Juno News - Preston Manning on Alberta’s referendum and the fight for the West

00:00:00.000 Welcome to The Fighter. I am your host, Chris Sims, and we have a very special show for you.

00:00:13.020 You do not want to miss this. Preston Manning. Yeah. Preston Manning, it would take me half an

00:00:22.000 hour to properly introduce him. Suffice to say that he was the founder and leader of a movement

00:00:28.940 for smaller, more accountable government in Ottawa.

00:00:34.240 Way back in the late 1980s,

00:00:36.820 he picked up a torch and basically said,

00:00:39.700 the West wants in.

00:00:41.560 We need reform,

00:00:43.200 which is why he started the Reform Party.

00:00:45.840 What kind of reform?

00:00:47.080 Well, how about some accountability within government?

00:00:50.460 How about living within your means?

00:00:52.320 How about slaying the deficit

00:00:54.280 and not running up that debt clock?

00:00:56.460 That all comes back to Preston Manning. Not only did he call for all of those things as he was eventually leader of the opposition, he inspired an entire cohort of people, including me, to move to Ottawa, to work within Parliament, to truly push for reform, to be that change that we all wanted to see in the world.

00:01:24.560 Now, there was a bunch of young people like me back in the day, and there was people from all ages that truly believed in what Mr. Manning wanted to do.

00:01:34.440 That's why we have the Manning Foundation.

00:01:36.700 That's why he started all of these different groups in order to push for grassroots democracy so that everyday working people like you, the listener, the viewer, the subscriber to Juno News, the supporter of the Taxpayers Federation,

00:01:51.220 that people like you had a voice. He was also one of the champions of Senate reform.

00:02:00.400 He was asking pertinent questions like, why are we spending all this money, millions and millions

00:02:06.160 of dollars per year, on an unelected chamber of government? Like, really? Why are these people

00:02:13.860 getting paid by taxpayers' money when we taxpayers have no voice? We don't get to vote for senators. 0.93

00:02:20.280 And so there was a big push to try to reform it, to try to make that it's elected and accountable.

00:02:27.000 And it just never worked, frankly.

00:02:29.640 And so now, of course, here he is, well into his 80s, and he's still fighting for people.

00:02:38.000 I'll get choked up because he meant so much to me.

00:02:40.840 And he still means so much.

00:02:43.160 And he's still working.

00:02:44.740 and now we've got this big vote coming up in Alberta October 19th there's a referendum and

00:02:52.080 there's a whole bunch of questions on there it's not just should Alberta have a vote whether or

00:02:57.720 not to become sovereign no bunch of stuff on there like should Alberta appoint its own judges

00:03:03.240 or should we take a look at how much money we're sending to Ottawa should we try to be

00:03:08.460 more independent in other ways. And another big question on there is, should we get rid of the

00:03:15.320 unelected Senate in Ottawa? So Mr. Manning saw all of these complex questions, and he's been

00:03:24.240 the one to keep an eye on all of the stuff happening between the West and the rest, namely

00:03:30.300 Ottawa. And he's not just taking it lying down. He actually has a big forum coming up, and I want

00:03:36.920 you to make a note of this on your calendar, okay? It is called Alberta End of the West. It's

00:03:43.380 happening on September 19th and 20th, and it's all going to be online, and you'll be able to sign up

00:03:50.340 to be able to get, you know, the streaming link so you can hear some of these super important topics

00:03:56.540 being discussed in a really fulsome way. Namely, how did we get here, and where do we go from here?

00:04:05.160 Let's find out. Joining me now is Mr. Preston Manning. Mr. Manning, I can't thank you enough

00:04:14.400 for what you've done in all of our lives for the movement of smaller, more accountable government.

00:04:20.140 It's an honor to speak with you. Thank you for joining us.

00:04:22.520 Well, thank you for having me.

00:04:24.340 I wanted to talk about your latest project because you never seem to slow down.

00:04:29.880 And it is Alberta and the West.

00:04:32.560 You're going to be having, as far as I can see, it's like a virtual town hall on September 19th and 20th.

00:04:39.600 Can you explain this to us, please?

00:04:42.000 Well, as you know, there's a lot of angst in Western Canada in respect to its relationship to the Federation and the federal government.

00:04:51.660 Alberta is going to have this referendum on October 19th.

00:04:55.560 And so what this video conference is, is an educational exercise to have presentations on the major options, everything from the premier's position about a sovereign province, but within and not without the federation to the secession proposals to the stay, remain, but and do what?

