Western Standard - Independence Debate (with Derek Fildebrant and Duane Bratt)

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00:14:00.000 One minute.

00:14:30.000 All right, ladies and gentlemen,

00:15:00.000 Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for coming to the Western Standard's first debate on

00:15:06.880 Alberta independence.

00:15:09.200 We are happy to have you all here, and for those of you who attended our first annual

00:15:14.680 Calgary Stampede BBQ, you got to witness an excellent water fight.

00:15:19.460 There will be no water balloons here tonight, unfortunately, as much as I know you all want,

00:15:24.320 but that's only a one-time-a-year thing.

00:15:26.800 So, first of all, I'm not going to do the introductions. I'm just here to kind of set things up.

00:15:32.400 If you are a subscriber, thank you. If you are not, please visit www.westernstandard.news.com.

00:15:41.100 And we also have a store we'll plug at the end of the evening. So, thank you for coming.

00:15:46.640 I would like to start off by introducing our esteemed moderator, Donna Kennedy-Glund.

00:15:53.080 She is a National Post columnist, former cabinet minister, and I got to know her as a member

00:15:58.760 of the Fair Deal panel, which was an interesting experience and it's an absolute genesis into

00:16:04.580 what we have here today.

00:16:06.000 So please give a round of applause for Donna Kennedy-Glans.

00:16:09.840 Okay.

00:16:10.840 Good luck.

00:16:11.840 This one is fun.

00:16:14.840 Thank you.

00:16:17.660 Good evening, everyone.

00:16:18.660 I'm glad you're here.

00:16:19.660 I can't believe you came out.

00:16:21.660 It's 29 degrees outside in Calgary, and it's Stampede.

00:16:25.520 Way to be here, way to be citizens.

00:16:28.020 I'm really, really grateful you're here, all of you.

00:16:36.580 As Josh said, I've worn a lot of hats,

00:16:39.140 but the hat that probably helps the most for this role

00:16:42.260 as moderator for tonight's debate

00:16:44.960 is my role as a mother of three sons.

00:16:48.580 I'm gonna keep this civil,

00:16:50.280 and I'm gonna rely on you to help me do that.

00:16:54.460 This is a really important debate.

00:16:57.440 Now some of you will come in this room,

00:17:00.160 you know where you're gonna vote in November,

00:17:03.100 you'll have decided one way or another

00:17:05.280 and maybe nothing you're gonna hear tonight

00:17:08.320 is gonna change your mind.

00:17:10.900 But it may help you talk to people you care about

00:17:15.460 and break down some of those barriers between the silos.

00:17:18.760 That's why I'm here tonight.

00:17:21.040 And there are other people in this room

00:17:22.740 who haven't decided.

00:17:24.820 Let's respect that.

00:17:26.620 They want to hear the arguments

00:17:28.520 and I am going to push these two gentlemen.

00:17:32.880 They know what they're talking about.

00:17:35.060 They're credible.

00:17:36.980 But I'm going to push them hard, to be honest.

00:17:40.440 This is not a time for, you know,

00:17:43.260 all hat, no cowboy, no cows.

00:17:45.920 This is real, this is real.

00:17:47.780 This is a really big deal coming up in October.

00:17:50.940 This is probably the biggest issue

00:17:53.000 we have faced as a province ever.

00:17:55.980 And I think it's really important,

00:17:57.860 and I'm really grateful, as I said,

00:17:59.660 that you're here, that you care,

00:18:01.520 and that you want to listen to everybody's point of view.

00:18:14.340 So I wanted to explain to you

00:18:15.920 how the debate's gonna roll out.

00:18:17.780 I'm going to toss a question to one of the debaters he'll have three minutes to

00:18:23.900 make his case his opponent will have three minutes to counter and then the

00:18:29.840 first debater will have an opportunity to sum up for one minute and Leah here 0.99

00:18:35.300 got volunteered to be our flag bearer so she's got a yellow flag and a red flag as 0.91

00:18:40.580 as we time out here.

00:18:46.280 I also want to talk a little bit about emotions.

00:18:50.040 I've been at debates like this where things are controversial, people have different views,

00:18:56.980 and frankly, you all seem really pleasant, and I'm grateful for that.

00:19:03.480 But that's not always the case in some rooms.

00:19:06.800 And just because we want this to be an opportunity for people to be able to listen and hear and

00:19:13.300 think, maybe talk to their neighbors a little bit, I am going to be ferocious.

