HANNAFORD： Can independence solve Alberta's 'Ottawa problem？'
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
159.20032
Summary
In this week's show, we talk to UCP Founding President Erika Barutis about Alberta's new Prime Minister, Mark Carney, and why he's a better choice than Justin Trudeau. We also talk about why Premier Danielle Smith thinks Alberta has an "Ottawa problem."
Transcript
00:00:00.560
Good evening, Western Standard viewers, and welcome to Hannaford, a weekly politics show.
00:00:21.520
It is Thursday, July the 17th. Last night in Edmonton, Premier Danielle Smith told about 400
00:00:27.920
people in an Alberta Next panel that Alberta has an Ottawa problem. From the response, it seems a lot
00:00:35.600
of people in the room felt the same way, but outside the UCP membership and the people who give
00:00:41.760
up a Wednesday night to go to a political meeting, how widespread is that sentiment? With me tonight
00:00:48.160
is UCP Founding President Erika Barutis. She's also Department Head of Applied Politics and Public
00:00:56.480
Affairs at Macamay College. Welcome Erika. Thanks for having me. Oh, it's always a pleasure. Erika, you
00:01:06.160
know the Premier fairly well, I think, founding president of the party. Why does the Premier
00:01:12.400
think that Alberta has an Ottawa problem? We reported last night that she said that. Well, you tell us.
00:01:20.560
I don't think many people should be surprised. Premier Jason Kenney also said we had an Ottawa
00:01:28.560
problem. He used a different term, which was standing up to Ottawa. This has been a decade-long thing. I
00:01:34.880
think Premier Smith is just maybe more direct in her communication. And from my understanding of last
00:01:40.160
night, that sentiment by the 450 individuals really resonated that even though Mark Carney may be better
00:01:48.720
for Alberta than Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, that you can't just flip a decade of frustration
00:01:57.600
in a month or two. And so I think that this is a position where the government and this Alberta Next
00:02:04.080
panel is looking to find pathways, have conversations, since both the Fairdale panel and just
00:02:11.600
getting a pulse check of what the sentiment by Albertans still truly is. Well, do you get the
00:02:19.440
sense that enough people care about this to actually give the Premier the kind of support that these
00:02:25.120
panels are supposed to generate? I mean, we've only had two so far. I hope that they'll do a series
00:02:32.720
over the time, especially in those urban centres. You know, it's all published. They're doing a lot of
00:02:37.920
road showing for this over the summer months, similar to what the Fair Deal panel said. But I
00:02:44.240
don't know if it's going to just be an echo chamber of validation or what will come out of it is the
00:02:50.080
bigger thing. So they can have the conversations. What are they doing to address what has been done
00:02:55.440
since the Fair Deal panel? What can be done? What will be done differently? And what does that mean
00:03:00.720
to Albertans in a landscape under Prime Minister Mark Carney than Justin Trudeau? Because the chess
00:03:10.320
board is different now. You said something a moment ago that I wasn't expecting. And when you said that
00:03:15.680
there was a thought that maybe Mr. Carney would be better for Alberta than Mr. Trudeau. Well, I mean,
00:03:22.000
obviously Mr. Trudeau was not good for Alberta, but is there a little optimism within the government?
00:03:28.080
I mean, you saw it even with how all the elected officials and leaders of our country, including
00:03:35.360
premiers and prime ministers, were playing nice during Stampede. There has been some movement
00:03:41.360
towards perhaps who I believe Mark Carney to be more so with secrets and scandals. But I will say he did
00:03:49.680
build the Building Canada Act, pushed it forward, you know, probably upset some of his base,
00:03:56.880
some of his colleagues, but held on that commitment that he ran on. And that opens up opportunities for
00:04:03.840
consultation for large infrastructure projects, including pipelines, to once again be feasible,
00:04:10.480
which were not the case under Justin Trudeau. And so I think there is optimism. However,
00:04:14.880
devils in the details with how these consultations with Indigenous peoples go,
00:04:20.880
how consultations interprovincially go. So there's still a lot of runway to see how much Carney is
00:04:29.120
willing to push. But I think the fact that he even introduced it, tabled it, and actually got it
00:04:35.200
through, is a sign that he's going to do differently than Justin Trudeau.
00:04:40.880
Okay. Well, if that's the feeling within government circles, that's great. You said the devil was in
00:04:48.960
the details. And quite frankly, down here, when we wrote about it, we were saying, well, really,
00:04:54.320
nothing has changed. He's got lots of exits if he doesn't want to go through with it. But anyway.
