What does Danielle Smith’s win mean for Alberta？
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Summary
Chris Simms is the Alberta Director with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation (CTF) and has been covering the election of the United Conservative Party of Canada (UCP) for years. She joins me to talk about the election results and what she's looking forward to in the coming years.
Transcript
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i want to welcome into the show here chris sims she is the alberta director with the canadian
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taxpayers federation and obviously has been covering this extensively we saw her with my
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colleague rachel emmanuel on true north uh chris what are your first thoughts on the election
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results uh nice to be on here and it was nice to see you on monday night of course during our big
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election coverage uh we're pretty pleased with the policies that the ucp was promising during the
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campaign so to back up a little bit even before the election the ucp government passed a law saying
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that they would have balanced budgets and that they would rein in their spending and tie it to the rate
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of inflation and population growth now that's a big deal it sounds kind of dry but it's a really
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big deal because that keeps the government from just splurging if they get a big surplus if oil is
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good that year it keeps their spending in check it's something that the ctf has been asking for
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since the 90s like the backstreet boys were topping the charts when we were last asking for this so we
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were super happy to see that they also agreed to seriously pay down the debt in a big way so again
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this is all law this wasn't even something they had to campaign on um they are going to put 50 percent
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of their surplus down on the debt every year uh that's really similar to what the late premier
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ralph klein did when he put 75 percent down that's how he held up that paid in full sign and so we're
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really pleased to see the promises that now that they've made during this election including things
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like strengthening the taxpayer protection act by saying hey you know what if we want to increase your
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personal income taxes or business taxes you need to have a referendum on it first and the government
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needs to win it so there's some pretty serious promises we're seeing so we're pretty happy with
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that yeah let's talk about the referendum aspect because stuff like this i i find it is useful in
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some ways but not in others because governments that want to get around it can get around it i mean
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it's not a constitutional requirement so theoretically a future government could say we're just going to
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change the law requiring the referendum and pass the tax on our own but i guess my hope would be
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that it either reflects or creates a culture where governments in alberta do not look at the
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taxpayers as atms exactly and i think especially in alberta now i'm a transplant our family moved out
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here in the summer from british columbia and i will say one of the biggest differences i've noticed
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here in alberta is the grassroots activism and how engaged people are i mean you can send out an email
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with a heads up of like a few days saying hey come to this pub in red deer if you want to hear about
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balanced budget legislation like the cost of just transition and 200 people will show up like it's
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really remarkable i've never seen anything like it and apparently it's just par for the course here
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in alberta and what's interesting is that right now the taxpayer protection act in alberta is the
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reason why we have no pst it's currently the only element of the taxpayer protection act it is that
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you will have to win government a referendum before you put in a sales tax good luck with that so that's
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why we have no pst so we're hopeful that it'll have that same level of sharp teeth when they expand it
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well and just on that note of direct democracy here and of citizen engagement the kenny government
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also passed i think it was bill 52 if i'm not mistaken which allowed for recall of politicians
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and i think even of specific bills if i'm not mistaken so again you know there's another level
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of democracy if a politician goes against their word goes against their promise there's a a very high
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bar but there is a bar nonetheless that groups of people that get together in red deer and across the
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province can say no we are recalling you because you have failed to uphold your mandate to us as an
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mla that's right and before that the only jurisdiction in canada that had that rule was british columbia
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and it was used almost successfully one time basically the mla realized he was going to get recalled and
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then quit and so it worked well that way and so alberta not to be outdone did pass that law but what's
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really interesting is that they did bc1 better it's extended to city level too they did it as a
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two banger with that with that law so now municipal city councils can get recalled as well it's a really
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important tool like you said the threshold is high you know it's not as if you get a couple of
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disgruntled people in you know red deer somewhere that they're going to pull down the whole government
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but it's that tool in the toolbox it's that little tap on the shoulder so that if an mla or a premier
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or whatnot or a city council or a mayor starts messing exactly or exactly or school trustee starts
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messing around and getting into hot water there's that extra oh man i could lose my job but there's a
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flip side too which i find really interesting and fair it doesn't just fire them it holds a by-election