00:19:19.320 I'm going to do the mama bear thing.

00:19:22.180 If somebody tries to turn this into a spectacle, I'm going to boot them out of the room.

00:19:28.760 Okay?

00:19:29.760 Is that fair?

00:19:32.760 Okay, let's get going. I want to introduce our two debaters, brave men who've stepped

00:19:43.880 up, Derek Fildebrandt, who is going to be on my right but your left, which is very interesting

00:19:50.240 to me. Derek has been self-described as the mosquito in the tent that they just can't

00:20:01.820 quite kill. I think that's probably the most apt description of Derek Fildebrandt that

00:20:08.560 I know of. He's former Wildrose in UCP. He's done many, many things, and I'm going to let

00:20:16.400 each of the debaters introduce themselves and explain why they are here tonight. But

00:20:21.720 Derek, I'll let you take the podium here. And our other debater is Duane Bratt, a Mount

00:20:30.620 Royal University political scientist who many of you will have seen on TV, on CTV, on CBC,

00:20:38.940 on Western Standard. He's ubiquitous. He's always got something important to say because he's been

00:20:45.260 watching Alberta politics for a very long time. He also has been teaching lacrosse players and

00:20:51.740 students at Mount Royal University how to play clean and tough and tonight he's going to be

00:20:57.500 making the case for staying in the Canada game. Dwayne.

00:21:10.500 Good show of civility, boys. Good start.

00:21:16.500 I'm going to open up the shoot here. I kind of got a little stampede jargon for Derek.

00:21:24.500 give him three minutes to explain himself, besides the mosquito thing, and explain why he was so highly motivated that he came and found Dwayne and I and wanted to host this discussion. Over to you.

00:21:39.900 Thank you, Donna, and thank you, Dwayne, for agreeing to debate me tonight, especially in a room that I think is disproportionately a bit Western-standard. It's brave of you. I appreciate it.

00:21:47.620 Alberta has given Ottawa a net $322 billion more in revenue than has received back since

00:21:58.620 2007.

00:22:00.620 Alberta has six times Nova Scotia's population, but only three and a half times as many MPs

00:22:06.620 and half as many senators.

00:22:08.620 Alberta votes overwhelmingly Conservative, but four out of five of our senators are Liberals. 0.92

00:22:13.620 Most of them are on the radical left, and one even pushes transitioning little children. 0.95

00:22:18.620 Well, meaning Federalist conservative politicians tell us that we just need to vote for them to make everything okay. 0.83

00:22:25.620 But we have done that for the last 28 elections in a row since 1935.

00:22:32.620 We have said the West wants in, but on the occasion that we do get in, the changes that we get are relatively small and quickly reversed by the next Liberal government.

00:22:42.620 Conservatives may promise a pipeline, but they will never promise to reform the Constitution,

00:22:48.860 to give the West fair representation or to end equalization.

00:22:52.900 They cannot because they need to win votes in the East to form government.

00:22:58.540 I fight for independence not because I dislike Canada.

00:23:03.000 On the contrary, I love Canada.

00:23:06.620 I grew up in small army and air force towns across Canada and had dreams of being a captain

00:23:10.900 in the Royal Canadian Navy. But our Canada is gone. It has been replaced by a post-national

00:23:18.520 economic redistribution zone. That Canada is terminally ill and it shows no signs that

00:23:25.300 it is willing to save itself. That Canada is crippled with shame and guilt and only

00:23:33.180 arouses itself to fly the Maple Leaf when the bad orange man says mean things. That Canada

00:23:39.300 tore down its monuments to Sir John A. Macdonald and Queen Victoria.

00:23:45.100 That Canada spits on the heroes that conquered and settled a harsh and hostile wilderness

00:23:50.700 and made it into one of the greatest and freest nations on earth.

00:23:54.800 That Canada lowered its flag in self-flagellating shame for months to atone for a genocide that

00:24:01.200 it well knew was a hoax.

00:24:04.420 That Canada rejected its liberty for censorship and the false illusion of safety. 0.96

00:24:10.080 That Canada opened the floodgates to third world mass migration that is destroying the 0.99

00:24:14.920 inheritance passed on to us by our ancestors. 0.62

00:24:18.900 That Canada tells you that you're racist if you oppose it.

00:24:23.060 That Canada puts tampons in the men's room of a military base that used to be the home

00:24:27.860 of one of the most feared armies in the world.

