The Alberta Roundup with Isaac Lamoureux - August 20, 2022


Smith tells Kenney to stay out of leadership race


Episode Stats

Length

9 minutes

Words per Minute

174.12935

Word Count

1,575

Sentence Count

105

Misogynist Sentences

1

Hate Speech Sentences

1


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hello everyone, welcome back to the Alberta Roundup. I'm your host Rachel Emanuel. Today
00:00:15.860 we're going to be talking about UCP leadership candidate Danielle Smith, who has asked Premier
00:00:20.420 Jason Kenney not to wade into the ongoing leadership contest to replace him. A new blueprint
00:00:25.220 for provincial policing would add hundreds of officers to rural municipalities. Alberta
00:00:29.840 Education Minister Adriana LaGrange has won the UCP nomination in Red Deer North after
00:00:35.080 a challenge this week. A UCP MLA is blaming the COVID-19 restrictions on Calgary MLAs who
00:00:40.840 advocated for them. UCP leadership candidate Travis Teews says assisted dying should not
00:00:45.760 be offered to those suffering from a mental illness. And of course we'll have our update
00:00:49.680 on the UCP leadership race and the Alberta Liberal Party, who attracted no applicants to
00:00:54.760 run in its deadline for party leader last week. All that and more happening now on the Alberta
00:00:59.780 Roundup. Let's get into today's topics. UCP leadership candidate Danielle Smith has asked
00:01:04.980 Premier Jason Kenney not to interfere into the ongoing leadership contest to replace him.
00:01:09.700 On his radio show last weekend, Premier Kenney called Smith's Alberta Sovereignty Act nuts
00:01:15.040 and said it would make Alberta a laughing stock. You guys know what this is, we've talked about
00:01:19.260 it many times before. The Alberta Sovereignty Act would essentially bar federal legislation
00:01:23.520 deemed harmful to Alberta. Smith has pitched it as a means to get major projects built in Alberta
00:01:29.160 again without federal interference. It is a pinnacle piece of her platform promises.
00:01:34.480 In response to Kenney's statement, Smith said his comments are premature,
00:01:38.300 ill-informed, and disrespectful to a large and growing number of UCP members that support this
00:01:43.560 important initiative. Alberta Justice Minister Tyler Shandro has unveiled the government's blueprint
00:01:48.600 for provincial policing, which promises to add hundreds of officers for rural municipalities.
00:01:53.180 The blueprint said a provincial police service would add 275 police officers to the smallest 42
00:02:00.040 detachments. The model also proposes a minimum of 10 frontline police officers per detachment.
00:02:06.160 Currently, there is no minimum for a number of officers and some have as few as three.
00:02:11.440 Minister Shandro told me this week that provincial policing is a conversation happening all over the
00:02:16.160 country right now. He said, quote,
00:02:18.060 And we think that Alberta is on the precipice of being a leading voice in modernizing policing in
00:02:23.560 the country. Alberta Education Minister Adriana LaGrange has won the UCP nomination in Red Deer
00:02:28.460 North. As I previously reported, she was being challenged by popular freedom fighter Andrew Clues,
00:02:33.620 the co-founder of Hold the Line. Hold the Line was a group that helped Albertans during COVID-19
00:02:39.320 restrictions, including to help them resist vaccine coercion. That vote happened in Red Deer on
00:02:45.100 Thursday. I was there for it. The polls closed at 8pm and the results were announced about one hour
00:02:49.760 later. LaGrange won the contest with 298 votes. That's 78 more than Andrew Clues received, but
00:02:55.980 pretty high turnout for a nomination contest. After the victory, LaGrange told me she was very grateful
00:03:01.580 and thankful for the support and that her victory was democracy in action. Let's talk about the
00:03:07.440 controversy of the week. UCP MLA Grant Hunter has said that COVID-19 restrictions came about because
00:03:13.600 Calgary MLAs on the committee overseeing pandemic policy outweighed the number of rural MLAs who did
00:03:19.800 not want restrictions. He made the comments on an unrelated Facebook post in which constituents
00:03:25.180 began responding and asking him why he did not speak out against the restrictions and he was forced
00:03:29.260 to address their comments. He said Calgary and Edmonton wanted the restrictions and so MLAs living in
00:03:35.300 those jurisdictions advocated for them. Those MLAs outweigh the number of rural MLAs on the committee
00:03:40.860 which made decisions about pandemic rules. He also said that the whole caucus was never given
00:03:45.660 the opportunity to vote on restrictions. He wrote, quote, if we were able to vote, I'm confident
00:03:51.140 because the majority of MLAs come from rural Alberta, we would have had a regional approach.
00:03:56.220 Hunter was Alberta's Associate Minister of Red Tape Reduction from April 2019 until July 2021.
00:04:02.640 He also said he was removed from cabinet for fighting against COVID restrictions.
00:04:06.560 What we're watching this week, UCP leadership candidate Travis Tape said assisted dying should
00:04:11.680 not be offered to those suffering from a mental illness. Of course, medical assistance in dying,
00:04:16.640 commonly referred to as MAID, was legalized in 2016. But the Trudeau Liberals recently expanded
00:04:22.100 the eligibility for it. They expanded it to include the disabled, despite every Canadian national
