion I had a couple of weeks back with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.

00:01:46.340 Now, just to give you a little bit of context here, Danielle Smith was the keynote speaker at True North Nation, which was True North's first ever live and in-person event.

00:01:55.700 We had it in Calgary, the heartland of so many of the people that value and support the work we do.

00:02:02.080 It's not to say we don't appreciate everyone else. We're hoping to take the show on the road and do True North Nations elsewhere.

00:02:08.960 But we did our first one in Calgary, and we had all sorts of True North personalities and friends of True North out.

00:02:16.700 And we sent an invitation to the Premier of Alberta, who I've known for many years, as we used to work for the same company.

00:02:23.900 And I had the privilege of guest hosting for her for quite a while.

00:02:27.500 And she graciously accepted, and she came to give a bit of a talk.

00:02:33.160 She gave a bit of the State of the Union or State of the Province, if you will, to people.

00:02:37.560 But she wanted to sit down and just take some questions and tie in her remarks and her contribution

00:02:43.780 to some of the things that had been raised by audience members and in discussions and by panelists at True North Nation earlier in the day.

00:02:51.980 Now, we have not shared footage of the events we had at True North Nation because we let loose a little bit

00:02:59.640 and we were focused more on putting a live show together and not producing pre-recorded content.

00:03:05.040 But we did get a recording of Danielle Smith's talk and of my sit down with her.

00:03:10.200 So I wanted to share that with you for the first time here today.

00:03:13.900 Premier Danielle Smith, thank you.

00:03:21.980 See, I never get the standing ovation.

00:03:26.420 I need to come up when you are getting the standing ovation to basket it.

00:03:29.520 I gave a little bit of context earlier.

00:03:31.780 You and I used to work together in radio, and I had the great privilege of guest hosting for you,

00:03:36.380 which was always very challenging because you had very large shoes to fill on on that slide.

00:03:40.840 Well, it was always challenging when I came back after a week of Andrew Lawton hosting

00:03:44.220 because I'd get nothing but texting, oh, why don't they have him instead of you?

00:03:47.300 I really like that guy.

00:03:48.440 One of the things that I, and I, again, my confession that I'm from Ontario,

00:03:55.660 but I get a lot of reminders of the work you're doing in Ontario now

00:03:58.860 because I'll be, you know, out in the world and I hear the radio ad telling me that Alberta's calling

00:04:02.980 or I was in Ottawa a couple of weeks ago and I see the truck driving around

00:04:07.020 reminding lawmakers about these energy regulations.

00:04:10.600 Now, is the message sinking in?

00:04:13.520 I mean, our Ontarians, which is I think where you've been targeting a lot of these efforts,

00:04:17.120 certainly on the electricity stuff, is that message sinking into people?

00:04:20.600 I can tell you the greatest engagement that we're having on our advertising campaign is from Toronto

00:04:25.140 as well as we're getting also engagement from Eastern Canada, from Vancouver,

00:04:30.580 as well as, of course, Calgary and Edmonton.

00:04:33.260 Not every province is going to be as impacted as Alberta is,

00:04:36.780 but we have 90% of our power grid is natural gas and we have already paid the price.

00:04:43.000 When the NDP accelerated the phase out of coal, that cost our system billions of dollars

00:04:48.460 that we're still paying off, in fact.

00:04:50.340 There's three plants that are just coming on stream in the new year

00:04:55.760 that were based on that early phase out of coal.

00:04:58.300 I know you've got the federal government leaping in saying,

00:05:00.120 that's not good enough.

00:05:00.960 We want you to phase those out too.

00:05:03.180 One of the things that we have to, that I'm trying to get across is that Stephen Gibault,

00:05:08.780 it's not just advisory, it's not just let's see if we can attain it.

00:05:12.720 He's using the criminal law power to say that if we do not achieve a net zero power grid by 2035,

00:05:19.460 if we have natural gas on the grid that isn't abated to the level of 95%,

00:05:23.720 those who are running those generators will go to jail

00:05:27.300 or they'll face up to $10 million fines.

00:05:29.860 So what board of directors do you think is going to give any head of any power company

00:05:35.620 the go-ahead to build a plant today knowing that that technology doesn't exist?

00:05:39.760 It's not going to happen.

