Western Standard - June 15, 2026


HANNAFORD： The Clarity Act, Ottawa’s real plan to block Alberta independence

Topics
Clarity Act independence process
Hosted by
Nigel Hannaford
Mentioned
Stephen Harper Smith Pierre Pauly George Koch James Mason Pierre
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Episode Stats


Length

23 minutes

Words per minute

145.94

Word count

3,459

Sentence count

88


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Jim Mason and George Koch argue that the Clarity Act was drafted to prevent Quebec from separating from Canada, rather than facilitate it. They argue that it was written to prevent separation, not facilitate it, and that it's a big mistake.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.480 Good evening ladies and gentlemen and welcome to Hanna Ford, a weekly politics show of the
00:00:20.160 Western Standard.
00:00:22.000 It is Thursday, June the 11th and we're coming to you today from the floor of the energy
00:00:28.560 show down here at BMO in Calgary and it is time to talk independence with me
00:00:36.220 today is retired engineer and nuclear physicist Jim Mason who with Calgary
00:00:41.100 writer George Koch has just co-authored three articles about the Clarity Act
00:00:45.720 Jim welcome to the show thanks very much for the invite you're very welcome Jim
00:00:52.380 you write about the Clarity Act but your message is that there's nothing clear
00:00:55.500 about it at all what's what's the issue here well to start with Nigel let me maybe address some
00:01:03.500 issues some people might have with who am i to talk about the clarity act you know what does
00:01:07.900 a guy with an engineering degree and a physics degree uh know about clarity act and and it i
00:01:14.860 think studying physics makes you understand you have to deal with facts and it doesn't matter
00:01:20.460 whether the facts are pleasant or unpleasant you have to deal with facts gravity is a fact
00:01:25.260 and the fact that you stand on on the scales and it shows that you need to lose some weight
00:01:29.820 is neither here nor there and when i was working for a defense electronics company
00:01:37.580 i got to read a lot of government contracting documents payments of work
00:01:42.780 terms conditions performance specifications these things like that from the point of view of trying
00:01:47.500 to figure out well what do we actually have to do to satisfy this customer and when i read the
00:01:53.020 clarity act it was like eye-popping uh those sort of things are sort of there like the statement
00:01:59.500 of work is reasonably well defined you have to have make a question you have to have a referendum
00:02:05.020 you have to get the results and if the results are appropriate then you have negotiations and
00:02:10.060 eventually you get to having a constitutional amendment the problem comes when you look at
00:02:15.820 the specifications which are pretty much totally absent and the terms and conditions are all up to
00:02:21.820 the customer that is the federal government they're the ones who get decide when things are
00:02:26.540 satisfactory so so if i'm hearing you're right you're you're you're saying that a lot of people
00:02:31.980 think separation was going to be like a friendly divorce that you just say well it's time you sit
00:02:37.180 down and divide the assets shake hands and go your separate ways you you think that's not the case
00:02:43.580 I think that's definitely not the case.
00:02:46.880 I mean, in most negotiations, and maybe even in acrimonious divorces,
00:02:52.060 both parties are interested in finding a resolution.
00:02:55.740 That's not necessarily the case the way the Clarity Act was written.
00:02:59.400 The province seeking independence is clearly at a disadvantage
00:03:03.000 with the government that controls the whole process.
00:03:08.100 Well, that's...
00:03:09.540 So look, in your article, which we reprinted, by the way,
00:03:13.580 It originally appeared in C2C, but the Western Standard reprinted it earlier this week.
00:03:19.760 You describe the Clarity Act as potentially very carefully and deliberately drafted to prevent secession, rather than to facilitate it.
00:03:33.360 Now, drawing from its history after the 1995 Quebec referendum, what evidence or drafter
00:03:40.860 insights support this view that it's actually not what it says it is?
00:03:46.280 More important even, how might the fact that that original purpose is going to backfire,
00:03:51.740 is it going to backfire in today's Alberta context?
00:03:54.740 Well, that's a big question.
00:04:01.100 It's a big topic.
00:04:03.100 When you read the Clarity Act, it sounds like it's describing a process that if you kind of follow the process and do all of the things you're supposed to do, it will naturally lead through independence.
00:04:16.820 But when you get right down to it and you look at, there are sort of four gates, I would say, that you have to get through.
00:04:23.320 One is you have to have a clear question.
00:04:25.500 The second one is you have to get a clear majority.
00:04:28.000 The third one is you have to complete negotiations on appropriate constitutional amendment, and then you have to get the constitutional amendment passed.
00:04:38.380 And in three of those four gates, the federal government has the key, so it decides if the question in its mind is clear, whether the majority in its mind is clear, and it's in charge of the negotiations.
00:04:51.080 and then it's over to the rest of the provinces and the way it's written up it looks like
00:04:56.540 to get the amendment seven out of the other 10 provinces have to approve it so it really is