00:05:19.860 So there'll be these presentations and then delegates will be out in virtual land and they can ask questions and cross-examine what are the strengths and the weaknesses of these positions.

00:05:31.400 And this is going to be live streamed.

00:05:34.740 So we're hoping that audiences, for example, people that follow the Canadian Taxpayers Federation might tune in.

00:05:43.000 And of course, one of the questions we hope to get, and we'll make sure we get, is from each proposal, what will it cost and who will pay, which gets into your field of taxation.

00:05:58.200 So we're hoping this will be helpful in equipping people to vote in that referendum.

00:06:03.560 And of course, it will deal with issues that are relevant to people outside Alberta as well.

00:06:08.960 Mr. Manning, I know that whenever we're speaking with our supporters, including at in-person events, I'm shocked by how quickly the room fills up.

00:06:17.800 Whenever I'm going to a speech now, along with, you know, colleagues from other organizations, it's amazing.

00:06:23.400 We had hundreds of people out to Claire's home to talk about censorship and taxation just the other day.

00:06:29.900 People are really riled up about this.

00:06:32.300 Is that why you felt it was necessary to have this kind of a forum to really talk about this?

00:06:37.660 Ideally, the kind of debate that will occur in this thing is sort of what should happen in the legislature or the House of Commons.

00:06:46.520 But our democratic institutions become so polarized that you can't seem to have that kind of discussion there.

00:06:54.880 So we're trying to create an assembly virtually.

00:06:59.620 And, of course, with the technology today, you can do that.

00:07:02.260 And I don't think there's difficulty in getting people to participate.

00:07:08.340 As you say, there's energy out there and there's unrest out there and people want to do something.

00:07:14.060 But they often ask, well, what can I do?

00:07:16.040 Well, you can inform yourselves is one of the starting points.

00:07:20.920 I do note that sometimes people will say, oh, poo-poo, you know, from eastern Canada.

00:07:26.220 What are those Albertans upset about now?

00:07:28.760 Even just financially.

00:07:30.660 Even just financially.

00:07:31.580 seeing how transfer payments are lopsided, how we will often have our energy sector get strangled

00:07:40.340 by regulation. Are those sort of things things you're expecting to talk about?

00:07:44.200 Well, I think those issues will be raised. There's structural problems. You can discuss

00:07:49.220 policy and what would be a better policy with respect to the West and respect the rest of

00:07:54.920 country, but there's a structural constitutional unfairness and inequities. You refer to the

00:08:02.520 operation of the equalization formula, the fact that we have Trudeau tainted judges and the

00:08:10.220 provinces are not consulted on the appointments. And of course, there's the Senate, which was

00:08:16.260 supposed to be the place where effective regional representation would occur. And of course, that

00:08:22.880 does not occur in our Senate. So yes, there are these broader structural problems and I'm sure

00:08:28.720 they'll be raised. Of course, the question will be what can be done about them. But yeah, yeah.

00:08:33.120 I'm so glad you're doing this panel that's coming up once again September 19th and 20th.

00:08:39.760 Can anybody sign up for it? Yes, yes. Particularly for the live streaming, just

00:08:47.280 going to the website and registering there so that they can be given notices of when this

00:08:53.680 thing is actually happening. It's still a month away, so there'll be people inquiring. They'll

00:08:59.120 get interested two days before, but they want to know how they can connect to it, so that'll be the

00:09:03.520 way. I'm so glad you raised these issues, sir, because a lot of folks may not realize it's not

00:09:09.120 just one question coming up on October 19th, right? No, and this is the central Canadian media,

00:09:16.320 the secession is a sexy topic and they think it'll get attention. But as you say, there's

00:09:24.800 nine other questions on that ballot. The first five deal with immigration. This gets into the

00:09:30.560 whole idea of should the provincial governments push the envelope in areas of joint jurisdiction,

00:09:37.680 which is agriculture, environment, and immigration. The first five of those questions

00:09:42.880 ask people, do you think the province should do that or not? And then there's four other questions

00:09:49.260 that deal more with the structural questions. Should provinces be consulted with respect to

00:09:54.780 the appointment of judges? And what about the Senate? That question actually says,

00:09:59.700 should it be abolished since it simply doesn't work? Well, I have to ask you then,

00:10:05.820 since you bring up the Senate, and a bit of background. When you said the West wants in,

00:10:10.700 I was one of those cohort of kids that followed you into Ottawa as part of our staffing pool,

00:10:16.140 and one of the issues you brought up and championed was the EEE Senate,

00:10:20.780 making sure it's elected and accountable.