00:05:41.140 And so that's the message that we're trying to get through

00:05:43.220 and it's a message that should be resonating across the country

00:05:46.940 because we expect that our growth in the need for power is going to double

00:05:50.700 between now and 2050.

00:05:53.400 And I know that Quebec thinks that it's going to be easy to just bring on new hydroelectric power.

00:05:58.960 I can tell you it's not.

00:05:59.940 Look what happened in BC.

00:06:01.200 They started trying to build Site C in 1954.

00:06:03.880 It is not easy to bring on hydroelectric.

00:06:06.500 Small modular nuclear, while it's maybe promising technology, it's not there yet.

00:06:11.080 And so every single province is going to face this energy crunch that we get.

00:06:15.220 And the most reasonable thing to bring on, especially in an environment where we have

00:06:19.420 such a great supply of natural gas is natural gas

00:06:23.100 and work towards greater and greater emissions reduction.

00:06:25.620 So that's why we've been advocating across the province or across the country.

00:06:29.780 Not only impacts us as well as Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick the most,

00:06:35.220 but any other province wanting to bring new power on is going to be impacted too.

00:06:38.920 One of the themes that's come up in our discussions today is this rule by experts,

00:06:44.060 which Canadians and certainly Albertans have been subjected to for much of the last three years.

00:06:49.060 And, you know, we look at it in a media context, you know, media saying experts say,

00:06:52.920 which you know well from your career in broadcasting,

00:06:55.220 but governments have been far too deferential to this technocracy that exists.

00:06:59.640 And I'm wondering how you found that as premier, you come in with a very decisive mandate,

00:07:04.120 not just when you won the leadership, but then you won an election, you have a majority.

00:07:07.480 But there's resistance from people that are supposed to be serving the government.

00:07:12.480 Well, I found it interesting because the left always likes to quote experts

00:07:16.800 when they want to take away your freedoms.

00:07:18.380 But when I brought out the experts from the Alberta Electric System operator

00:07:21.800 to say the grid would fail, they say, oh, we don't believe that, right?

00:07:24.600 So I've always taken the approach.

00:07:27.840 I remember when I was on the air, if there was a contentious issue,

00:07:30.300 I'd bring somebody on and they'd say one view.

00:07:32.520 And then I knew there was somebody who had the opposite view. 0.84

00:07:34.180 I'd bring them on and our listeners would say, darn it, the expert you had on yesterday, 0.68

00:07:38.240 they told us something different. 0.84

00:07:39.320 How am I supposed to know?

00:07:40.220 And that's the whole point is that you have a multitude of different opinions on any given issue.

00:07:47.040 And it's really up to us to hear all of the different sides

00:07:49.820 and then to be able to make our best judgment.

00:07:52.140 That's what I think democracy should be.

00:07:53.820 And that's what I think the role of the media should be.

00:07:55.760 But there's a real problem that exists in all governments.

00:08:00.500 And I think it goes back to the system that we have of parliamentary accountability.

00:08:05.280 So how it's supposed to work is if something in your ministry screws up,

00:08:09.700 you as the minister take the fall, right?

00:08:11.920 That's what's supposed to happen.

00:08:13.560 So I'll tell you what happened instead.

00:08:15.520 What has happened instead is all of the big decisions have been spun off to an agency,

00:08:20.260 a board, a commission, a crown corporation,

00:08:22.780 so that when somebody screws up, then the politicians can say,

00:08:26.620 oh, that's them, that's not us.

00:08:28.300 Is this across the board and all files?

00:08:30.100 Across the board, all files.

00:08:31.200 And so part of the reason why we had to take back power from Alberta Health Services

00:08:35.860 is it started off being a way for us to have some kind of coordinated decision-making

00:08:43.320 around hospital services.

00:08:45.220 Well, I can tell you that they started hiring away all of the experts that we had in our department,

00:08:52.320 paying them more money, hollowing out the policy-making process,

00:08:55.380 and they started making policy.

00:08:56.980 So now essentially Alberta Health Services receives all the money,

00:09:00.840 makes all of the policy, delivers service, contracts out to all of their competitors,

00:09:05.640 which you can imagine how well that works,

00:09:07.500 and then starts sliding into primary care, mental health and addiction,

00:09:11.340 Indigenous health, and so on, and continuing care.

00:09:14.280 And so we have now essentially lost control of about $18 billion of our overall budget.

00:09:20.840 So that's why we have to start bringing some of that back.

