00:00:13.240Well, it's never a dull moment in Alberta politics.
00:00:16.940I said on someone else's show yesterday that Alberta politics is the exception to Paul Wells' dictum that the most boring outcome is the most likely.
00:01:17.340You didn't use quite that strong a language, but in a statement you released after the vote, you know, I want to fairly paraphrase what you're saying.
00:01:26.160You said that people, you know, the people have spoken and the UCP is taking its marching orders from that mandate in the referendum, which is a more strong and sovereign Alberta within the United Canada.
00:01:38.240And it's OK. People could have voted on either side of that debate.
00:01:41.360But that if people cannot essentially get in line with the way the party is moving on this, which is a federalist direction, maybe a decentralized federalist direction, but federalist, then perhaps they should join another party.
00:01:58.060You did say that candidates for the party, MLAs for the party, and even people serving on constituency associations and boards all need to be on board with this.
00:02:08.220um is that meaning that if uh if people in the party still want to speak openly for
00:02:16.880another referendum maybe not immediately but at some point in the future potentially
00:02:21.900does that fall outside of uh the direction you've given for if these people have a place
00:02:27.720in the party or not well i can't i can't tell what's going to happen in the future but i i can
00:02:31.560tell you that uh we won't be having another referendum on this because uh the people have
00:02:36.480spoken. I don't, we could have the referendum tomorrow and I wouldn't expect the result to be
00:02:40.700any different. 75% of people have said that they want us to work on fixing the relationship
00:02:46.020with Canada within the current constitutional and political framework. So you have to have
00:02:51.100some certainty about what you're going to put forward to the people in the next campaign.
00:02:55.540And we can't have any uncertainty about our willingness to listen and hear and respect the
00:03:00.760results of what we get in the citizen initiated referenda. I mean, that's always been the deal
00:03:05.140in conservative politics is that we, we, if we can't agree on a policy issue, we don't put it
00:03:09.880in our policy book, but there is a mechanism to put it to the people. But I think the corollary
00:03:14.120to that is when the people have spoken, you also have to listen to them too. And if I look through
00:03:18.780writing by writing by writing, I don't, I haven't, I don't know if all of the final results have come
00:03:23.500in, but I think it was only two writings that, that went marginally on the, on the option two
00:03:29.300side. Technically Notley voted for independence. I just want to put that on the record. Notley
00:03:35.120voted for independence central peace not lee but doesn't that tell you something that says to me
00:03:39.180that if you want to be a representative that has credibility you have to be able to go to the people
00:03:43.480and say hey if you vote for me i will represent you faithfully and if you've rejected what they've
00:03:48.180just told you then it becomes uh pretty difficult to have that credibility so yeah i think it's very
00:03:52.960reasonable for me to say if you want to be a representative you have to accept the the results
00:03:57.240from question 10 and if you want to be a representative on on our provincial board as
00:04:01.320well, because as you know, board elections are coming up. We can't have this, an internal divide
00:04:06.540going over this as if we're going to be debating it again and again. We've got to focus on the
00:04:11.000things that are going to be forming a party platform to get us elected. This is not one of
00:04:17.960them. Yeah, I can certainly see that for, you know, maybe some of the voices agitating for,
00:04:23.220we just need another do-over right now, and it'll somehow be different than this. I can see that.
00:04:27.780But, you know, at some point, again, it's a kind of a hypothetical, but maybe if someone wanted to run as a candidate or someone want to start to stand for the party board or in a constituency and they openly say, well, OK, we accept the results.
00:04:43.680But at some point in the future, in different circumstances, perhaps this could be in the cards. If someone was to say something along those kinds of lines, accepting the results now, but not closing the door for all time in the future, would that count, though, as falling outside the guidelines you've established here?
00:05:04.860I would prefer for people to make a commitment that they're going to respect the results of what Albertan's told us.
00:05:25.020And that's still, I think, a varied life, especially now that I've seen the less amount of enthusiasm there was for the other constitutional questions.