00:05:02.460 on the surface of it maybe a well-defined process but in the details it's a real problem to
00:05:09.840 execute successfully i see now just to clear one point before we go any further
00:05:18.360 Stephen Harper had a go at drafting legislation to prevent separation.
00:05:23.880 Is that the legislation that we're dealing with now?
00:05:27.560 Well, not really. They're about the same as night and day. Mr. Harper's version
00:05:36.440 of the Clarity Act was in fact pretty clear. He wanted it well understood by the people in Quebec.
00:05:43.320 This was all originally targeted at Quebec.
00:05:46.500 We wanted the people to understand that they weren't voting for something wish-to-washy like Sovereignty Association or some kind of revised federalism.
00:05:56.480 They were voting to separate.
00:05:58.140 And so his act said if they didn't provide a very clear question in that regard, that the federal government would provide one.
00:06:05.540 And he actually had the wording in his version of the act of what that clear question would be.
00:06:11.540 Then he said that the majority that was required was simply a simple majority,
00:06:16.660 and that was also very clear.
00:06:18.980 And then he said that if that happened,
00:06:21.320 the federal government would be authorized to enter negotiations,
00:06:27.540 and once the negotiations were completed,
00:06:30.080 the whole thing would be put to a national referendum,
00:06:32.520 and if that passed, then it would go through the normal constitutional amendment process.
00:06:37.820 So it was all pretty well laid out.
00:06:40.620 Still very difficult to achieve, mind you, but it was clear what you had to do.
00:06:46.700 The current one is just the opposite. While it appears clear all of the requirements to get
00:06:54.140 past the gates, there are no objective criteria for deciding whether you've met them,
00:06:59.260 either the question or the majority. Well, I think that's kind of an important
00:07:03.900 thing for people in Alberta to know. So, look, you've really studied this,
00:07:09.500 in addition to the first article there's two more coming uh let's just say that the the efforts of
00:07:17.020 those people who are seeking independence for alberta were very successful and we have an
00:07:23.500 undeniably strong vote in favor of separation walk us through a realistic day after you just
00:07:35.740 have this strong vote in alberta one of the most likely federal or provincial responses that could
00:07:41.820 derail the process and how much might aboriginal treaty rights or other provinces factor into
00:07:48.540 blocking or complicating these negotiations what's it going to be like well i think probably the very
00:07:55.820 first me at the provincial level is that the people who are we're seeking independence if we
00:08:00.860 if they got a really clear majority, would be ecstatic.
00:08:04.240 There'd be parties all over the place.
00:08:06.400 How the provincial government would respond is another question.
00:08:10.280 I mean, at the present, Premier Smith is kind of walking on a tightrope a bit.
00:08:15.820 She's sort of advocating for a sovereign Alberta with the United Canada.
00:08:20.840 And so in that case, with the people voting for the independence route,
00:08:27.200 she would potentially be in an awkward position although having gotten her marching orders if
00:08:36.480 you like from the people you probably would have a pretty clear mandate what the federal government
00:08:42.460 would do i suspect is is first point out that they have to consult with a large number of people
00:08:50.280 a large number of different bodies or parties as to whether or not the result really is a tier
00:08:59.460 majority. And for kind of all sorts of nuances that might come into play in that, for example,
00:09:05.600 in Quebec, before the Quebec government had its referendum, the First Nations had their own
00:09:12.220 referendum and they voted in excess of 90%, I think it was like 96%, to stay as part of Canada.
00:09:18.780 So the federal government might want to examine how that vote was split up between polling locations that were clearly First Nations and others that weren't.
00:09:31.780 Also in the Quebec referendum, there was a very presided split between urban and rural.
00:09:39.780 The rural ridings voted overwhelmingly for independence, and several of the urban ridings, particularly the ones with large English language content, they voted overwhelmingly to remain part of Canada.
00:09:57.000 And it was that vote, in fact, that vote in Los Alipos, like a handful of ridings, that that vote was enough to make the difference between independence and remitting in Canada.
00:10:09.180 I think probably the federal government will try to reserve judgment for a little while
00:10:15.260 until they've had the opportunity to examine all of the potential things that we could
00:10:20.940 use that they could take into consideration.
00:10:24.860 So now you have a vote and you have a pretty clear indication of how Albertans feel
00:10:33.660 and it was in favor of separation and the federal government because obviously it can't afford to
00:10:41.580 agree to it alberta is the powerhouse of the entire confederation we leave take our money
00:10:47.780 there's not much left uh so they have to stop this somehow um once they've run out of arguments
00:10:55.780 and they say no because no is what we think.
00:11:00.780 What responses are left in Alberta?
00:11:07.540 Not a lot.
00:11:10.720 So does this end in violence?
00:11:14.100 Well, the one thing that the Supreme Court was clear about,
00:11:18.720 and in fact this was the yes and so good question