00:10:24.860 Have you decided that it's time to abolish the Senate, or where are you on that?

00:10:29.260 Well, ideally it should be reformed, but if it can't be, then what's the point of having it?

00:10:36.860 as you say, there's been enormous effort made. The Senate has become a chamber of ridicule too.

00:10:42.940 People used to say alcohol, protocol, and geritol. Those were the three priorities

00:10:48.300 the Canadian Senate. We had quite an adventure with respect to that. When I was in the House

00:10:55.820 of Commons, there was an unspoken rule between the House and the Senate that neither would

00:11:00.060 criticize the performance of the other. So every time I raised the word Senate,

00:11:05.180 the Speaker ruled me out of order. The one occasion on which he couldn't do that was

00:11:09.820 when they introduced the Nunavut bill, creating Nunavut as a territory. There was a little clause

00:11:15.660 in there saying that Nunavut was entitled to one Senator, and the Speaker couldn't stop me

00:11:21.020 speaking on a bill. So I spent an hour and a half outlining the prospects and the need for

00:11:27.020 Senate reform. But the challenge is that the Harper government tried to carry this a little

00:11:32.220 further. They said, well, can we democratize, at least democratize the thing? And they had a bill

00:11:39.900 that would have done that. And of course, it went to the Supreme Court and the court said, no, that

00:11:43.740 was really a constitutional amendment. So it couldn't be changed by some vote of the House

00:11:50.540 of Commons. So there's been a lot of experience put into that, but so far it's been fruitless.

00:11:57.340 And people keep trying. You championed this, you tried. You point out former Prime Minister

00:12:03.500 Stephen Harper, he tried and then they got that court ruling. I don't like to say somebody gives

00:12:08.780 up, but he kind of gave up on it at that point, right? Well, yeah, they felt they couldn't do it.

00:12:13.020 Of course, there were some funny sides to this too. There were some of these senators

00:12:19.500 under the old system that they could go to, in the winter, they could go to Mexico and just get

00:12:25.820 back for enough days to qualify for pay and pension. One of them, it used to be in Mexico,

00:12:32.220 when he came back, some of our fellows organized a mariachi band outside the Senate door.

00:12:37.500 I remember that.

00:12:40.460 But I mean, it's funny in a way, but it's tragic. Every attempt and there's no impetus

00:12:46.940 within the Senate. My father was appointed to the Senate. Pierre Trudeau called him up.

00:12:53.580 They were going to appoint former premiers to the Senate.

00:12:58.300 And so he said he wanted to appoint my father.

00:13:00.280 So my father said, well, you got to, frankly, I think you're the worst prime minister the West has ever endured.

00:13:08.200 And Trudeau said, well, maybe that opinion would be better expressed in the dignity of the red chamber instead of on the street.

00:13:14.920 but there was a group in there i can't remember who they all were of senators that actually tried

00:13:22.500 to do it from within but there was only six or seven of them they could not get the rest of

00:13:28.160 course particularly to agree to the equality provision so so the bottom line of all of this

00:13:33.480 is is that the senate cannot be reformed except by a constitutional amendment and unless you had

00:13:39.740 of federal government and seven of the 10 provinces with 50% of the population that

00:13:44.960 agreed with that, it could not be done. And it looks pretty steep, those odds right now.

00:13:53.320 Well, the one encouraging thing, maybe not on Senate reform, is you're starting to get

00:13:58.580 at least four of the premiers who are strongly in favor of persuading the federal government to

00:14:07.480 withdraw from these areas of provincial jurisdiction that it is intruded upon.

00:14:12.920 Awakeham, this new premier in Newfoundland. Newfoundland is like the Alberta of Atlantic.

00:14:19.000 Anybody will do something different or stand up and say something, they'll be in Newfoundland.

00:14:23.320 The premier of Quebec, Charest, and even if she's replaced by a PQ

00:14:31.480 premier, there'll be a resistance to Ottawa intrusion. Then there's Premier Moll and Premier

00:14:36.760 Smith, and maybe the four of them could drag along Ford or Houston. Again, these are conservative

00:14:44.120 premiers. Now you're getting up to six premiers, maybe even seven if you roped in PEI, that

00:14:51.880 would be in favor of the federal government reducing its intrusiveness in areas of provincial

00:14:58.200 jurisdiction, natural resources, health, municipal governance, and property and civil rights.

