What would an INDEPENDENT ALBERTA really look like？ (with Bruce Pardy)
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Summary
Candice Malan talks about the war of words between the premiers in Alberta and Saskatchewan, and why it's important to keep the country together. She also talks about a new guest, Bruce Parry, who joins the show to join her on the show.
Transcript
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Hi, I'm Candice Malcolm, and this is the Candice Malcolm Show. Thank you so much for joining
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us. We have a great episode. I'm really excited. We have Bruce Party joining the program a
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little later on. I want to start, though, by talking about something we talked on the
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show yesterday, and things have just escalated a little more. So I want to go through this
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quickly. And I'm talking about the battle of the premiers, the sort of war of words
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that's happening right now between the more progressive left-wing premiers like David
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Eby in British Columbia and Doug Ford in Ontario. And yes, I'm sorry, Doug Ford, you
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now fall into the more liberal progressive premiers because of what's going on in the
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country. And they're fighting against the more conservative, independent-minded premiers
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like Alberta, Danielle Smith, and Saskatchewan, Scott Moe. So they dragged Scott Moe into this
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and speaking to reporters, kind of trying to drill him on what his position is. We talk
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a lot about Alberta independence, but people in Saskatchewan feel, you know, just equally
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as burned by the feds and equally as disappointed in the outcome of the recent election. As,
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they're brothers in Alberta. So here is Scott Moe responding to the question on the pathway
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Would you vote to leave? Would you vote to stay?
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It is my job to put a question to the people of Saskatchewan. If people in Saskatchewan
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trigger the legislation for plebiscite, it's the job of the government then to formulate a
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question for the people of Saskatchewan. Now, you're getting way over your skis with respect
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to what that process might be or what that process might entail.
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And so he's right. You know, it's not up to the premier to say, hey, we're done,
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we're going to leave. In Canada, this is all spelled out in the constitution. This is all
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spelled out because of a Supreme Court case that has decided that, yes, provinces have
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the right to succeed. They have to meet certain thresholds and they have to answer a clear
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question. And so, yes, there's been a lot of talk about Alberta and them possibly going
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it alone. Well, Saskatchewan has the same process. They have the same constitutional legal rights
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governing them. And Scott Moe just very clearly points that out. Now, on the other side,
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we have British Columbia Premier David Eby calling on Premier Smith and Moe to push back
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strongly against any kind of separation, separatist sentiments by that clip.
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I understand. You know, you've got a couple of conservative premiers in Saskatchewan and Alberta.
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Their preferred candidate was not successful in the federal election. They have strong bases of
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support for the conservatives in those provinces. They're navigating tricky waters. But I certainly
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encourage them all, Premier Smith, Premier Moe, and I believe that they're on board for this,
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to work together for the good of the country, to hold the country together, and to push back
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It's interesting because this whole idea that people in Alberta and British Columbia or people
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in Alberta and Saskatchewan are just being poor sports, like their candidate didn't win,
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oh boohoo, like pick it together and let's all go ahead with Team Canada, is just so missing the
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point. It's so surface level, right? It's like the idea that these two provinces and thankfully people
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all over Canada have just been blatantly disrespected by the federal government for over a decade and that
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other people in other parts of the country have decided to double down on this. Like I said this
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throughout the election. I thought it was an incredibly important election and that we were
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faced with a fork in the road and I don't like the way that our country is going. You know,
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the saving grace for me is that it's a minority government. I do believe we'll be at another
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election in another two years. Maybe that one will be the most important election of our lifetime.
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But if we keep doubling down on this path of just ruin, like economic ruin, we're heading towards
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poverty, we're heading just towards an economic collapse, socialism, big government, everything is
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taking over. It's changing the mindset of Canadians. It's just not a good path.