00:11:22.600 that was referred to it with respect to protects the session,
00:11:28.360 that they were asked to rule on was whether there was any legal method,
00:11:33.780 whether the universal, sorry, unilateral declaration of indefendment was legal
00:11:40.580 either under the Canadian constitution or under international law.
00:11:46.120 And if the answers to those were yes,
00:11:49.940 then the government wanted to know which one of those would take custody.
00:11:53.840 It turned out the answer that the court delivered on both of those questions was no.
00:11:59.140 There is no legal justification for a unilateral declaration of interference
00:12:02.920 under either the Canadian constitution or international law.
00:12:07.800 And therefore, that's replayed in the Clarity Act, if that is the case.
00:12:13.280 So that makes any kind of consideration of that getting a little dicey.
00:12:16.940 It's kind of ironic that we're having this discussion in the run-up to July the
00:12:25.480 4th, because in 1776 there was no consensus on the legality of the Universal Declaration
00:12:33.340 of Independence then either.
00:12:35.400 So I guess it comes down as if you can make it, if you decide to do it and you make it
00:12:40.360 stick, then it becomes legal.
00:12:43.700 Yes.
00:12:44.700 But the Supreme Court acknowledged that in its decision. It said the other option, of course, is that legal or not legal, if the province would declare, unilaterally declare independence, what followed next would depend on the international response.
00:13:00.540 what, if any, countries would recognize this new country
00:13:05.020 and what, if anything, those countries might do about it
00:13:09.160 in the event that the federal government wanted to institute
00:13:12.360 some sort of policing action, if you like, given that the UDI is a fee.
00:13:16.920 And they acknowledged that that was a possibility
00:13:19.080 and it would all depend on the response from the international community.
00:13:25.300 Well, of course, the only international community that really matters
00:13:28.860 is that of the United States.
00:13:31.100 So, what we're really saying then is, to summarize the discussion thus far, is the
00:13:40.100 Clarity Act is unclear, and it gives the federal government every opportunity to weasel out
00:13:49.340 of a pretty clearly voted declaration of intent from Alberta.
00:13:58.580 And that after that, if the federal government will make no concessions, then Alberta's only
00:14:06.460 option is UDI and, you know, it's hard to say who would do what, but if they had support
00:14:15.500 from outside Alberta, that's what they might do.
00:14:21.820 You know, for those of us who have been raised as you have, and I'm old enough to have on
00:14:27.660 a certain concept of Canada from sea to sea to sea, this seems almost like an unreal situation.
00:14:38.120 Could this really happen?
00:14:39.120 Well, it does sort of, except we both have lived through the previous session with
00:14:45.240 Quebec so we know it's can indeed happen that the way you've described it
00:14:51.900 yeah that's that's unusual I just like to elaborate on one thing perhaps in
00:14:59.480 terms of what the federal government might do one option that it has is to
00:15:11.080 simply kind of go through the process because the very last step in the process is the passing of
00:15:19.960 the constitutional amendment by seven out of ten provinces and so they could let everything go
00:15:25.480 through that on the assumption that that's not going to happen but it won't be their fault right
00:15:32.200 it would be the people of canada through their elected representatives in the other province
00:15:37.560 provinces who are high bashing the whole thing that's another option as well and that but then
00:15:43.160 we're around to the same outcome what then for albert what do they do so i i've looked ahead
00:15:50.600 skipped ahead into your uh second article here and the one that we haven't published yet uh you
00:15:57.320 probably you suggest a possible way out of the mess that's your uh that's your quote um so what
00:16:04.600 high-level alternatives or reforms to the Clarity Act and the constitutional presences or Alberta's
00:16:11.720 approach do you see as more constructive for addressing Western alienation while preserving
00:16:19.080 stability? You don't just get the provinces to say no and cause a problem. Is there something
00:16:24.680 more positive that we can be looking at here? Well, this is maybe going to sound like a bit
00:16:30.680 of a hedge but it seems to me that the situation that is currently involved offers a pretty good
00:16:37.320 opportunity in the sense that there's there's an opportunity now for albertans to send a very
00:16:43.880 clear message that changes to the federation are needed and and there are fundamental changes that
00:16:52.200 need to be made to the federation not only for alberta's medical but for everybody's been
00:16:57.080 But they have an opportunity now with a question that is put forward by Premier Smith that is not going to actually lead to separation unless that those changes cannot be put in place.
00:17:14.460 So Albertans have an opportunity to send everybody else in Canada a very clear message that they want to see some changes or they will have another think about whether or not they really want to be part of the Federation.
00:17:28.740 And I think there's a very measured and incremental way to go about that.
00:17:37.660 One is you can think Albertans can propose a number of changes that the federal government is entirely in control of, such as repealing the nine bad laws.