00:09:23.220 Now, it's tough to do because when things go wrong,

00:09:26.140 now, of course, you do have to be politically responsible for it,

00:09:29.400 but I've always felt the accountability rests with the democratically elected people anyway,

00:09:34.020 that the people know that there's no difference between the two.

00:09:37.220 They know that we have the power to make the changes,

00:09:39.060 and so now we just have to have the courage to bring some of that back.

00:09:43.840 You mentioned the media.

00:09:47.180 Perhaps it's a loaded question,

00:09:50.000 but do you believe the media is treating your government and you fairly?

00:09:53.820 Well, let me take a straw poll.

00:09:56.640 Do you think the mainstream media treats our government fairly?

00:10:02.040 What is it that they don't get or refuse to get?

00:10:05.680 I'll tell you the problem that the media has is they don't understand conversation,

00:10:10.880 and they don't understand the exchange of ideas.

00:10:12.920 They get locked into a narrative,

00:10:14.800 and then for some reason they believe that they are the ones who it's their job to control the narrative

00:10:19.900 and to discredit any alternative voices,

00:10:23.460 and that's not how democracy is supposed to work.

00:10:26.220 And so what has been delightful to watch with the alternative media that has developed

00:10:30.540 is that you guys play by different set of roles.

00:10:33.460 You believe that you have to get fair, accurate, balanced reporting out there,

00:10:37.160 that you have to listen to all sides,

00:10:38.880 and so I've been grateful that you've put that out there.

00:10:42.260 But there's this new, you know, it's funny.

00:10:45.040 I've tried to analyze what has happened to the media

00:10:47.540 because I started in print a number of years ago,

00:10:51.540 and we used to have a letters to the editor section,

00:10:54.100 and it was a small letters to the editor section.

00:10:56.180 If you ever want to get a letter printed,

00:10:58.100 stay under 200 words.

00:10:59.720 Try to stay away.

00:11:00.540 You know, I'll make one pointed argument.

00:11:02.620 It's very heavily curated.

00:11:04.500 But what Twitter and other types of media do is it's like you've blown up the letters to the editor section,

00:11:11.680 and that's the only thing that matters.

00:11:13.060 And now the media is looking at what trends on Facebook and what trends on Twitter

00:11:17.380 to give guidance to them about what they should be writing in their news stories.

00:11:20.960 I can tell you that never used to be the case.

00:11:22.860 It never used to be the case when I was in print that the reporters would say,

00:11:26.880 hey, what are people writing in on the letters to the editor section today

00:11:30.120 because that's what my story is going to be.

00:11:32.180 So that's the real problem is everyone is chasing after the clicks

00:11:35.220 because the more clicks you get, you can monetize that,

00:11:38.200 or maybe you get more likes,

00:11:39.500 and so that maybe gives them more esteem within their profession.

00:11:43.520 But it's not giving good information.

00:11:45.100 It's not giving good journalism to the public in my view.

00:11:47.720 Find three tweets, and then people are saying that.

00:11:50.080 I guess to talk about the relationship between Alberta and Ottawa,

00:11:55.880 this is obviously a more tense relationship right now

00:11:58.560 because you're not rolling over like the federal government would expect Alberta to do.

00:12:03.200 There could be a conservative government in the future,

00:12:05.680 and I know Pierre Polyev this week spoke out against an Alberta pension plan,

00:12:10.500 but I'm curious how you envision that relationship working.

00:12:13.720 What would your model relationship be with a conservative government federally,

00:12:17.340 let's say, which would be more willing to, I think,

00:12:20.180 play ball with Alberta than the current government is?

00:12:22.420 Well, here's what I would say is I know that we had these same frustrations

00:12:27.000 prior to the conservatives winning a majority government last time,

00:12:31.380 and what I would say I observed happened in Alberta is we said,

00:12:35.220 phew, isn't that great?

00:12:36.700 All of our problems are taken care of.

00:12:38.560 Now we don't have to worry about doing any additional advocacy.

00:12:42.380 And guess what happened is that as soon as Stephen Harper left office,

00:12:46.520 not only did everything revert, it's even gone worse.

00:12:50.960 And are we in any better position by having not taken the initiative

00:12:54.600 to do some of the things to defend ourselves?

00:12:56.600 I don't think we are.

00:12:57.900 And so I love Pierre Polyev.