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so that say there were some group that was really mad about whatever reason and a lot of people
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perceived it as being unfair and they fomented this big campaign and they said let's have a
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by-election hey if that person's voters and that riding says you know what bob did a good job we still
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like bob he can keep his job he just needs to win the by-election and that's happened in the states in a
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couple instances so it's a really interesting tool yeah that that is actually an interesting point and
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i think it's actually quite a valid one i mean there have been arguments in favor of anyone who
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crosses the floor should have to be re-elected under that party's banner and again i mean whether there's
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a legal mechanism that should do that or not is is something that other people can decide but
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but i don't think there should ever be a case where mlas lose sight of what they're there to do
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and i feel oftentimes especially in minority governments where you don't have like the sort
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of damocles over your head there there can be a very easy way for an mla to get there they've got a
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four-year blank check they know that voters aren't going to start paying attention for maybe another
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three years so they can do what they want and certainly at the federal level we've seen that i
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mean what's happened when we've given the government the credit card without a spending limit
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yeah exactly it's that um you've probably seen that cartoon where this the couple is standing there
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and justin trudeau is running around flinging money everywhere and they're one of them's happy
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and then the wife is telling the husband he's got your wallet because he's flinging it everywhere
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yeah i got my climate action ascent of a few weeks back too and i was like oh money i was like
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wait wait i already paid them this is my money exactly it's your money that having been washed
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through levels of bureaucracy thank you very much for your donation um but here in alberta we have
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those swords built in now at every level of government and so we're really happy about it
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and you know the reason why we're happy about it is because the taxpayers federation we're grassroots
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you know we take you know non-refundable you know non-receivable donations we don't take money from
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taxpayers you know we have thousands of supporters across the country most of them are you know small
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town farmers those sort of folks and they often will email us with things like you know i i want lower
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taxes i'm worried about my neighbors because they're using a food bank like really direct
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stuff and so to see this kind of direct democracy and these tools being put in the hands of the people
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of alberta it's just a very good thing i know conservatives uh some conservatives and i use that
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with the capital c here not the lower c have come to fear the ctf because the ctf is unafraid to call out
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when uh so-called conservative politicians go against their their pledges you know aaron o'toole comes to
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mind you know running as the big true blue conservative and then all of a sudden find some
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weird like air miles carbon tax hybrid to run on in 2021 i know you like anyone else in media has
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come across danielle smith on many many avenues uh over the last several years when she was in media
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when she was a business advocate as premier has she been receptive to the issues that ctf has tried
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to put forward very much so uh so like you yes of course uh we've interacted with danielle personally
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over the many i think actually you were there when danielle and i were like concocting uh plans
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for world domination at red lobster or something i was sitting right there at the table i happen to
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remember that conversation and here she is premier can i just take my ctf hat off for just a second
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yeah and just as like a human being it's pretty remarkable like this political comeback she was
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you know all that stuff that happened with wild rose the floor crossing she lost her seat during
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that time and now here we are one year from when i think you and i were talking about this
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and she's elected to a majority with as premier it's a pretty remarkable comeback and i would say the
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same thing if she were wearing like a red or orange jersey just objectively speaking it's a pretty
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remarkable comeback politically here in canada and so to put the ctf hat back on yes she has been very
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receptive interestingly one of the first things we did is we asked all of the ucp leadership candidates
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to sign our pledge promising if i'm premier never ever a pst uh-uh not gonna happen and she signed it
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right away and what's interesting is during the signing and i hadn't mentioned this to her at all
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it was just her kind of nerding out as she would put it she's signing it and she says hey i really
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liked the paper you guys did like 15 years ago where you said if you put enough money into the
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heritage savings fund we could get rid of an income tax like wouldn't that be neat in the future i'm
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just like yeah that would be neat did she write that on the pledge as well because that might have
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been a good appendix to uh to try to bring up with her i should have called her on it and said put a
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pride her on that you know yeah yeah exactly but yeah to you know yes the short answer is yes and