00:04:59.200
And that's the thing is, I'm being optimistic because we had a communist prime minister operating
00:05:04.480
under a liberal banner. Now we have a, let's say, progressive conservative, might be a stretch,
00:05:08.880
or a true liberal under a liberal government. So I think the fact that at least on the spectrum,
00:05:14.560
we've seen a shift back to the values and the beliefs that that party operated on,
00:05:19.760
is a little bit more comforting for someone like me that looks at, okay, the predictability,
00:05:25.680
the sustainability of this, and the feasibility, whereas Justin Trudeau was just on his little
00:05:31.200
climate change course. Well, I think he was on one that was largely laid out and explained to him by
00:05:39.280
by the president incumbent. You know, Mr. Carney has been pushing this for 20 years. And this is why I
00:05:44.000
think so many of us find it so difficult to think that he's, it's all changed now.
00:05:49.120
No. And I think to that point, I'm trying to be an optimist to say, I'll give the chance, but you
00:05:55.680
can't expect, and you and I are in the policy details, where an average Albertan hasn't seen
00:06:02.080
the proof in the pudding or the devil's in the detail. And so until there's a pipeline built, until
00:06:07.360
there is autonomy within the province and return to how the constitution is written, I think that the
00:06:14.720
sentiment that probably came out in that meeting last night will still resonate in large circles
00:06:21.040
across Alberta. Well, that's actually the next thing I wanted to ask you about. It's pretty clear
00:06:28.320
by the nature of the policy resolutions coming forward for the party convention in November,
00:06:34.640
there are a very large number of members of the UCP who are actively looking at a path to independence,
00:06:44.000
what it could look like, what the destination would be, how far they prepare to go.
00:06:51.040
There's an interest there. Do you have any sense of what the sentiment is
00:06:59.760
more widely in Alberta among people who aren't members of the UCP? Now, obviously, anybody who
00:07:06.640
voted NDP, I'd say they were poor market for the idea of independence. A lot of people did vote for the
00:07:12.960
NDP. On the other hand, there's probably, I would guess, a lot of UCP voters who have a sentimental,
00:07:23.760
maybe a practical attachment to the government of Canada. So, as these meetings go forward, to what
00:07:32.640
extent are they actually seeking input, and are they promotional, and where do you think people are in
00:07:38.320
Alberta on the matter of independence? I think that there's a few different circles. I think the
00:07:45.760
unfortunate thing is what the NDP is trying to do is say, and even broader circles of saying, like,
00:07:52.720
separation equals 51st state, which is very different than, I think, what a lot of people that may be
00:07:58.480
coined separatist, or separatist curious, or whatever you want to call it, that you'd want to know what that
00:08:04.560
path looks like. But that doesn't mean that you're going to go become the 51st state. There's individuals
00:08:10.000
that would want to explore separation under a dominion versus true independence, so still
00:08:17.920
respecting and working with the monarch, which has its own pathway challenges one way or the other.
00:08:24.800
The others are looking at, you know, what does independent look like with a market access? And so
00:08:31.440
there's the sentiment of separate separation, which I think there's more people than you'd think feel
00:08:37.440
that way because of the frustration that we had for the last decade. There's some people that,
00:08:42.400
like myself, would love to explore that, but at the same, well at the same time, seeing what Kearney does.
00:08:50.160
And so my hope is that not only are we looking, here was what the Fair Deal panel put forward,
00:08:56.080
here is our current environment, this is what we've learned, this is what we should be looking at,
00:09:00.720
these are the questions we missed, or the perspectives we missed. Again, I think that
00:09:06.320
there's going to be maybe, you know, less exploratory of how this is done by these conversations,
00:09:15.520
but I hope that the Alberta Next panel comes up with what that would look like to present to Albertans to
00:09:21.440
get, I want that full understanding before I would go to a ballot box to make a decision. I don't vote by
00:09:28.480
my sleeve or my heart, I vote with my gut and my brain. And so without that information,
00:09:33.760
I think it's very difficult. Similarly to, I think how a lot of people felt about leaving the CPP.
00:09:40.000
There's a sentiment there, but how you actually do it is a heck of a lot harder
00:09:43.440
in reality. And there just wasn't that roadmap that I think a lot of people that maybe have the
00:09:50.720
sentiment towards can actually tangibly understand.
00:09:54.720
I'm wondering, Erica, whether I'm right in assuming that many people think, well, we have the referendum,
00:10:01.920
and then if we vote for independence, we're on our way. I don't think it's quite that simple, is it?