00:13:00.040 I think he's doing an amazing job.

00:13:01.160 I hope everybody saw his interview where he was chewing the apple,

00:13:04.080 which is fantastic.

00:13:06.360 I'm sure there's going to be a lot more media

00:13:08.620 who get that same kind of treatment from him in the future,

00:13:11.340 and maybe they'll be a little more careful in how they ask questions.

00:13:13.920 But I still think that the best positioning for our federal counterparts

00:13:19.160 is to be really supportive of the Constitution,

00:13:22.220 really mindful of the division of powers,

00:13:24.520 because I think that that's a message that resonates in Quebec

00:13:27.300 as well as resonates here.

00:13:29.040 If you want to fix health care or put in long-term care programming

00:13:32.940 or fix pharma care, run for provincial office,

00:13:36.040 that is not the job of the federal government to do those things.

00:13:39.140 And the federal government always does this.

00:13:41.460 They come along and they dangle a few dollars in front of us,

00:13:44.680 and they say, okay, we'll give you 10 cents on the dollar to run the program,

00:13:47.680 but we're going to tell you 100% of the way to run it.

00:13:50.060 And everybody normally says yes.

00:13:51.820 Well, we're not going to say yes to those kinds of things.

00:13:54.000 And I hope that when we see a change in government...

00:13:56.360 When we see a change in government,

00:14:03.640 what I would love for Pierre to do is to start working on ways

00:14:06.900 to give back some of that decision-making authority to the provinces.

00:14:11.920 In Quebec, what they often do is when the federal government

00:14:15.200 comes calling with a program, they say, yeah, we'll take your money,

00:14:17.500 but we'll deliver the program our way.

00:14:19.480 I would like to see if they want to partner with us on programs,

00:14:22.460 they'll do the same thing, or maybe they'll transfer us tax points.

00:14:25.040 Maybe one day the federal government will only start taxing us

00:14:28.520 to the level that funds the areas of constitutional jurisdiction

00:14:31.920 that they are responsible for,

00:14:33.580 and they will leave those other areas to us

00:14:36.440 so that we can generate our own source revenue.

00:14:38.280 That's the conversation I want to have with the federal government.

00:14:42.220 And...

00:14:42.780 As for the pension, I know it's very controversial,

00:14:49.220 but what I would say is that a firewall letter

00:14:52.220 was written in 2001 by a lot of academics,

00:14:54.740 including, at the time, Stephen Harper,

00:14:56.680 and they said, what do we need to do to be more like Quebec?

00:14:59.760 Collect our own taxes, have our own provincial police,

00:15:02.260 manage our own immigration, and have our own pension system.

00:15:04.920 So this conversation's been going on in our province for 25 years.

00:15:08.680 It has.

00:15:10.220 And...

00:15:10.520 And...

00:15:11.220 When we got the report done,

00:15:16.600 it was done by Morneau Chappelle.

00:15:18.280 So yes, that Morneau, Bill Morneau,

00:15:20.760 so it wasn't like we were choosing somebody

00:15:22.320 who we thought was in the bag for us.

00:15:24.280 They looked at what the legislation says,

00:15:26.680 and we have overpaid in this province

00:15:28.220 $60 billion in our premiums.

00:15:30.060 That has compounded over time,

00:15:31.560 and so we are now entitled,

00:15:33.180 under their formula,

00:15:33.980 to $342 billion,

00:15:36.300 which, yes, is 53% of the assets.

00:15:39.060 And so we've asked the federal government,

00:15:40.460 if you disagree with our calculation,

00:15:42.640 tell us what you think the calculation should be.

00:15:44.820 Or CPP, if you disagree,

00:15:46.380 tell us what you think the calculation should be.

00:15:48.040 And all they've come back with is, you know,

00:15:50.400 slander and negativity,

00:15:51.340 and they haven't answered that question.

00:15:53.080 But we should be mindful of this,

00:15:55.040 and I'm hoping the rest of the country

00:15:56.380 is mindful of this.

00:15:57.960 That is how every single federal program is set up.

00:16:00.480 We always overpay,

00:16:02.700 and we always get back less

00:16:04.300 than we put into the program.

00:16:06.120 And I think that there's a time for us to say

00:16:08.320 enough is enough,

00:16:09.180 that we have to make sure...

00:16:11.080 Thank you.