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And if saying enough is enough, you know, that's not like being any kind of like a traitor to your
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country. That is actually standing up for your people and for what is best for everyone. So going
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back to Ontario, Premier Doug Ford, we played the back and forth with him and Danielle Smith
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yesterday. Well, later in the day, yesterday on Wednesday, he sort of clarified and struck a
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slightly more reconciliatory tone saying that he does support the people of Alberta and Saskatchewan
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and that he's it's there's not the big rift that people are playing it up to be able to play that
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clip. We get along. I think there's this big, big misnomer that we don't get along. I could call her up
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right now and say, you know, come to Toronto, we'll be going out for lunch. So there's not this big rift that
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everyone's playing out. You know, I just want to support the people of Alberta and Saskatchewan. They've been
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ignored for for a decade now. And I support them. It's as simple as that. So just to remind you,
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this is what Danielle Smith said the previous day on Tuesday, talking about for she also said they
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have a great friendship, that they have a constructive friendship, but that she doesn't
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tell him how to run his province. He shouldn't run tell her how to run her provinces. Play this clip
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now at Wealthsimple.com. Well, Doug and I have a great friendship. We don't agree on everything. In
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fact, I think we supported different people in the last federal election. And so we don't have to
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agree on everything. But what I will say is we have a constructive conversation at the cough table.
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I continue to look forward to having a constructive conversation with him at the cough table.
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But he's the Premier of Ontario. I'm the Premier of Alberta. We just have different issues that we
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have to respond to in our respective jurisdictions. I don't tell him how he should run his province,
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and I would hope that he doesn't tell me how I should run mine. But we have a
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very respectful relationship, and I hope that continues.
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And so, of course, Premier Smith is not herself a separatist. She's said that many times.
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But again, in Canada, our constitutional order and previous Supreme Court decisions have meant
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that Canadian provinces do have the right to separate. There is a pathway. And of course,
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as someone who respects democracy and just wants what's best for the people of Alberta,
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she would be willing to do what the people basically tell her to do. And so I find this
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topic of Alberta independence, Alberta separatism, really interesting. In some ways, it's sort of
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like, you know, people have just had enough of Canada, they've had enough of this liberal
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government, and driving our country into the ground to totally disrespecting individual rights and
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freedoms, our heritage and our tradition as Canadians, and, you know, pushing this sort of like
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left-wing global, globalist, utopian, environmentalist scheme onto all of us. Let's go it alone.
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And on the other side, it's kind of optimistic. It's like, hey, we can build something better
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and determine our own future and build something that will make us truly free. And so to talk a
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little bit more about this idea of Alberta independence, I want to bring on Bruce Party.
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Bruce is a professor of law at Queen's University, a legal scholar with the Fraser Institute,
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a senior fellow. And so I had Bruce on this show back in February. He wrote an essay calling for
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an Alberta Declaration of Independence. Isn't this interesting? So three months ago,
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before all of this stuff was flaring up, before the Alberta Accord, which Alberta Premier Daniel
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Smith recently announced, we went through this on the show, basically just calling out the federal
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government and making it very clear all of the demands that Alberta has for the future, that
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Alberta requires basically economic freedom and the ability to get its products to market and
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end to equalization payments and stopping subsidizing other big, rich provinces, all totally
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reasonable things. You know, it seems that every few years or maybe after the last few Justin Trudeau
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victories in Ottawa, there has been a bigger and bigger separatist movement. And then it kind of
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goes away. And then it comes back. I think if Pierre Polyev had won the election, it wouldn't be
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flaring up quite so much. But because we got another liberal government with Mark Carney, it seems to be
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back. So Bruce, first, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for joining us. Why don't you walk us
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through your essay and walk us through the sort of timeline of independence for Alberta and Western
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sort of separatism? Yeah, it's been very interesting to watch. And the election, of course, was perhaps
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a, you know, you put it as a fork in the road or a threshold. You know, you could probably tell ahead
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of time that if there was one outcome, things would die down. If it was a different outcome than when we
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actually got, that things would ramp up. And that's, that's what's happened. And that's predictable.
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You're right about the back and forth over time. And one of the dangers here for Alberta is that
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they will forget that old saying that goes, when people tell you who they are, believe them.