00:10:07.200
Absolutely not. And like I said, there's different versions of what does independence look like?
00:10:12.480
Is it independence from all of Canada and removing the monarch? Is it independence there? Is it, like you said,
00:10:19.200
with the UCP policies? I wish they had more sessions on how to write good policy, but I digress.
00:10:26.960
But, you know, you're going to get a lot of confusion.
00:10:29.840
Exactly. You can sign up for applied politics and public affairs and learn how to actually write
00:10:34.800
either convention floor policies or public policy. But thank you for that underhand pitch and promotion
00:10:40.960
of the program. But yeah, so I think there's going to be some confusion there, but it's not A to B. It's A to B,
00:10:47.840
C, D, E, maybe F. And so that's where I'm hoping that these conversations get the sentiment of the true
00:10:54.080
direction Albertans want to go. Again, people that are looking for separation may be more inclined to attend
00:11:03.680
these versus what the, you know, attending one of these NDP pro Canada, whatever they're running,
00:11:11.760
in contrast to what the government is proposing.
00:11:15.040
Yes. So I think the Clarity Act would be triggered, would it not? That would be the first step?
00:11:22.880
Yes. Yeah. You'd have to do that. You'd have to go through, I mean, I don't even know from how
00:11:28.720
you'd establish, once you do the Clarity Act, I mean, should it go past that?
00:11:33.120
What does it look like for decisions of constitutional change? What does it look like for
00:11:39.680
infrastructure, right? You need to establish a police force, a banking system, a pension.
00:11:45.840
And that's where I think a lot of people look and they're like, well, that's why 50 first state is
00:11:49.600
easier because that's already established. But conforming to that, I mean, I would hope if we ever
00:11:56.960
got there, we looked at what Texas has and some of their exemptions from the constitution. But I
00:12:02.240
really don't get the sentiment that people want to join the US. I think that the message is more,
00:12:07.280
we're really frustrated. We feel like we're not respected in confederation. I think Saskatchewan's
00:12:12.480
right there. It's just, they're not as loud as maybe Alberta has been or is currently. And that
00:12:19.440
regardless of Carney being in office, a parting of the clouds of Trudeau, that there is maybe
00:12:26.320
opportunity, we can't just all of a sudden lean in with false hope that, or optimism guiding us,
00:12:34.560
while there's still people that are frustrated and want to see our premier and our province push for
00:12:43.360
You have used the word frustration a number of times in the past 10 minutes. And there are two
00:12:50.240
things that legitimately could frustrate people. One is the sheer amount of money that goes out of
00:12:58.160
Alberta and quite frankly keeps the rest of the country going. The other is the lack of interest or
00:13:06.560
respect even for the dominant values of Alberta that we don't get from the rest of Canada. I'll just
00:13:17.120
go out on a limb here and I say the money is an irritation, but it's not the main thing for me.
00:13:22.240
But I do find it deeply offensive that what seem to be social attitudes that are prevalent in Eastern
00:13:31.680
Canada are and come through parliament and then get directed to the rest of the country,
00:13:38.400
amongst whom is Alberta. Probably the PEI isn't too happy with some of the things they do either.
00:13:46.960
But anyway, we're talking about Alberta and you have this lust for control and authoritarian
00:13:56.800
dictates that comes out of Ottawa that is, you know, we don't want that. We're a freedom loving people,
00:14:03.280
I think. So where do you see the center of gravity for all that frustration that you're talking about?
00:14:10.080
I mean, if we had a case study, I'd look at the fact that Quebec seems, sees themselves as a distinct
00:14:17.040
society. When you look at Alberta, and I would extend it to Western Canada, we don't have the cleavage of
00:14:22.640
Western alienation for no reason. We are treated differently. We have, you know, less seats in the
00:14:29.280
Senate. The four provinces equal one Quebec or one Ontario. There's distribution of seat count,
00:14:36.320
seeing elections be decided before our polls close. Like there's a lot in the democratic,
00:14:41.680
like the parliamentary democratic system that isn't working right now. The way Confederation was set up
00:14:47.680
is that the dictatorship isn't like the federal government is the same value as the other
00:14:53.360
provinces that they work in collaboration. I think that when you talk, I talk about the frustration.