00:16:12.660 ...that we're keeping those dollars here.

00:16:14.940 The last thing I'll ask you about

00:16:19.140 is I realize our time has elapsed here,

00:16:22.140 and we're so glad that you took a bit of extra time

00:16:24.080 to sit down for this that's come up today

00:16:26.120 is the influence of unions.

00:16:27.360 And I would broaden that to environmental NGOs.

00:16:31.060 I know this was something

00:16:31.800 your predecessor government took very seriously,

00:16:34.280 but how real is that fear

00:16:36.740 of, you know, kind of this disproportionate influence

00:16:40.520 that the NGOs and unions have in Alberta politics?

00:16:43.780 Well, I don't know if Elections Alberta

00:16:45.700 will ever do an investigation,

00:16:47.320 but I can tell you that the fact that the NDP,

00:16:52.280 the unions and the media,

00:16:53.320 were all so dogpiled on us during the election,

00:16:57.360 and every person I know said that they were seeing

00:16:59.540 multitude of negative ads.

00:17:02.360 You'd go onto YouTube

00:17:03.240 and you would see dozens and dozens of ads.

00:17:05.500 So we know what our spending limit is.

00:17:07.960 I think they overspend by sevenfold or more.

00:17:11.860 And so that is not the way our legislation works,

00:17:14.840 but I don't know if we'll see Elections Alberta

00:17:17.280 do any investigation into it.

00:17:18.900 But that's what happens

00:17:20.140 is you're supposed to have a division

00:17:22.000 between the party and the PACs

00:17:23.820 that are supporting them.

00:17:24.680 I don't think that there was any of that.

00:17:26.380 I think that you saw a lot of integration

00:17:28.280 between the two.

00:17:29.140 So we do have to be mindful

00:17:30.600 that there is a very strong connection

00:17:34.700 and they're going to use it too

00:17:36.360 to their advantage during an election campaign.

00:17:39.000 What I would say is that

00:17:40.780 I think that we have an opportunity

00:17:42.800 to split the union support

00:17:44.580 because if you're a blue-collar worker

00:17:46.980 and you work for any resource industry sector,

00:17:49.680 why in the world would you support the NDP now?

00:17:52.040 They're talking about just transition.

00:17:54.140 They're supporting the federal government's net zero agenda.

00:17:57.300 They want to phase out fossil fuels.

00:17:59.560 They're actively supporting that kind of campaign.

00:18:02.460 And so why would anybody

00:18:03.880 who works in a resource extraction industry

00:18:05.800 or pipeline industry

00:18:06.880 or build some of those major construction industrial projects,

00:18:10.600 why would they support them?

00:18:11.620 They should be with us.

00:18:12.860 And that's something that I think

00:18:13.980 the Ford government has done very well on in Ontario

00:18:17.300 in saying that those blue-collar, high-paying jobs,

00:18:20.740 they have more in common with their values,

00:18:23.260 with the conservative movement

00:18:24.320 than they do with the guys on the other side.

00:18:26.620 And so I think we have the ability

00:18:28.420 to leverage those relationships.

00:18:30.300 And so I'll tell you one of the things I'm doing.

00:18:32.480 I'm going to Halifax in a couple of weeks

00:18:35.000 because we have a Council of the Federation.

00:18:37.120 The Building Trades has a demonstration project there

00:18:40.120 where young people can go

00:18:42.100 and spend 45 minutes at each of 18 stations.

00:18:45.160 And by the time they've spent a day there,

00:18:46.520 they'll know everything that it takes to build a house.

00:18:48.980 And I thought, well,

00:18:49.660 doesn't that work really well

00:18:50.960 with what it is that we're trying to do?

00:18:52.220 We're trying to get more young people into the trades,

00:18:54.180 knowing that there's good careers

00:18:55.280 that come out of working with your hands.

00:18:57.320 Maybe we can have those kinds of relationships

00:18:59.500 working with the building trades

00:19:00.940 so that we can start fostering,

00:19:03.240 not only, I think,

00:19:04.300 a better educated next generation

00:19:06.320 that's going to be entrepreneurial,

00:19:08.200 but also, I think,

00:19:09.580 start building some of those important ties

00:19:11.540 with people who are doing

00:19:12.460 some really important work for our country.

00:19:15.160 So public sector unions,

00:19:16.700 I don't have the answer to that one yet.