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Because Canada, and especially the federal government, has told Alberta over and over again, what it really
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is. And yet the inclination, and understandably, on the part of Albertans, is to go back again, and say, well,
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let's try this one more time. You know, please do the following things and make us happy. And if you do,
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then we'll stay. But they've demonstrated, the federal government now has demonstrated quite a
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number of times already, that it's not really interested. And it might be that Albertans have
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more faith in both the country and in the federal government than, than the real picture actually
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deserves. So, and there's an irony here as well. That there's a big picture going on. A lot of
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Albertans perceive, I think, that the dispute with the federal government is all about money. And to an
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extent, it is. The federal government is, is, uh, obstructing Alberta's primary industries. It is,
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uh, uh, Alberta has always been the, the, the, the payer into equalization. In, in, in these and many
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other ways, it is, in fact, about money in the sense that the federal government is making Albertans
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poorer, or at least not as wealthy as they ought to be. But there's a much bigger picture going on.
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If you like, the conflict between Alberta and the federal government reflects a larger conflict,
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even an ideological conflict, between two different visions of the way governments and
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countries and societies are supposed to work. Now, I don't want to overplay this because, you know,
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you could, it, there's all obviously nuance and gray and so on. So, but, but, but symbolically,
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you could put it this way. The irony here is that Alberta at the moment with its separatist
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inclinations is the nationalist entity and the federal government are the globalists, right? And so the,
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the, the, the response to the Alberta inclination to separate that goes, you know, you, you are being
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a traitor to your country. Well, it's actually probably the reverse. It is the Albertans who want
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to separate, who are concerned about the forces that have taken over this country, the country that
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they thought that they knew, the country that they thought that they knew and are discovering that
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it's not that country at all. What Albertans want is for Canada to be the country that they have in
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their heads. And that country is one that is, uh, governed by the rule of law. It's a capitalist
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country. It's a country that is, uh, free enough for you to find your own way, to apply your own skills
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and to apply your own determination and to earn what you can. The fact of the matter is that that
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is really not the country that Canada is now. It may have been at one time. It's not Canada now. Canada
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And if Alberta's asks are essentially asking the federal government to make Canada not a socialist
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progressive country, that's not going to happen because those ideas are now deeply embedded in the,
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in the Canadian fabric, if you like, in the way the constitution's been interpreted in the way the
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federal government behaves. Even equalization, as an example, equalization, the idea of equalization
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is in the constitution. The constitution says, not, not, not the specifics, not the particular policies,
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but the idea of equalization is in the 1982 constitution. It, it embeds as a constitutional principle,
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the socialist idea that money will be taken from some areas and given to other areas. It is a
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constitutional mandate for redistribution of wealth, right? So if Alberta thinks, well, we're going to
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come in and we're going to fix this because, you know, we're upset, that's not going to happen
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because the country, unfortunately, is now built on these kinds of ideas. And so it won't be able to
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function if it, if it, uh, if it accepts those, those requests. I, I agree that I think Danielle
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Smith's requests in the Alberta Accord are very unlikely to be met by Mark Carney and the liberals.
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Like it's basically saying, imagine if conservatives had been elected over the last 10 years and done
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all the things that they had promised to do, not even the things that they would have been actually
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able to do, but all the things that an ideological conservative, uh, would have wanted to do. It's
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interesting. I watched, I recently watched Jordan B. Peterson's video on Mark Carney sort of talking
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about why he thinks Canada is in deep trouble and basically talks about how Mark Carney's values as
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laid out in his book values are not Canadian values, right? They are progressive, environmentalist,
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lefty values. I think this was the thing that used to drive me crazy about Justin Trudeau is that he
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purported to be Mr. Canada and his Canadian values were fundamentally different than my Canadian values.
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I don't recognize Canadian values. That's my point. That's my point. I think this is,
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I think this is a mistake. It's not, it's not just Carney and it's not just Trudeau.
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Those values you're talking about here, here, here is the uncomfortable possibility.
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Those values you're referring to are Canadian values. Those have become Canadian values. We just had an
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election and 60, well, you could put it, you could, you could put it two ways. You could say that,
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you know, either 60% of the, of the people who voted, voted for a progressive socialist party, or,
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or you could say, well, almost a hundred percent of voters voted for a, some kind of a progressive
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party because most of the parties running were, have progressive policies. No, all the parties,
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all the parties are running. You're right. There, there, there was no traditional conservative
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party running. So that idea, and I, and I'm on the same page as you, that I would like Canada to
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not be what you're describing. I would like Canada to be a country that does not embrace the set of
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values that you referred to. But I'm afraid that it is. I mean, we, we saw this, we saw what Canada really
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was, for example, during COVID. And that was not a mirage. That was, that was pulling back the curtain.
