00:00:00.000Why now? Why is the federal government doing this now? Like, do we know?
00:00:06.220That's the million dollar question. We don't know. I can tell you some of the rampant speculation I've heard. One speculation I heard is that Ottawa is setting up a showdown between itself and Alberta, actually, and is going to set itself as the sort of protector of rights and Alberta as the villain.
00:00:26.060That's one theory. Another theory that I've heard is that this was basically a lawyer's brainchild.
00:00:33.960It could have been David Lamedi, who was dean of McGill Law, very academic lawyer, obviously recently left PMO.
00:00:40.860This was just a hobby horse of his. There's no question that lawyers like to bring in tests and frameworks.
00:00:47.980And so this was really just a lawyer's idea and the federal government ran with it.
00:00:52.780It could be also that Carney is looking to wedge himself with Pierre Polyev, who has said very openly that if he were to be prime minister, he would invoke the notwithstanding clause on the federal level for the very first time in relation to mandatory minimum sentences and violent criminals getting out on bail easily.
00:01:15.380So lastly, on this issue with Alberta, could this then be used, say, you know, apart from the social issues, as they're often described, say that we wanted to strike down C-69 or say we wanted to get rid of the energy cap or strike down the tanker ban off the West Coast and say that the federal government said, OK, fine, and agreed with us.
00:01:37.060there would be a miracle and we would be able to actually get our energy out to market in this
00:01:42.380situation um say the supreme court or a level of court says you know what i don't think so because
00:01:48.200for whatever reason name it um you know national unity or environmental blah blah blah and in that
00:01:54.260situation the prime minister of the government in ottawa says notwithstanding your decision and
00:01:59.460opinion on this we're going ahead with it anyway in this scenario if this goes through then would
00:02:05.500the Supreme Court have the final say and be able to just squash it? Yeah, absolutely. The clear
00:02:10.920implication is that Ottawa is proposing a transfer of power. The federal government is proposing
00:02:15.680a transfer of power to the courts to have the ultimate reviewing say. It says particularly if
00:02:21.940the courts find that an invocation of the notwithstanding clause would cause what they
00:02:25.580call irreparable harm, which you could easily see in the context, or you could easily see a lawyer
00:02:30.560making this argument in the context you bring up um about energy pipelines and you know arguments
00:02:36.240around environmental impact they would have the final word and again that's where the constitutional
00:02:40.880crisis would come in um because it would come down to basically a battle of wills would alberta just
00:02:47.280plow ahead with it even though it's officially unconstitutional or at that point do you just
00:02:52.240have to say I have we have to play by the rules.