00:19:18.840 But that's also one of the reasons

00:19:21.560 why we are looking at providing

00:19:23.980 a lot more opportunity for people

00:19:26.100 to do charter hospitals in our environment.

00:19:29.540 We now have 300,000 surgeries that we do.

00:19:32.340 60,000 of them are being done

00:19:33.880 through chartered surgical centers.

00:19:35.800 It just gives more opportunities

00:19:37.120 for people who want to be

00:19:38.180 in the caring professions

00:19:39.420 to work for a private sector operator,

00:19:42.480 a doctor, a surgical team,

00:19:43.900 rather than having to work

00:19:45.500 under the government-run system.

00:19:47.880 So those are the,

00:19:48.600 charter schools the same way.

00:19:50.420 I mean, the unions, the ATA,

00:19:52.100 hate the independent schools,

00:19:54.140 the charter schools,

00:19:54.920 and the homeschools,

00:19:56.400 because that gives more options

00:19:58.340 to educators that are outside

00:20:00.100 the realm of the ATA.

00:20:02.180 So I believe in competition.

00:20:04.220 And so if we're able to provide

00:20:05.700 more options for more people,

00:20:07.420 I think that that will not only be good

00:20:08.920 for the recipients of the service,

00:20:11.180 but also those who want to work

00:20:12.740 in those professions.

00:20:13.780 So that's what we're trying to do.

00:20:16.780 That was Alberta Premier Danielle Smith

00:20:19.220 got a standing ovation at the beginning

00:20:21.220 and at the end of that,

00:20:22.820 which I know was,

00:20:23.820 you don't often see politicians

00:20:25.700 that are able to get

00:20:26.500 that sort of a response,

00:20:28.080 although she was speaking

00:20:29.380 to a friendlier crowd.

00:20:30.680 But even so,

00:20:31.340 in Alberta politics,

00:20:32.220 we've seen time and time again

00:20:33.640 how people will oust leaders

00:20:35.740 they believe are underperforming.

00:20:37.760 I mean,

00:20:38.200 I had Jason Kenney on the show

00:20:39.880 a number of times

00:20:40.600 when he was Premier,

00:20:41.520 including when he was fighting

00:20:42.920 for his political life.

00:20:44.500 But ultimately,

00:20:45.200 this guy who came to Alberta politics

00:20:47.420 as this great unifier

00:20:49.320 ended up becoming

00:20:50.260 a very divisive figure.

00:20:52.120 Now,

00:20:52.640 you can unpack

00:20:53.600 all the different reasons for that.

00:20:55.160 Was it just COVID

00:20:56.000 or were there other things?

00:20:57.660 But what's interesting here

00:20:59.120 is that Danielle Smith

00:21:00.140 was carried to victory

00:21:01.780 in a wave.

00:21:03.620 She was carried

00:21:04.360 and I think had a lot of the people

00:21:05.780 supporting her

00:21:06.480 that were people that,

00:21:08.160 you know,

00:21:08.360 very critical of lockdowns

00:21:09.760 and vaccine mandates

00:21:11.020 and all of that,

00:21:11.800 very Alberta first

00:21:13.040 in their approach to politics.

00:21:15.040 One of those groups

00:21:16.580 was Take Back Alberta. 0.92

00:21:18.360 Now,

00:21:18.860 the thing that is important

00:21:20.020 to note there

00:21:20.540 is that they've said,

00:21:21.380 yeah,

00:21:21.600 we want Danielle Smith in power 1.00

00:21:23.240 but we are also going to make

00:21:24.760 some pretty serious demands

00:21:27.000 of this party

00:21:27.940 to remain accountable

00:21:30.220 to its grassroots members

00:21:31.620 and if not,

00:21:32.660 well,

00:21:32.980 maybe we will have to do

00:21:34.100 what we did with Jason Kenney.

00:21:35.800 So,

00:21:36.260 that's an interesting bit of context

00:21:38.160 if you bring it to the UCPA GM

00:21:40.200 coming this weekend.

00:21:41.360 It starts Friday

00:21:42.160 and it continues Saturday.