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even during the election campaign they agreed to a lot of things like opening up the taxpayer
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protection act and before that they agreed to balance budget legislation debt repayment saving
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money in the heritage fund a lot of the meat and potato things that the ctf has been asking for
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there's one little thing if we could push it for one more thing we would really like to see put in
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the taxpayer protection act and that's the carbon tax so it's going to sound weird but of course right
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now there's just a federal carbon tax what happens if that gets scrapped what prevents whatever
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provincial politician is here in alberta from creating a provincial one here again it was awful
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when premier rachel notley had sprung one on albertans but they got their say so on that now we're forced
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to pay justin trudeau's mandatory minimum carbon tax and people here really don't like it and so we
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would like one more change to the taxpayer protection act and that is to put a provincial
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carbon tax shield in there yeah that would be a i think a very very good one and if i have the chance
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to sit down with the premier in the coming months i'd like to ask that so do remind me if you get wind
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that she's coming on the show i will before i let you go chris i want to ask you about that ralph
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klein paid in full because i think that it's very difficult to unwind government which is why putting
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a pst in place for example would become permanent i i just know it i know that it's going to become
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very easy for a government to look at the numbers when something like that was in if it were ever in
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and say you know to roll this back would just be too costly uh is it possible to get back to that
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paid in full or has debt just become such an accepted part of doing business now as government
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that there's no real appetite to make those tough calls anymore that's a great question and again i
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would say the same thing if the numbers were there for an ndp or liberal government but here in alberta
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the debt clock is going backwards like i've never seen it happen before so rewind about six or eight
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months or so ago uh the government at the time before the election put down the biggest one-time
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payment on the debt so they got a surplus they had some savings they had some money to actually use
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and instead of just blowing it now i'm sure they wasted money on the margins here and there that we
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haven't found yet but they put a big chunk down on the debt and so now the debt again it's an
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astronomical number it's around 73 billion dollars but it's going down they're reducing the debt and
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they already passed legislation saying 50 of the cash surplus must now go down on the debt
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or they'll penalize themselves or you know we're allowed to chase them around in a fiber costume or
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i can bicycle lock my neck to their leg like you know we we will make them keep their promises and so
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here uh debt is on the radar uh i don't think that's quite broken through at the federal level yet
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like the the folks in the parliamentary press gallery aren't really paying attention to that yet
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but i'll tell you when that debt servicing cost also known as your interest payment on the federal
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debt eclipses line items like national defense or health care or something like that they'll start
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paying attention then do you guys have i you lived in ontario previously i know so you may know this do
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you guys have the uh an alberta equivalent of the ontario opportunities fund which is this stupid
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thing in ontario where you can like voluntarily donate your tax refund to pay down the provincial
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debt oh which is like mike harris did it and i'm like apparently it gets like i don't know forty
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thousand dollars a year or something but i'm like but in alberta i might actually trust that the
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government would be responsible with that in ontario i don't i was never going to give kathleen
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win my tax refund or anything here's a bag with no no hole on the end of it right yeah um but yeah
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yeah promise but probably um but in all seriousness anyone can make a donation they would just have to
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contact the treasury board yeah it's for real find out their direct deposit or their mailing address
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and give money to them in fact i don't recommend that ever no no i'm not but it's like i really believe
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in alberta and i want alberta to be able to do that again because it sets the standard for every other
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province in the country that you don't get to just run your government and run your affairs on debt
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and pretend that that's the only way of doing things yeah exactly and it's it's an example i
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actually give to a lot of folks when i'll be online or whatever and post something like hey we've got tax
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cuts or reductions here and they're like i'm happy paying more taxes and i'm like well here's the
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address of revenue canada feel free you know take my portion and so so we're we're very hopeful
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but we're also practical they made a lot of big promises during this campaign so we're going to
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have to work really hard on the ctf side of things to hold them accountable for those promises and we
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will all right chris sims from the canadian taxpayers federation good seeing you monday thanks for
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popping in today really appreciate it thank you thanks for listening to the andrew lawton show
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support the program by donating to true north at www.tnc.news