00:15:06.760 and not using its spending power to invade those areas. That's where the real opposition

00:15:14.920 in many respects to the Kearney government is, that group of premiers, in cooperation maybe with

00:15:23.320 the official opposition in the House of Commons. That is an interesting possibility if that

00:15:29.880 coalition develops and exerts itself. Wouldn't that be something, and you could

00:15:36.040 We'd even add to that mix British Columbia because it always is teetering, right?

00:15:40.100 With a change of government, which is likely if there's an election there.

00:15:44.080 Yeah.

00:15:44.180 But what it would take, and I think the Alberta Premier is one of the strongest of that group on this issue.

00:15:53.320 It would take that group to stand up.

00:15:56.360 What I'd like to see, if I was in the House of Commons today, I would push for an act respecting provincial jurisdiction.

00:16:03.520 And it would amend the statutes that authorize federal intrusion in areas of provincial responsibility. That would be the Impact Assessment Act, which is the one under which caps on oil and gas production.

00:16:17.620 It would require amending or repealing the Oil Tanker Moratorium Act. It would include amending or changing the Canada Health Act, which is sort of five conditions that a province has to meet.

00:16:31.280 if it's going to get Canada health transfers and it's the reason there's no innovation on that

00:16:36.800 front. You'd amend the Canada Infrastructure Bank Act because the federal government is using that

00:16:43.280 bank to fund municipal infrastructure without even talking to the province about it.

00:16:50.320 So that one statute would be an act to respect, put it that way, respect provincial jurisdiction,

00:17:02.340 I think would do more to improve federal-provincial relations and to remove the irritants that

00:17:08.200 are causing this continued Western alienation and even talk of separatism.

00:17:14.960 It would certainly take the temperature down.

00:17:17.520 And if you can just envision all those things that you mentioned,

00:17:20.320 That is basically what the sovereign Alberta within the United Canada looks like, right?

00:17:26.860 Yeah, and I've raised this with a couple of the premiers.

00:17:31.400 This business of writing letters to Kearney, anybody can write a letter to Kearney.

00:17:36.280 I don't know how many letters they get.

00:17:38.100 The opposition office gets 500 texts, emails, phone calls a day.

00:17:44.620 Goodness knows what the prime minister's office.

00:17:46.480 So I say, as a premier, writing letters is okay, but you're a legislator.

00:17:51.480 In addition to sending the letter, why don't you draft this statute?

00:17:56.480 If they won't draft it, you draft it. You've got people that can do that.

00:17:59.480 This draft, this act respecting provincial jurisdiction.

00:18:03.480 And the next time there's one of these photo ops and so forth,

00:18:07.480 you walk over to the prime minister's podium and put the act on his table and say, pass this.

00:18:14.480 and you have your friends in the House of Commons

00:18:18.920 put that draft bill on every desk

00:18:21.860 in the House of Commons and the Senate

00:18:23.300 with a little yellow stick on it.

00:18:25.420 Pass this.

00:18:27.220 Pass this if you're sincere about this,

00:18:31.040 trying to repair the federal-provincial relations

00:18:33.980 rather than just making vague statements about it

00:18:36.620 and press releases and photo ops,

00:18:39.340 but that doesn't do anything.

00:18:41.640 Amen. That would go such a long way.

00:18:43.640 I assume topics like this are going to be discussed at your upcoming panel.

00:18:49.160 We're coordinating this. The attempt is to get it as objective as possible. It's not grinding an

00:18:57.800 axe for one or the others who want to get these. But I think these are the type of questions and

00:19:01.880 issues that will be discussed there. For the Taxpayers Federation supporters, no matter what

00:19:09.400 What is proposed?

00:19:10.820 This question of what will it cost and who will pay?

00:19:15.200 What will be the tax implications?

00:19:18.600 That's a relevant question whether you're talking about secession or you're talking

00:19:22.880 about staying or you're talking about increasing provincial sovereignty.

00:19:26.580 It's a very relevant question and people can say live stream this thing and they'll be

00:19:31.780 able to ask questions and make comments through that mechanism.

00:19:34.760 We only have you for a couple more minutes.

00:19:37.120 We're speaking with Preston Manning.