00:21:44.840 Because the party

00:21:45.680 is going to be electing

00:21:47.300 not just its governing executives

00:21:49.340 but it's going to be electing

00:21:50.860 also various policy proposals

00:21:53.480 that are being put forward

00:21:54.560 and some of those

00:21:55.360 are hot-button issues

00:21:56.760 that Danielle Smith

00:21:57.500 has not really wanted

00:21:58.740 to wade into,

00:21:59.740 at least not like

00:22:00.520 many of her supporters

00:22:02.020 and members want her to,

00:22:03.240 notably the gender issue

00:22:04.560 which we saw pass

00:22:06.120 by just a resounding margin

00:22:08.080 when it was going before

00:22:09.620 Conservative Party of Canada

00:22:10.980 members federally

00:22:12.100 at their convention

00:22:13.620 in Quebec City

00:22:14.740 and now we see

00:22:15.520 a very similar

00:22:16.700 and analogous

00:22:17.860 set of proposals

00:22:18.820 being put forward

00:22:19.700 in Alberta

00:22:20.540 and I think they're going to

00:22:21.440 pass with like

00:22:22.360 107% of the vote.

00:22:23.720 I think it'll look like

00:22:24.700 a North Korean election result.

00:22:26.160 It'll be such a decisive margin.

00:22:27.780 So,

00:22:28.140 that's a pretty clear mandate

00:22:30.360 to a leader.

00:22:31.620 So,

00:22:32.120 I think there's a cautionary tale

00:22:33.860 in Alberta politics

00:22:34.780 which is that a leader

00:22:35.600 can never

00:22:36.120 start leading

00:22:37.340 without worrying

00:22:38.680 about what the members

00:22:40.000 think

00:22:40.340 and what the base thinks

00:22:41.380 and I think that was

00:22:42.260 very important to note

00:22:43.780 and I think it was also

00:22:44.540 very important

00:22:45.140 Danielle Smith

00:22:45.700 took the time

00:22:46.340 to speak to

00:22:47.020 True North Nation

00:22:47.840 because that's not something

00:22:49.380 a lot of leaders

00:22:50.720 would have done.

00:22:51.580 I mean,

00:22:52.560 Aaron O'Toole

00:22:53.100 when he was

00:22:53.560 Federal Conservative Leader

00:22:54.660 was very accessible

00:22:56.140 for interviews

00:22:56.760 and he was running

00:22:57.480 for the leadership

00:22:58.060 but once he was the leader

00:22:59.280 it was a lot harder

00:23:00.580 to pin him down

00:23:01.840 and I think that's

00:23:03.100 again,

00:23:03.760 a thing you can tell

00:23:04.640 a lot about someone

00:23:05.420 by who they want

00:23:06.100 to speak to.

00:23:06.660 So,

00:23:07.340 we're grateful

00:23:07.960 to have had Danielle Smith

00:23:08.900 there,

00:23:09.240 grateful to get the chance

00:23:10.320 to catch up with her

00:23:11.160 and grateful again

00:23:12.600 to all of those of you

00:23:13.940 who came out

00:23:14.440 to True North Nation

00:23:15.300 and I'm going to keep

00:23:16.260 touting it

00:23:16.720 so that when we do it again

00:23:18.000 you'll not want to miss

00:23:19.020 the next one.

00:23:19.640 So,

00:23:20.100 that does it for me.

00:23:21.400 If I see you in Calgary

00:23:22.960 this weekend

00:23:23.680 do come over

00:23:24.380 and say hello

00:23:25.140 or I guess if you see me

00:23:26.040 because I wouldn't have

00:23:26.880 seen you by that point

00:23:27.740 if you're coming up

00:23:28.400 but it's also like

00:23:29.560 1am in London right now

00:23:31.160 when I'm recording this

00:23:31.960 so bear with me here

00:23:33.120 but we'll see you there

00:23:34.400 and back with

00:23:35.120 regularly scheduled

00:23:36.060 programming

00:23:36.660 on Monday

00:23:37.220 here on the

00:23:37.740 Andrew Lawton Show.

00:23:38.680 Thank you,

00:23:39.320 God bless

00:23:39.800 and good day

00:23:40.660 to you all.

00:23:41.600 Thanks for listening

00:23:42.240 to the Andrew Lawton Show.

00:23:43.920 Support the program

00:23:44.740 by donating to

00:23:45.560 True North

00:23:45.980 at www.tnc.news.

00:23:48.660 Andrew Lawton Show.

00:23:57.560 We'll be right back.

Juno News - November 02, 2023

Danielle Smith's stand against Ottawa

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