00:05:33.040The fact that 62% voted that they want that to be a priority for me, well, it's a priority for me.
00:05:38.240And I'm sure that there will be other issues.
00:05:40.280And I think it would be far more constructive for us to identify why is that 25% still disaffected?
00:05:47.520Because we made a lot of strides on fixing the nine bad laws, on getting pipelines built again, on being able to build natural gas power plants.
00:05:57.700So what are the other things that we have to do in order to convince that group of voters that Canada can work?
00:06:03.980That's what I've got to hear from our members.
00:06:06.080And that's what I want to want to work on.
00:06:08.000But I think we have to do it within the construct of what we have under our Constitution and what we have under our political laws with our relationship with Canada.
00:06:16.200Well, OK, that's where I want to explore a bit more here.
00:06:18.840I was disappointed to see the constitutional questions defeated here.
00:06:24.000But my own feeling is that I always thought it was perhaps not a great idea to have a vote on constitutional amendments at the same time as you're voting on independence.
00:06:33.900That they're, you know, one, you should maybe try before another.
00:06:37.520But I think a lot of hardline federalists voted, as they perceived it, the straight ticket.
00:06:42.540They would see if I'm voting for the federalist side of the independence referendum, I'm therefore also going to vote for the pro-federal control all the way down.
00:06:53.260And then some of the nutters on the independent side saying decline the nine as well. So maybe it was a fair bit of both. So I'm actually not convinced that that was a fair representation of of public opinion. But that is the result. And the result is the result. But I don't think it actually is a real representation of public opinion, especially just a few years ago, 60 percent voted for equalization from the Constitution.
00:07:14.940The advice in the column I wrote yesterday was that the independence movement should try to refocus itself into the broader sovereignty movement, which is a broader movement that by some definitions might include you because you've talked about a sovereign Alberta within a united Canada.
00:07:32.980So that's a bigger tent, pushing a sovereignty agenda, which means constitutional reform, and there's different ways that could look, and also internal sovereignty.
00:07:41.580You know, I made the point that, you know, it's a bit much to ask people to establish an Alberta armed forces if we haven't yet established an Alberta police force, although you have made some progress with the Alberta sheriffs. There's some direct some progress in that direction. There hasn't been a ton of progress on an Alberta pension plan. However, you've talked the referendum, you obtained the mandate to move forward on some immigration questions that that is, again, maximizing internal sovereignty under the current constitutional framework.
00:08:08.860So there's kind of the two for the two tracks here. One is internal sovereignty under the current constitutional arrangement that we should maximize. And the other one would be constitutional reform. One you could do probably a bit easier than the other. But I'll break it into two parts. First, on internal sovereignty.
00:08:27.000um how hard are you prepared to go on things like alberta pension plan and alberta police force
00:08:33.260and uh well actually i think you've already indicated on immigration that you're willing to
00:08:37.560to go there so maybe i'll leave that part out that's already kind of decided but yeah on police
00:08:41.340force and alberta pension plan how hard are you willing to go on maximizing internal sovereignty
00:08:46.180well i would i would say if we put alberta pension plan on this last ballot it would have failed
00:08:50.340there's there's no question in my mind yeah and so i i guess the to your point someone needs to
00:08:56.140be out there making the case for why it is we would be better off with an Alberta pension plan.
00:09:01.060And I think Alberta Prosperity Project started there, but I don't think that they were collecting
00:09:05.080signatures to put that on the ballot. It's a shame. It would have been nice if we'd had that
00:09:09.780public discussion, but I don't like putting forward questions that I know are going to fail
00:09:15.060because once something failed, it becomes very difficult to ever bring it back again. And I
00:09:19.280still think that there's a potential, if we could ever get the number from the federal government
00:09:23.600and people understood what it would mean for their contributions as well as their benefits
00:09:27.420and what it would mean for the investment, there's a potential that that would win some hearts and minds.
00:09:31.360So there's some more work that needs to be done on that.