00:24:31.240 Canada used emergency war powers to violently and unconstitutionally crush a peaceful protest

00:24:37.000 of flag-waving Canadians that were sick of having their freedoms crushed on the altar

00:24:40.760 of COVID hysteria. That Canada was ashamed of the Canadian flag until we raised Alberta's

00:24:47.120 blue shield in defiance. Alberta, and perhaps Saskatchewan, is the last bastion of real

00:24:53.660 Canadian patriots. Patriots proud of our past and unwilling to surrender our future. We

00:25:00.500 We are trying to save a part of Canada by declaring that our portion of it is proud

00:25:05.900 of its inheritance and is willing to fight to hand it to our posterity stronger than

00:25:11.340 we found it.

00:25:16.340 Okay, Duane, over to you.

00:25:27.260 So why are we here tonight?

00:25:29.580 There's always been a separatist sentiment in Alberta since it became a province in 1905.

00:25:35.540 In fact, I would argue it has spiked much larger in past years, 1981 at the height of

00:25:42.960 Pierre Trudeau's national energy program, or in 2019 with the re-election of Justin Trudeau

00:25:48.860 after the Alberta Liberals lost every seat that they had in the province and had the

00:25:53.260 lowest voter turnout they ever did in its history.

00:25:57.580 So why are we having a referendum in 2026?

00:26:01.460 I'd make the case that there's two reasons.

00:26:03.580 One is the election of Mark Carney in April of 2025.

00:26:08.220 Separatism has a large partisan element.

00:26:11.540 And in fact, if you listen to Derek's opening statement, there was a large partisan element

00:26:16.020 to that.

00:26:17.580 And so therefore, when liberals are in office in Ottawa, there is more separatist sentiment

00:26:22.880 in Alberta.

00:26:24.060 But the second is Daniel Smith.

00:26:27.660 We've always had premiers fighting Ottawa, whether that was William Aberhart, Ernest

00:26:32.300 Manning, Peter Lougheed, Don Getty, Ralph Klein, Rachel Notley, Jason Kenney.

00:26:39.180 But they were all fierce Canadians.

00:26:42.780 None of them were sympathetic to separatism, unlike Daniel Smith.

00:26:48.380 The UCP is not a separatist party, but there are separatists within the UCP, at the national

00:26:55.240 executive, at the constituency association level, at the caucus level, and amongst many

00:27:01.120 of its supporters.

00:27:02.780 So the reason we're having this referendum is about internal party unity and a potential

00:27:08.540 threat to Smith's leadership, and willing to risk national unity in the process.

00:27:15.580 Now I am not going to change many minds tonight, but what I hope to do is make the case for

00:27:21.360 why Alberta needs to remain in Canada and identify the myths and risks of Alberta separatism.

00:27:30.120 I am a very proud Canadian.

00:27:32.020 I'm also a very proud Albertan.

00:27:34.200 In fact, I often joke that the next reporter from Toronto that doesn't understand time

00:27:38.940 zones may push me to the separatist corner.

00:27:43.800 But like a majority of Albertans, I do not want to have to choose my identity.

00:27:49.060 I do not want to have to choose between being a Canadian and being an Albertan, because

00:27:54.600 I am both.

00:27:56.720 Thank you.

00:28:04.480 No shrinking violets here tonight.

00:28:06.560 Good.

00:28:07.560 Okay, we're going to start with one question to Duane, and he will have to defend it, and then it will flip over to Derek to rebut, and then we'll close again with Duane.

00:28:22.120 So, first question, Duane.

00:28:24.540 Support for separation and for triggering a binding independence referendum in October may have cooled somewhat in the polls, although this crowd may not agree with that.

00:28:34.120 Yet this entire conversation and all the stay versus leave campaigning has put Alberta independence firmly on the national map.

00:28:44.920 Other provinces are now watching.

00:28:47.560 My question to you, regardless of the outcome of the October 19th referendum in Alberta,

00:28:53.920 if we don't meaningfully change how confederation works, the threat to Canadian unity will only grow bigger.

00:29:04.120 Do you agree or disagree?

00:29:06.940 So I often hear this, that this is between separatism and status quo,

00:29:11.560 that somehow Alberta is the same place in Canada in 2026 as we were in 1905.

00:29:20.540 There has been substantial change in the country since that time period.

00:29:26.220 So, yes, we can talk about the grievance of not having natural resource rights in 1905.

00:29:32.060 That was changed in 1930.