00:19:39.160 Manning, you brought up cost and even the Senate issue is such a cost. I think it costs over $140

00:19:45.960 million to run the Senate this year. And then you brought up the silly things that are happening in

00:19:52.920 there. I don't know if you saw our news this week, but the Speaker of the Senate went on this three

00:19:57.960 year long globetrot. Did you see that? Oh, I did see that. Yeah. And what on earth does that

00:20:04.520 accomplished. You go to Japan and you're the Speaker of the Canadian Senate, which is an

00:20:10.520 ineffective and utterly useless chamber. Exactly what do you say or do at such meetings?

00:20:22.120 That's a good example, that there's no sense of fiscal responsibility there.

00:20:27.320 At one time, there was hope that the Senate might be more fiscally concerted than the House of

00:20:32.760 Commons. I could ask these questions every time the bill came through, that's fine, but what does

00:20:37.640 it cost and who's going to pay it? But that's the last thing that the current Senate would think

00:20:43.880 about. Yeah, and it was a while ago that they were talking like that. Do you think it can be reformed

00:20:49.480 or do you think that we should vote to get rid of the unelected Senate? I will point out that's part

00:20:54.280 of the question. They call that the unelected Senate. Do you think we should do that? I think

00:20:57.960 people, even people who support reform will vote, get rid of it, just to give a signal to Ottawa

00:21:05.640 that there's no support or respect for that out here. I'd be very surprised if that provoked

00:21:14.600 the constitutional amendment that you actually need, but it would at least send a signal.

00:21:20.840 I want you, while we've got our last question here, Mr. Manning, and thank you so much for

00:21:25.000 the generosity of your time. You know, you've got me, you've got most of our viewers on side,

00:21:31.320 wanting smaller government, more accountable government, standing up for things like the

00:21:34.920 West in Alberta, pushing back on Ottawa. Can you just make a quick appeal to their sisters-in-law

00:21:41.400 and their brother who may be thinking, oh, this is making me queasy. The idea of a referendum

00:21:47.080 is kind of scary. Why should they maybe tune in then to your panel that you're going to be doing

00:21:53.000 next month because you've got some thoughtful things that are going to be happening there.

00:21:56.840 I think that's a broader question about democracy. This business and particularly

00:22:01.160 from central Canada, why on earth would Alberta have a referendum? What they're really saying,

00:22:05.960 why on earth would you ask ordinary people who are paying for whatever comes out of it,

00:22:11.560 why on earth would you ask them even for their opinion? That's an anti-democratic

00:22:17.880 sentiment. And I say to people, regardless of what your views are with respect to this

00:22:24.620 referendum, get out and vote and participate in informing yourself. And there's this old saying

00:22:31.820 that people who do not involve themselves in the governance of their country will be governed by

00:22:37.500 those who do. So if you don't like those who do, or you're uncomfortable with those who do,

00:22:42.840 The alternative is to get involved some way yourself.

00:22:47.080 Mr. Manning, for folks who are listening and want to get involved and want to tune in, do we have a website yet or how can they find out more information?

00:22:54.880 We're going to post this all over the Taxpayers Federation.

00:22:57.600 They're going to get it from us.

00:22:59.620 It's the albertaandthewest.ca, I believe, is the website.

00:23:05.700 I should be more up on that.

00:23:07.680 That's okay.

00:23:08.700 Okay.

00:23:09.560 Yeah.

00:23:09.740 awesome mr manning thank you so much for your time today okay thank you god bless you once again

00:23:16.140 that is the preston manning i'm actually kind of pinching myself right now that i got to interview

00:23:22.380 mr manning um what do you guys think about this isn't this nourishing to be able to get this kind

00:23:28.620 of input and isn't it encouraging to be able to be told by someone who declared the west wants in

00:23:36.300 has always been dedicated to democracy, has always pushed for the little guy, has always said, you

00:23:42.040 know, we need to be able to have referendums and recall legislation, that he's still fighting for

00:23:47.360 you. I don't know, that just makes me feel so much better. Let me know what you think about the show

00:23:52.500 in the comments. If you have not done so yet, please head on over to Juno News. Subscribe to

00:23:57.920 Juno News because it's independent journalism. We don't get funded by the media. And lastly,

00:24:03.520 subscribe to this YouTube channel, like the video, and most importantly this time,

00:24:09.580 because it's Preston Manning telling folks to get out there and get involved.

00:24:14.220 Share this show with people who need to know.

Juno News - August 27, 2026

Preston Manning on Alberta’s referendum and the fight for the West

Episode Stats

Transcript