00:09:33.340But I have also committed that in legislation that if once we get those numbers,
00:09:37.640it would have to go to a referendum of the people to get an affirmation on that.
00:09:41.000Because, you know, everybody's got their own tax dollars.
00:09:43.920They have to look at their own context.
00:09:45.920They have to look at their own concerns and see if it makes sense for them.
00:09:48.920At the moment, I don't think that there's a majority support for that.
00:09:53.100When it comes to provincial police, the reason I didn't put that forward is 80% of people are already governed by a municipal police force, even more now that Grand Prairie just this week announced that they were getting rid of the RCMP two years early, and now they've got a municipal police force as well.
00:10:07.560And there are others that are contacting us because they want sheriff's detachments.
00:10:11.140And so we will slowly but surely be working with every municipality that wants to make that choice.
00:10:15.820And I think the more that look at the economics of it and the level of policing that they'll get that will be improved, I think you'll see more and more do that.
00:10:22.600And at some future point, we'll have to make a decision if we're going to continue the contract with the RCMP after 2032.
00:10:29.820But we're certainly moving in the direction of giving more policing options.
00:10:33.360If we put it to a vote, why should Calgary and Everton that aren't policed by the RCMP get to decide that those of us in rural Alberta who are can't have a municipal police force that's more responsive to us as well?
00:10:44.960And then immigration. I'm very pleased that we got a mandate, although it's kind of a go slow or go cautiously forward on this one. I think we've got a pretty strong mandate to be able to talk about having citizenship when you go to vote. I hope people know what that means. It means everybody's got to get their passport in order or go and get their driver's license that has the new Canadian moniker on it, because we'll be acting on that one for the next provincial election.0.85
00:11:10.440And then developing an agreement with the federal government, similar to what Quebec has had since 1991, where we get to have more autonomy over what an Alberta work permit would look like, what a pathway is to permanent residency, what the numbers of people are in the different programs that we offer.
00:11:28.360I've already started the conversation with the prime minister and he seems amenable to it.
00:11:31.900And I was pleased to see that Saskatchewan and Newfoundland and Labrador have also said, you know what, us too, we want to have more control over immigration as well.
00:11:38.300So I think it's going to start a national conversation, which is very good.
00:11:41.860The question is, I mean, we have to focus on the things that really resonate with Albertans.
00:11:49.220I think equalization is maybe a standout exception.
00:11:52.760I hear a lot of frustration about that program.
00:11:55.460And I think we have a real opportunity now with a Quebec premier who thinks that equalization has been devastating for his province and he wants to wean his province off of it.
00:12:06.800And I think that if we can get Quebec to stand on its own two feet, we can ask Manitoba to as well.
00:12:12.280And I know that that's an aspiration for Tim Houston in Nova Scotia.
00:12:16.100And we should be asking the same New Brunswick.
00:12:18.060Every province that can chart a pathway to being self-reliant should do so.
00:12:22.280So this is an opportunity for us to finally have that conversation now that everyone is talking about major nation building and wealth building projects.
00:12:29.460I think it's more in reach than it ever was before.
00:12:32.080So I want to talk more about the constitutional side.
00:12:35.040As I said, I don't think that a lot of these referendum questions were necessarily how people felt.
00:12:43.620There was a lot of, you know, a lot of the hardline federalists voted the straight ticket, I think.
00:12:48.580And a lot of those people are kind of protesting against the government.
00:12:51.980And referendums are often a way of very safely doing that for people.
00:12:56.640But, you know, any actual constitutional agreement would be a package, obviously.
00:13:01.140It would not be just a standalone, you know, not every province would get the, you know, select A, C, G, and F.
00:13:08.340No, the Constitution's all in or all out.
00:13:10.560It'd be a package like Meach Lake or Charlottetown.
00:13:14.580If you're trying to find a way to get people who supported independence in this referendum, you know, one quarter cannot be ignored, but one quarter also doesn't get to dictate to the three quarters.