00:29:34.120 We can talk about the role that Peter Lougheed played working with Pierre Trudeau in patriating

00:29:41.880 the Constitution for 1982, including reinforcing the role of natural resources in the Constitution

00:29:50.640 and supporting a notwithstanding clause currently being used by the provincial government.

00:29:57.360 Those are just constitutional changes.

00:30:00.000 You hear about the Senate, okay, and there has been lots of reforms around the Senate.

00:30:07.160 Just on the appointment process, Mark Carney reversed the partisan ban that Justin Trudeau

00:30:13.380 put in around the appointment of Senate.

00:30:16.620 We have had Senate elections, sometimes honored, sometimes not in this province.

00:30:21.520 We actually are going to have a referendum on abolishing the Senate.

00:30:25.540 That is not status quo.

00:30:27.320 That shows changes from 1905.

00:30:30.600 You look at the economic standing, the political standing of Alberta, it is not from where

00:30:37.720 we were in 1905.

00:30:39.720 Alberta would have gone bankrupt in the Great Depression were it not for federal assistance.

00:30:46.220 Likewise, the oil sands greatly benefited in the mid-1970s from money from both Ottawa

00:30:55.200 and the Ontario government, from a tax regime change that was made in the mid-1990s under the

00:31:02.320 Liberal government working with Ralph Klein that furthered the development of the oil sands.

00:31:09.840 Or economic oil policies, right? Just look at some of the changes that have been done

00:31:17.200 by Mark Carney in the last year. Look at the one, two, three MOUs that Carney has signed

00:31:24.480 with the current government now you may laugh at that and you're probably thinking there's no way

00:31:30.640 in hell that pipeline will ever be built that was the same comment that people made about trans

00:31:36.560 mountain now trans mountain went over budget but trans mountain is now making money serious money

00:31:43.680 for both ottawa and the alberta government so this idea that the choices separatism or status quo

00:31:52.640 is a false choice because nothing is status quo thank you over to you derek

00:32:02.800 thank you duane

00:32:05.680 all of the constitutional changes that you mentioned duane were pre-1982 the uh it's funny

00:32:13.680 how we call it repatriation of the constitution it was patriation but it's an odd term i guess

00:32:18.080 we use in our political history but 1982 and we had the constitution act and we got the charter

00:32:23.120 and whatnot when peter laheed fought to have uh to further entrench and clarify provincial ownership

00:32:29.760 over natural resource uh rights in the constitution for the provinces since then however without any

00:32:36.720 changes to the constitution through the proper amending formula courts have begun to erode

00:32:43.200 those rights. That's why the primarily liberal appointed Supreme Court of Canada allowed federal

00:32:50.720 intrusion into how we develop our natural resources in Alberta. That's why the federal

00:32:56.320 government is constitutionally allowed, as the Supreme Court decides at least, to impose a carbon

00:33:00.960 tax. That is a court decision because the Liberals tend to appoint the majority of our Supreme Court

00:33:06.640 justice because they're in power more than the Conservatives. Those rights are being

00:33:12.560 eroded regularly and they're going to continue to be eroded. Senators. Well, we've talked about

00:33:18.160 there's been changes to the Senate. The biggest change in the history of Canada constitutionally

00:33:23.200 to Senate appointments was imposing a retirement age. Was it 65 or 75? Yeah. So, because some

00:33:30.800 people were were serving until they were 100 and as senile as joe biden so we used to have a senate

00:33:37.920 full of joe biden's so i admit a little bit of improvement there they retire at 65. that is the

00:33:43.520 only substantial constitutional change alberta has six senate seats nova scotia has i believe 10

00:33:52.080 New Brunswick has ten each of those provinces are six and five times less

00:33:59.580 population than Alberta individually because Alberta was the Alberta and

00:34:04.980 Saskatchewan were the only two provinces that did not negotiate their way into

00:34:08.820 Canada as independent crown or semi-independent crown colonies first

00:34:12.180 they were created by the federal government over the objections of the

00:34:15.240 colonial legislature of the Northwest Territories at the time we wanted to

00:34:18.840 have Buffalo. And instead we got divided in Alberta and Saskatchewan. We are, uh, Professor

00:34:25.680 Bratt talked about the referendum we're having on abolishing the Senate coming up. Now, every

00:34:30.840 functional federation in the democratic world has a functioning upper house of some kind

00:34:35.120 the UK Senate, sorry, I mean the US Senate, uh, the German Bundesrat, et cetera. But remember

00:34:41.800 we had a referendum on equalization in the constitution in 2021. Anyone remember what

00:34:46.960 happened there? Nothing. That is why I reluctantly support the independent side, because whenever we

00:34:54.320 try to change something in good faith and good natured, you know what happens? Nothing. There is

00:35:00.720 unfortunately only two choices. It is the status quo or it is independence. All right.