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And so we have to deal with the reality that the country is not what we would like it to be. And
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the question that follows is, is it productive to try to change it into that which we imagine it ought to
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be or to accept the reality that we've now been confronted with and decide, well, I'm speaking
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now of Alberta to decide, you know what, this just isn't going to work anymore. We have tried.
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And you'll note, you'll note the kind of response that, that, uh, the sentiments in Alberta are
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receiving compared to the sentiments, the separate sentiments from Quebec long ago. Okay. Again,
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I don't want to, to, to, to overgeneralize, but you could put it this way.
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When Quebec long said, you know, we aren't happy.
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The response sometimes was, well, we're sorry you're unhappy. What can we do to help?
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Because we want you to stay. The, the, the, the central Canada federal, and even sometimes
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Albertan, um, response to separatist sentiments has been not, we're sorry, you're, you're unhappy.
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How can we fix it? It's how dare you? It is an accusation of betrayal. And, and that is,
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I think a, a gauge of the, of, of one of the differences between this conflict as it unfolds
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and the one that happened with respect to Quebec. Well, I, it's interesting because I think
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many people just because Quebec has its own language and they have a French speaking culture
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that they are seen as being culturally distinct. And it's interesting the way you're framing it,
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that because of like almost a commitment to more conservative, free market, liberal values,
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like small L liberal, classical liberal from 150 years ago values, uh, when the country was founded,
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um, that, that, that Alberta in some way is a distinct society as well. But I wonder, Bruce,
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like, is, is that really the case? I mean, you know, we just talked about how you could say,
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you could argue that both, uh, that every single political party running in the Canadian election
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was in some ways progressive, like none of them hold, uh, traditional Christian values. Um,
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not, none of the candidates running, even for the more libertarian or conservative parties,
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they, they, they didn't have anyone who was pro-life for instance. And, and, and yet like,
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you know, in, in Alberta, I, I wonder, like I lived in Edmonton for four years. I have a lot of friends
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who live in Calgary. It's, it's also a rather progressive place in many ways that I believe at this
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point, the separatist sentiment is somewhere floating around 30%. So I, I worry that even in conservative,
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the bastion of conservatism in the heartland of Canada, that this, this toxic sort of ideology,
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the thing that you and I are talking about in that we, in our careers, in our lives, we fight
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against, um, that it's, it's such a stranglehold around our society that, that, you know, even,
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even a movement like this wouldn't create the sort of, you know, a better path for people who are,
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are worried about, uh, this ideology. I think it's a fair point. I think it's going to be a test,
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right? And here's one of my favorite tests for Albertans. So part of the
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sentiment around this issue is the idea that they want to be free. They want, you want Alberta to be
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a free country, if you like, certainly a free province and, and fair enough. Good for them.
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But the test is, all right. So does that mean that you agree that socialized medicine has to go? In
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other words, free countries don't have single payer healthcare systems. And the danger is this,
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that Albertans will perceive that their problems are a lie specifically with a particular federal
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government and its specific policies. Well, as opposed to the, the, the large trends and features
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of Canada as a country. Now, one of those features, of course, is our socialized system of medicine
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and people get used to what they get used to. If you really want a free place to live, whether it's
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a province or a country, independent country, if you really mean that word free, then you do not mean
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a system of medical care that is run and controlled and paid for by the government. And so this is one of
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the things I like to ask the Albertans who, who profess a determination to be independent and free
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to say, does that include your healthcare? And when they say, well, we need to help,
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we need to keep our healthcare. Then my response is, well, then you don't really mean it. You don't
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really mean what it is that you're saying, or you're, you mean it is a completely different thing
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than the word suggests. Right. And so how is it then like, if someone, I mean, you, you wrote this,
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you're not yourself from Alberta, you're from Ontario, you live in Ontario. Uh, but you know,
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like we said, back in February, you wrote this declaration of independence for Alberta, where
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you believe that it is time for them to just cut ties, cut loose and start something new. Um, so can
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you walk us through like why you think that and whether you think it's something that could possibly
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happen? Yes, sure. So if you, if you go back to the time of the American, um, uh, revolutionary war
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and declaration of independence for them at that time, they wanted the Canadians as they then were
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to join them, to get out from under the thumb of the British crown. And the Canadians of course said,
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no, they, they, they wanted to be subjects. And so if you like the, the, the, the founding story
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of these two countries are diametrically opposed. I mean, America's is life, liberty, pursuit of
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happiness, independence. And the, the Canadians origin story is obedience, deference to authority,
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not to rock the boat. Canada, if you like, exists to, to, to resist the Americans. We have maintained
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that idea underneath our skin ever since. Uh, and so a lot of people in Canada and especially in the West
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have this idea that has been sort of unconsciously adopted from the Americans,
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that their constitutional order is about individual autonomy too.