00:13:25.380But, you know, that one quarter is obviously overwhelmingly conservative and found on the right.
00:13:30.900They're a part of the centre-right voting coalition in Alberta.
00:13:34.920If you want to channel that energy in a productive direction within the mandate that was given here, which is staying within Canada but maybe trying to fix it, how hard are you willing then to press on potential constitutional amendments?
00:13:53.080Because the constitution is pretty, I think, correctly thought to be set in stone ever since the failure of Meach Lake and Charlottetown.
00:14:00.900And or do you see an opening now with, you know, PSPP in Quebec and Mark Carney, who seems to, you know, like making a deal?
00:14:14.720Do you see an opening for actual constitutional amendments here?
00:14:18.200Or do you think we're more or less just going to it's going to be like the 2021 referendum on equalization where where we had a say and then nothing happened?
00:14:26.180I feel more confident that we can move forward and have constructive conversations around equalization, because we're not the only ones frustrated by it. All of the smaller provinces that are transferring and our net contributors and their neighbor, which is larger, is a net contributor or net beneficiary.
00:14:45.020Anyone who's in that position feels the same way we do.
00:14:48.360So we now have a coalition of other provinces, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, and Newfoundland and Labrador, who are just as frustrated as we are.
00:14:55.460But I guess I take a bit of a different position looking at the results of those referendum questions, is that people didn't vote straight down the ticket.
00:15:05.080In fact, we asked for them to vote yes to the rest, and people were thoughtful.
00:15:09.160They said, you know what, I'm not going to vote yes to all of these.
00:15:13.520And the other side that told them to vote no all down the ticket, no to the nine, they didn't listen to them either.
00:15:19.100They said, you know what, I just don't want these four constitutional priorities to be the ones that take the attention of the government for the next while.
00:15:27.360So I think people were actually quite thoughtful in how they voted.
00:15:30.660And I think why I have to take that to heart is that I don't believe that Albertans want me to waste a whole bunch of time on constitutional matters that may or may not go anywhere.
00:15:41.700I still feel like equalization because it had such a stronger level of support and because people still raise it as a source of frustration.
00:15:49.760That's one that I feel like I can spend a lot of time trying to advance and maybe there'll be other things.
00:15:54.640I certainly think immigration, especially a year and a half ago when we were doing our Alberta Next panel.
00:16:00.180Wow. Like we were getting unanimous rooms after we did our consultation saying, yeah, you've got to fix this.0.99
00:16:06.380And I think maybe the temperature came down on that a bit because finally the federal government realized that they had gone off in a wrong direction for a few years and had to start dialing back some of those programs.
00:16:18.880They haven't fixed everything, but maybe that was part of the reason why it wasn't as much of a priority as it was 18 months ago.
00:16:24.600But there'll be other things that will come up.
00:16:26.180I mean, the next one, of course, we still have lots of work to do to take all of the diversity, equity, inclusion kind of ideological politics out of our universities and other institutions.
00:16:39.600We still have work to do to make sure that that pastors reading scripture on Sunday don't end up running afoul of Bill C-9.
00:16:46.700So there's some work to do there. We will find areas where we can continue to demonstrate that Alberta is different.
00:16:52.540we've got different priorities, and the federal government shouldn't be imposing an ideology that
00:16:57.340is offside with what Albertans want to see. I have more work I need to do on guns. We've done as much
00:17:02.900as we can at the moment by protecting people, by saying we're not going to police and we're not
00:17:08.160going to prosecute any of the federal gun crimes. But I don't want people, even on paper, being
00:17:14.620made into criminals because of a stroke of a pen decided arbitrarily by the federal government.
00:17:20.200And the feds have agreed to wait on that one until the court case is decided.
00:17:24.360But I'm going to keep on advocating because we think there should be just a straight amnesty.
00:17:27.920Just don't turn people into criminals when they bought their firearms legally.
00:17:32.320So that's why I know that there's still these issues.