00:35:08.180 duane you get a closer on this one one minute yeah so i'm going to focus on two of the points

00:35:20.340 one is around the senate we hear a lot about how the senate is unrepresentative and that is true

00:35:26.340 it's not even representation by population but in some cases new brunswick nova scotia

00:35:31.780 It's the opposite of that. But is breaking up the country worth it for a House of Parliament with very little power, power that it defers because it is unelected, to the House of Commons?

00:35:47.780 And on the Supreme Court, okay, this idea that because the Supreme Court has been appointed largely by liberals, it always operates on behalf of the federal government, not when it comes down to internal trade barriers, where they often come down in favor of the provinces, as in the case of the Maurice case, the poor man from New Brunswick who was charged with smuggling for bringing beer from Quebec.

00:36:15.180 And the Supreme Court upheld that, which is provincial rights.

00:36:19.800 Likewise, the effort at creating a national securities regulator was blocked by the Supreme Court, okay, on behalf of the provinces.

00:36:29.780 So there has been lots of change.

00:36:32.680 This is not status quo.

00:36:35.420 Do you want to quickly respond, Eric?

00:36:37.820 Just very quick.

00:36:38.700 I'm going to grant this latitude here because they're still civil.

00:36:42.700 But if that ends, this latitude ends too.

00:36:45.180 Just very briefly, the Senate doesn't normally exercise its power because traditionally the Senate, more often than not, has had seat counts, a majority in the Senate, that align with the governing party.

00:36:58.420 That is clearly not the case. We had a ton of Trudeau-appointed senators before the last election when it looked like the Conservatives were going to win a stonking majority, stating that they were prepared to block the agenda.

00:37:09.360 In the late 1990s, the reason Canada has no abortion law whatsoever is the Senate asserted its power and blocked a bill duly passed by the House of Commons.

00:37:18.420 It's a rarer example.

00:37:19.820 And just on the last point about internal trade, I don't want a Supreme Court that sides more with the Feds or more with the provinces.

00:37:27.980 I want a Supreme Court that sides with the Constitution.

00:37:30.400 And internal free trade is where you should—don't sign with the provinces.

00:37:34.140 That was a bad decision that it's illegal to trade beer across provincial borders.

00:37:37.840 That's good.

00:37:38.600 do you want to counter no okay question two Derek you're gonna like this one you 1.00

00:37:49.100 are the heart of Alberta's frustration is unfairness I saw that firsthand on the

00:37:55.040 fair deal panel we saw it during the trucker convoy the grievances have been

00:37:59.840 building for decades and now they're fueling a pro-independence campaign but

00:38:05.840 But let's be honest here.

00:38:09.200 How is an independence referendum fair to the many Albertans who want to remain Canadian

00:38:14.260 and say they would leave the province if we go solo?

00:38:17.780 How is it fair to the First Nations who object?

00:38:21.580 A yes vote means carving out federal parks, military assets, indigenous reserves, unworkable

00:38:28.660 partitions.

00:38:30.340 And how is Alberta, going it alone, fair to the rest of Canada?

00:38:34.940 So my question to you, Derek, voting to move forward with an independence referendum is

00:38:40.820 inevitably polarizing for Albertans and will cause more harm than pursuing greater sovereignty

00:38:47.600 within Canada, as Quebec has done.

00:38:51.000 Do you agree or disagree?

00:38:52.500 Well, it wouldn't surprise you that I disagree with the entirety of the question

00:38:58.560 and statement, the premise of it.

00:39:01.940 But I think there are fair points in it that I think deserve fair attention.

00:39:06.680 First, would it be divisive?

00:39:09.120 Absolutely.

00:39:10.220 Every time we engage in democratic exercises, it is divisive.

00:39:14.660 We like one party over another, we like one candidate over another.

00:39:17.560 We're having a referendum on any issue, there's going to be a winning side and there's going

00:39:21.180 to be a losing side, particularly in such an existential question as this.

00:39:26.620 This will be more divisive than, say, an equalization referendum, and it's a very fair point.