00:14:59.440
Listen, I'm actually, I'm quite a realist, even though I have some optimism for Carney because more
00:15:03.840
of a fingers crossed approach. But I don't think equalization formula will be reformed. I don't
00:15:11.360
think Senate's going to be reformed. Because that causes us to open up the Constitution,
00:15:16.720
which we technically really haven't done since 1867. Because we just added the charter of rights
00:15:22.560
and freedoms like it was very minor, we tried to do a bunch of stuff leading up to that. And even in
00:15:28.320
the 80s. So I don't think that if Albertans are sitting here being like, well, we just need
00:15:33.680
constitutional reform. I don't think that that's realistic. But what I think the biggest thing that
00:15:39.280
frustrates Alberta is get the hell out of our lane. And stick to what your constitutional jurisdiction is,
00:15:46.800
don't try and jump over the province to deal with the municipalities like just stay in your darn lane
00:15:53.600
and do what you're supposed to do as a federal government. Well, and let provinces do what
00:15:58.560
provinces were designed to do. And I think that that would be a big sentiment shift from what we
00:16:07.120
currently are frustrated with. So to your point, money's annoying and a grievance because we see
00:16:14.560
it in dollars and figures. But the true sentiment to feel valued and appreciated would be, get the
00:16:20.720
heck out of my house. Yes. Well, you know, we tend, and the Premier herself tends to use the traffic
00:16:27.520
analogy a lot, staying out of a lane. The other thing that we might be reminding Otto is when you see a red
00:16:32.480
light, you're supposed to stop. And that's, uh, the red light is when you are in fact poaching on the
00:16:40.640
To be clear, I mean, I think our biggest default is we always talk about pipelines, but that has to
00:16:45.760
do with property rights. That has to do with transportation, corridors, um, a lot of like
00:16:51.440
investments that we have for research, innovation, anything at the post-secondary level. Like to a lot of
00:16:58.080
people, they just think, Oh, Alberta wants you just to allow us to build pipelines from coast to coast
00:17:03.120
and, and say F you to everyone else in between Alberta, like Fort McMurray, perhaps, and the ports. Um, I,
00:17:10.720
that's not the case. We've seen Saskatchewan actually go ahead, um, with a constitutional complaint and
00:17:17.680
looking at using notwithstanding clause against the federal government on things like even property
00:17:22.080
rates or carbon tax, or these types of things that are impacting industries that thrive. So I think it goes
00:17:27.920
beyond building pipelines and it's like, let us give you money. Like we're happy to play into that
00:17:35.200
as long as if we need help or we need, um, policy that allows us to thrive, that you're not getting in
00:17:41.200
our way. Yeah. Um, pure speculation, but from an informed source, how, how many, uh, how much of the
00:17:50.080
caucus is sympathetic to separation independence and how much, uh, how many members of caucus
00:18:05.280
That that's probably, I'm not going to pull a number out of the air because I think that's hard.
00:18:09.040
And I think that there's sympathy to separatism because you'd have large pockets of your collective,
00:18:15.440
especially in rural Alberta that would want to explore that, especially on land rights and,
00:18:20.560
and our agriculture, um, and forestry, uh, industries that also are harmed by federal
00:18:26.720
interference. Um, so I think that there's a lot that are sympathetic to it. And again, would like to
00:18:32.480
explore and see what comes out of this Alberta next panel. I have been critical that I don't think
00:18:38.960
elected officials should be leading this because it politicizes it as opposed to working with the
00:18:43.440
industries that are impacted and make policy suggestions or a roadmap for government to
00:18:48.880
explore. And so I think it muddies the waters on the intention of this panel, unfortunately. However,
00:18:56.160
I do think that there are, um, a lot that again, you can still be interested in separation, but love
00:19:03.920
the monarch and support the monarch. So, or the federalist federalism system. So I think it's not as
00:19:11.520
black or white of, are you a separatist equaling, you want complete autonomy and leaving Canada all
00:19:17.280
together or versus I am happy with how the order goes. I think where most probably people sit is in
00:19:25.120
that gray in between. Yeah. So, well, and caucus probably reflects that. Uh, yes. And people probably
00:19:32.080
should at this stage be in the, in that gray scene because there's so many things that we,
00:19:36.880
that we don't know. Uh, I see, I see we're coming close to time, Erica. Um, but there is this one
00:19:44.400
last question that I'd love to hear your thoughts on. Whether the referendum, which I think is going
00:19:51.360
to be sometime in the first half of next year, let's see, I think that's the latest information we have.
00:19:57.760
The referendums, referendum on independence comes in the first half of next year.