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But it really isn't. I mean, the Americans are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
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And the Canadians are peace, order, and good government. That is deference to authority.
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So you're dealing with two different ideas. And in many ways, my, my sense is, and I, you're quite
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right. I'm, I'm not from Alberta. I'm from Ontario, but I, but from a distance, it looks to me like
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Albertans think more like Americans in these terms than they do like many Canadians.
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Well, it's really interesting when we think of Canada as a country in the history and the idea
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that Canadians are literally just loyalists who are fighting against this idea of the American
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Revolution. But, but it would be for me, I'm from Western Canada, I grew up in Vancouver,
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and I'm, uh, I think I had like a fifth or sixth generation Vancouver person, um, on at least part
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of my family. And it's interesting when you go back far enough in the history of British Columbia,
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like the, the, the, that didn't, that wasn't originally part of Canada, right? And, and,
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and the original settlements by the British, the, it actually went all the way down to the Columbia
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River. So it was part, it was, it was its own separate entity before, and it was because Sir
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John A. MacDonald promised the railway that British Columbia decided to join in with Canada rather than
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the United States, and they moved the border. And for Alberta, I mean, I was in, I was at the
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University of Alberta in, uh, 2005 when they celebrated the centennial, the 100th anniversary of
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Alberta joining the Confederation, joining Canada in 1905. That's not a very long time. Like that's,
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that's a blink of an eye in terms of, and so, you know, this idea that, that just because, you know,
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Canada was the one that, you know, claimed all this territory and convinced these provinces, uh,
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to join them rather than the United States, that necessarily that was the right decision or the
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decision that will stand until the end of time. Like it's, it's, it's very much as a short period in
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history. And so it's interesting to think of, well, maybe that's not actually the best fit.
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And maybe there is a better arrangement, not necessarily that these places should be part of
00:24:41.540
the United States. Maybe they just have a different milieu and a different ethos than
00:24:46.580
Eastern Canada, or maybe, maybe it's all been merged together in the modern world. And so,
00:24:50.180
you know, the, the idea of the Laurentian elite controlling Canada, you know, there's a little
00:24:54.580
mini Laurentian elite that operate in Vancouver and in Calgary and in Edmonton and probably in
00:25:00.020
Saskatoon as well. I don't know, but in, you know, that, that, that mindset, the people who
00:25:04.420
are glued to the CBC and they hear propaganda day and night, um, you know, those people have
00:25:09.540
internalized this sort of anti-Americanism that does define Canada. I mean, when Justin Trudeau
00:25:14.820
went on his sort of post, uh, resignation, uh, media tour in the United States, he kept repeating this,
00:25:20.420
that Canadian identity is just not being American. That's it. Not American.