00:17:48.580 Then they can propose a change which maybe is a little bit more awkward.
00:17:53.120 You guys had a referendum a while ago on the re-equalization program that said, we'd like to see that out of the Constitution.
00:18:02.060 Well, that's a constitutional amendment, which everybody recognizes is a little bit difficult.
00:18:06.360 But you can change the formula, which is just an agreement of most parties.
00:18:11.460 And in fact, there was an essay that I wrote for the C2C Journal some while ago that explored an alternative formula for the equalization program,
00:18:21.280 which was perfectly straightforward and would solve many of the problems that the current one
00:18:26.440 has. So that's the second step is to do that. And then the third step is to say, and here are a
00:18:32.360 bunch of constitutional amendments that need to be made to preserve the federation. And those could
00:18:39.700 be whatever, you know, better representation by population, a triple E Senate, which we pursued
00:18:46.560 before those sorts of things they're getting a little bit more difficult but you've got the
00:18:52.000 first two steps is in the indicative of whether or not people are actually even interested in
00:18:57.040 pursuing the third one well that would be a possible outlook could be taken so it sounds
00:19:03.440 actually quite a lot what uh opposition leader pierre poilier was saying in calvary on monday
00:19:08.560 i don't know whether you managed to catch that address uh but the idea was somehow that we need
00:19:16.640 to make alliances on matters of specific interest with other provinces which sounds great but you
00:19:24.880 know we've been this route before with the reform party the west wants in we were sincere about that
00:19:34.160 the rest of the country thought it apparently a little laughable because it never actually took
00:19:40.400 east of the ontario border with manitoba so i guess people in alberta are very skeptical about
00:19:50.240 anything to do with the federal government and their intentions and how they would use the
00:19:56.560 clarity act against us so i you know i'm going to give you the last word because we're almost out of
00:20:02.320 time but can you send us off on any kind of an optimistic footing here that alberta can find
00:20:10.480 some kind of stability within confederation or are we really going to have to look abroad to see who
00:20:18.080 our friends are well i i'd like to think that if if the approach that i just discussed that sort
00:20:25.200 of three-step approach was perceived you'd get a pretty quick indication as to whether or not
00:20:31.360 the rest of the Federation is interested in making some accommodations and I'd like to think they
00:20:37.920 would be. I sort of disagree with Pierre that you need to make alliances with provinces on
00:20:44.480 individual things. The issue is not so much policies and to my mind it's not so much policies
00:20:51.520 and legislation because you can get those changed but if there's not some fundamental changes made
00:20:57.520 they can all be reinstituted again with some future government what in my mind would be much
00:21:02.720 better is some fundamental change to the structure of our governors although those things aren't
00:21:07.760 possible in the crystals well i think jim we we all want fundamental changes in the structure
00:21:15.600 of government except people who live outside alberta that's the problem isn't it that would
00:21:20.800 be me and i want it good do you think there are many people like you back there in ontario
00:21:26.480 uh that's a very good question all my family
00:21:31.520 okay i hope it's a big one because we're going to need their votes so jim let me ask you one
00:21:36.160 more thing here in alberta we have a referendum on whether to have a referendum coming up
00:21:42.000 obviously this is a pretty big deal if that referendum on whether to have a referendum
00:21:52.080 fails does that settle the issue i think what it settles is that alberta is now that they're
00:22:02.720 happy with or albertans have now said they're happy with the status quo so in the future if
00:22:08.720 they have any complaints about the situation in canada such as the equalization program or things
00:22:15.120 like that the uh the powers that be will simply point to that uh referendum and say look you
00:22:21.520 already voted that we're happy with the situation in canada so let's just quiet and get on with it
00:22:27.520 and i think that's a real a real uh risk exactly the current the coming referendum not being
00:22:35.360 resoundingly voted in favor so speak now or forever hold thy peace pretty much pretty much
00:22:43.680 so that's actually an important consideration when trying to explain the actions of the premier
00:22:50.800 as she as she pushes this forward if she gets a no vote then her actions are more or less endorsed
00:22:59.200 she gets a strong yes vote i'm sure she'll take that into account is that how you see it well yes
00:23:04.880 i think i think a no vote is we just carry on carrying on and a yes vote is maybe maybe there
00:23:11.280 can be some changes made you know and and here are the changes we'd like to see made and let's
00:23:15.200 see if we can make this work all right look jim mason nuclear scientist and engineer bringing the
00:23:24.320 logic of science to the intensely emotional matter of alberta independence and the rest of canada's
00:23:32.080 attitude to it thank you so much for joining us jim we'll be running the second article as soon as
00:23:36.960 we have it and with that I'm Nigel Hannaford for the Western Standard