00:20:02.160
If it passes, that's one set of consideration. If it fails, that is that people say, no, we're not
00:20:12.640
interested. We, or a majority of Albertans who vote say they're not interested. Does that not still
00:20:20.160
attach to the premier anyway? Like, as we've said earlier, the, her predecessors never did this.
00:20:29.280
Mr. Kenny, Mrs. Notley. And, uh, I think they wouldn't have done it. Uh, so she did. Does that
00:20:41.360
not say to people or could it not be interpreted? Well, she's actually in favor of, uh, of independence,
00:20:47.360
but doesn't want to say so. And so we have this referendum. So even after losing a referendum,
00:20:53.600
she could get up and say, Oh, that's it. The people have spoken, but it's still her issue. Do you think
00:20:58.400
she's going to carry that into the next election? Well, two interesting things. Kenny did bring
00:21:02.480
forward a referendum on equalization. So I agree that it is not the question of separation, but he
00:21:08.400
did bring forward a policy to push back on Ottawa. It failed and we're still having that conversation.
00:21:14.560
So I don't think that the issues that maybe are brought under a certain administration stick to that,
00:21:21.360
um, leader. However, hers is more open to not just let's reform the constitution, which I think many
00:21:30.240
folks realize is very, very difficult as opposed to separation. I think to me, it's what is the
00:21:36.000
question? Cause I think the equalization question was poorly written and confusing for people as well
00:21:40.400
as the time zone, um, or the daylight savings changes. So I think again, it's how the question is written.
00:21:47.840
Is there also a question that's, you know, by Thomas Lukasik brought forward on the opposite?
00:21:54.240
Is that confusing? Um, I would be very discouraged if it's brought as a standalone referendum,
00:22:00.320
because I think it's, uh, like a inappropriate use of taxpayers when you could just wait till
00:22:05.840
there's, they're already going to a ballot. Um, and so there's a lot of pieces there that I think
00:22:12.800
will be very indicative. Now let's play the hypothetical that it does pass. Um, I think the
00:22:18.960
question is by how much that you, do you truly have the support? Uh, there'll be a lot of pushback
00:22:24.000
because not every voter, you have an option to vote in the referendum. And so that might be hypercritical
00:22:30.240
that she'll have to navigate. I would say if it was held today in the form in which, um, some groups
00:22:35.920
have presented it, I don't think it's going to pass because again, like you said, we don't have
00:22:39.920
enough education that even something like me who would like to explore what that looks like,
00:22:44.960
how much would it cost to do this? Like a business case for being our own entity. Um,
00:22:52.000
I just don't know where that information is going to come to between now and potentially 2026. So
00:22:58.880
there's a lot of, um, roadblocks regardless of what happens if it goes forward. I think that it would
00:23:06.640
be political suicide for Danielle Smith to double down on something where she said,
00:23:11.040
this is up to Albertans to decide and they decided, no, but I'm still going to go forward with it.
00:23:16.160
Um, I think that that would be very career limiting move. So I don't think that she,
00:23:22.640
and she's also said that she's not a separatist. So whether people want to paint her with that brush,
00:23:26.960
because from an opposition standpoint, that sounds great. And it's an easy target or that she's like,
00:23:31.520
wants to be a Trumpite, whatever narrative they're driving. She's said it, she's giving it to Albertans.
00:23:39.120
Um, and so, but there's a lot of runway between now and then, and a lot of things that could influence
00:23:44.320
people like me. Uh, if you do it as standalone, I might just vote no, because I hate the context
00:23:51.440
in which it was presented. Last question, Erica, what would you say to people who, uh, say, yeah,
00:23:57.360
let's vote for independence and then see what sort of a better deal we can get out of Ottawa?
00:24:05.680
Um, be careful what you wish for, because it could be very detrimental. I mean, we look at Quebec,
00:24:13.200
um, and we have someone that's gone through it, been very, very close and there was no real roadmap
00:24:20.240
of how you would do that. So you're, you're charting on, or you're going through uncharted territory
00:24:26.960
and that comes with a lot of, um, unanticipated consequence. And we might just be told by all
00:24:34.080
of our colleagues, F off, get out of here. And then we're on a landlocked island, um, you know,
00:24:41.280
with, with very little to do. So this is where I think it's very important to be proactive to explain
00:24:46.320
the how to Albertans. Um, and maybe don't always just vote with your sentiment. Look at, look at the path.
00:24:54.000
Good words, Erica. Thank you very much for joining us today. Yeah. Thank you for having me. And good
00:25:00.720
luck with, uh, teaching the next generation to do politics better. For the Western Standard,