00:25:24.420
That's right. And he wasn't far off. That's, this is, this is, this is the thing. I mean,
00:25:31.700
people love default all the, all the crazy things that Justin Trudeau has ever said, but, but that
00:25:36.660
statement is actually not too far off. I mean, uh, forget who it was who said it now, but, but somebody
00:25:42.420
once said that a Canadian is someone who asks, what is a Canadian? And, and one of the best answers
00:25:49.300
is if somebody who's not American, uh, cause that, again, going back to the origin story,
00:25:53.940
that's part of the origin story of the, of the place, but, you know, back to BC and Alberta,
00:25:58.500
I mean, it's not too late. It's not too late for the people in those places to decide that it was a
00:26:03.860
bad call that to reorganize yourselves because you find you are, you are, you are. So let's put,
00:26:10.260
let's try an analogy. Here's a metaphor. Canada is like a family and there's, there are tensions in
00:26:18.580
our constitutional architecture. On the one hand, the federal government and the provinces
00:26:25.300
are supposed to be as a equal, equal powers, uh, with, uh, sovereignty over their particular heads
00:26:36.500
of power as, as identified in the constitution. In other words, they are an equal level to each other
00:26:44.420
and they each exercise their own powers. That's, that's, that's, that's one view or one way to, um,
00:26:51.220
to, to, to imagine it. The tension is though, that the, in other respects, the federal government is seen
00:26:59.220
as the parent and the provinces are seen as the children. And you can see that in various ways, like, for
00:27:06.980
example, uh, in the paramount doctrine and in the fact that the federal government is the one that
00:27:13.700
appoints all the judges to the highest courts, including to the provincial courts. So the federal
00:27:18.500
government is appointing the highest courts to the provincial courts of appeal, for example.
00:27:24.500
And that's the way for the federal government tends to behave. So for example, with respect to the
00:27:28.100
carbon tax, they've said, well, we have to do this because you know, the provinces won't do it on
00:27:33.540
their own. So, and of course, over time, the Supreme Court of Canada has had a, I think it's fair to
00:27:40.420
say an inclination towards a federalist centralized, um, point of view rather than the reverse. Okay.
00:27:48.820
So you have these, these, these two ideas and here's the thing, this parent, the federal government
00:27:57.460
has 10 children and has its favorites and Alberta is not one of them. I don't need to tell you who
00:28:08.420
the favorite child is. It's a child that gets a lot of Alberta's money and refuses to have any pipelines.
00:28:15.060
And it's not going to be effective for Alberta as a child to go to the parent and say, you know,
00:28:22.980
this is no good. You know, please change all this. Please change everything you do because we're
00:28:28.500
unhappy. That's not going to change who the favorite child is. It's not going to change the basic
00:28:36.020
parameters and assumptions and premises of the country. And so I, I have a little
00:28:46.020
my expectations are very low for this attempt to go back again and say, please,
00:28:52.020
because that hasn't worked in the past. There's no particular reason why it should work now.
00:28:58.020
Well, that's sort of a grim, uh, note to end the conversation on there, Bruce. Um, I, I, you know,
00:29:04.260
in some ways I find the Alberta independence discussion and movement exciting. Like it seems to
00:29:10.260
have a purpose and maybe a promise for a better future. Obviously for those of us that are attached
00:29:15.940
to Canada as a country and, you know, the, the, the, the patriotism that comes with Canada,
00:29:20.660
it would be sad to see the, you know, productive, more conservative part of the country just up and
00:29:26.900
leave. What would it mean for the rest of Canada? I mean, I don't, I don't know that I would really
00:29:31.700
want to live in that country, uh, to, to be perfectly honest, if there was no countervailing force
00:29:35.700
to the globalists as you described. So I don't know what would happen after that, but I do find
00:29:40.020
it to be an interesting, uh, conversation. Any, any final thoughts on this? Yes. Well, so this is,
00:29:46.020
is one of the hopes of, of the rest of us who are not in Alberta, that Alberta in pursuing its own
00:29:52.900
interest, which it ought to do, could be the catalyst for actually being able to change the country.
00:29:59.380
So if Alberta resolved to leave and whether it actually did or, or not, that would throw
00:30:06.820
potentially the country into turmoil and turmoil is what we need in the sense that if you simply
00:30:12.660
ask nicely, nothing's going to happen. But if you actually go and do it, then the, the, the, the way
00:30:21.940
that the country operates will become not feasible anymore. And that's the, the impetus I think we
00:30:29.220
need for actual real change. Well, that's, uh, that's super interesting and, uh, appreciate your
00:30:34.340
thoughts on this. We're going to have you, uh, back again for another segment on the tariffs and what
00:30:38.740
Canada, the correct response, uh, to Donald Trump and the tariffs are. But, uh, thanks for this
00:30:43.460
conversation, Bruce. Really appreciate it. All right, folks. Thank you so much. We'll be back again.
00:30:47.220
I'm Candace Malcolm. This is Candace Malcolm Show. Thank you and God bless.