00:04:27.400 disability organization saying they did not want that expansion because it makes the disabled feel as
00:04:32.140 though they are a burden to society and valueless. Yet the Trudeau Liberals took it one step further
00:04:37.260 and they expanded the eligibility to those suffering from a mental illness beginning March 2023.
00:04:42.560 So beginning in March 2023, you would be eligible for assisted dying if you have depression, anxiety.
00:04:49.280 I don't even want to say this out loud because it's so disgusting that this would be considered a
00:04:52.860 treatment option for those people. We should be telling them that there is hope available and that
00:04:57.760 there is a way to recover from these illnesses and to go on to live a happy and normal life.
00:05:02.380 Legalizing and expanding doctor-assisted suicide creates a slippery slope, as evidenced by the
00:05:06.940 shifting conversation to protect those with mental illness, Travis Tape told me this week.
00:05:12.460 Of course, we're having this conversation now because Global News reported earlier this week
00:05:16.800 that a Canadian Forces veteran seeking treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder and a traumatic brain
00:05:22.260 injury was unexpected and casually offered assisted dying by a Veterans Affairs Canada employee.
00:05:29.260 This is just the latest example of the federal government's assisted dying regime gone wrong,
00:05:33.860 and there is certainly no shortage of examples here. The Associated Press recently reported on a
00:05:39.640 recorded audio from a London, Ontario hospital that appeared to show the director of ethics raising the
00:05:45.780 subject of euthanasia with a disabled patient and saying that patient was costing the system,
00:05:50.520 quote, north of $1,500 a day. Travis Tape said, this is immoral and it should be illegal to even
00:05:57.520 mention the cost of services in a conversation about assisted dying. I'm curious to hear what
00:06:03.060 the rest of the UCP leadership candidates have to say about this. Of course, assisted dying falls
00:06:07.380 under the criminal code and as such is federal jurisdiction, but health care is administered by the
00:06:12.040 province. So what solutions, if any, do the other UCP leadership candidates have to offer to the
00:06:17.540 federal government's massively radical assisted dying regime. Let's move on to our UCP leadership
00:06:22.900 race update. Danielle Smith, who is emerging as a frontrunner with recent polls, placing her far
00:06:27.500 ahead of the remaining six candidates, won't seek to represent the riding of Calgary Elbow should there
00:06:32.440 be a by-election this fall. Smith is currently the only candidate in the riding who does not already
00:06:37.300 have a seat in the legislature. And it looked like one might be opening up for her this fall with
00:06:42.360 MLA Doug Schweitzer, who currently represents Calgary Elbow, saying he's going to step down
00:06:46.520 later this month or on another date established close to the time. He's already resigned his
00:06:52.360 cabinet position as a minister of jobs, economy, and innovation. But Smith isn't going to run in
00:06:57.280 this riding which is not a conservative safe seat. She wants to run in Living Cinema Cloud, which is
00:07:01.760 her home since 2011, and also a conservative safe seat. She says she's traditional. She thinks people
00:07:07.100 should run in the riding where they live. However, this seat is currently held by UCP MLA Roger Reed.
00:07:13.260 And even if Smith does win the nomination, Reed would stay in the seat until the next provincial
00:07:17.900 election, which is scheduled for spring 2023. This means that Smith wouldn't have a seat in the
00:07:22.800 legislature for the first six months of her leadership if she wins the premiership on October 6.
00:07:28.280 Let's move on to our funniest moment in Alberta politics this week. Looks like no one is interested to
00:07:33.020 be the leader of the Alberta Liberal Party. Not a single person submitted a nomination to run in
00:07:38.080 the Alberta Party Leadership Contest. That deadline was last Friday at 5 p.m. The party has since removed
00:07:43.340 the leadership section from their website, and they did not respond to my request for comment. But I
00:07:47.520 spoke to former Alberta Liberal Party leader Raj Sherman, who said nobody's interested in running to be
00:07:52.200 leader of the party because it struggled to elect any MLAs in the previous two provincial elections.
00:07:57.520 He's right, of course. In the 2015 election, the Liberals elected just one MLA. And in the most recent
00:08:02.740 2019 election, they did not elect a single MLA to the legislature. So if you're looking to get your
00:08:08.880 start in provincial politics, you could be easily acclaimed as a leader of the Liberal Parties,
00:08:13.580 something you're very interested in, I'm certain. Okay, guys, that's all for today. That's everything
00:08:17.480 I have for you. If you like what we do here at True North, please go to donate.tnc.news and support
00:08:23.960 our work. You can reach me on Facebook and Twitter as always. I look forward to hearing from you,
00:08:28.380 and we'll talk next week.
00:08:32.740 Bye.
00:08:35.640 Bye.
00:08:39.880 Bye.
00:08:42.880 Bye.
00:08:45.480 Bye.
00:08:49.560 Bye.
00:08:51.000 Bye.
00:08:53.000 Bye.
00:08:53.880 Bye.
00:08:55.440 Bye.
00:08:55.640 Bye.
00:08:56.580 Bye.
00:08:57.640 Bye.
00:08:58.640 Bye.
00:08:59.980 Bye.
00:09:00.640 Bye.
00:09:01.640 Bye.
00:09:02.640 Bye.