00:39:31.740 people's feelings are going to get hurt if the polls are believed my feelings

00:39:35.940 will get hurt but we're trying to change hearts and minds on that the winning

00:39:39.900 side is always gonna have to be gracious in in victory and the losing side is 0.74

00:39:44.640 going to have to be forgiving in defeat First Nations I believe it is much less

00:39:53.760 uniform than legacy media would have us believe it is not uniform I know many

00:39:59.640 people, Indigenous people, who are on the independent side, but I'm under no

00:40:05.020 illusions that as a whole they have our back. They are a minority that, if polling 0.79

00:40:10.380 is to be believed, are disproportionately on the Federalist side. I find that odd,

00:40:14.820 not that I can presume to speak for them, but the Indian Act has treated our

00:40:20.160 Indigenous people terribly. Why wouldn't this be an excellent opportunity to

00:40:25.360 rectify that, to bring them into the community of Alberta, treat them as

00:40:29.900 equals. But they have signed treaties, and treaties, good treaties, bad treaties, must

00:40:36.420 be respected. But just as the Dominion of Canada inherited the treaties from the

00:40:41.760 Crown Colonies of the United Province of Upper and Lower Canada, Nova Scotia, New

00:40:45.460 Brunswick, and eventually other Crown Colonies that pre-existed Canada and

00:40:49.240 came into the Dominion, an independent Alberta as a Republic or as a

00:40:53.360 constitutional monarchy would be obliged by law and honor to respect every one of those treaties

00:41:00.880 and it would be up to our indigenous people to decide if they want to renegotiate them or not

00:41:06.720 to the rest of canada i say if if you're worried about this being unfair

00:41:13.920 i hear you but there's a simple way to address it i'm not implacably an independent supporter

00:41:21.520 I can be won back, treat Alberta as an equal member of the family, open up the constitution,

00:41:30.240 treat us like everyone else in the family, and give us a seat at the table. Let the West in.

00:41:37.520 It's because I don't believe that the West is ever going to truly be in that I am supporting

00:41:42.880 the position I am in. So if the rest of Canada feels slighted by it, I understand that, but

00:41:47.360 but there's a clear answer if you don't want to feel that way.

00:41:51.680 Let's come to the table. Let's talk.

00:41:58.640 Over to you, Duane.

00:42:00.100 So let's break down this idea of fairness.

00:42:03.680 And I heard the comparison made between a referendum and a regular general election.

00:42:08.420 They are not the same.

00:42:10.220 In a general election, you fight, it's temporary, you have another election, four years later, you move on.

00:42:16.620 That's not with a separation referendum.

00:42:20.040 If that goes where the Canada side wins, that does not prevent a subsequent referendum, as we saw in Quebec.

00:42:30.020 But if the separatists win, then the story's over.

00:42:34.000 It's irreversible.

00:42:35.460 That is not fair.

00:42:37.880 If you first don't secede, try and try again is not a model of fairness.

00:42:43.360 On the treatment of Alberta, there was a book that came out by Donald Savoie, a very prominent

00:42:48.960 political scientist out of the University of Moncton, where he walked through how every

00:42:55.020 region of Canada feels that they're a victim.

00:42:59.820 Obviously Quebec feels that they're a victim, indigenous people feel that they're a victim.

00:43:04.040 Atlantic Canada, we hear about, oh, look how many extra seats PEI has in the House of Commons.

00:43:09.800 Yeah, that's why PEI runs the country, right?

00:43:12.320 They feel victims.

00:43:13.360 Obviously, Western Canada feels victims.

00:43:15.740 B.C., there's something about the Rocky Mountains they feel entirely ignored by the rest of the country.

00:43:20.340 And then the rebuttal would be, well, what about Ontario?

00:43:22.520 They obviously can't feel that they're the victims.

00:43:25.000 They actually do towards the United States because of the legacy of the Loyalists and the American Revolution.

00:43:30.580 So every part of Canada, part of the great Canadian trait, is we're all victims.

00:43:38.200 Ms. Candy Glantz mentioned at the beginning that she's a mom of three kids.

00:43:41.820 I'm sure each one of her boys believes that mom liked the other ones better right that's part of

00:43:47.700 the process and then there was reference to getting rid of the Indian Act Jean Chrétien when

00:43:55.740 he was Indian Affairs Minister in the late 1960s tried to do that and he was strongly imposed by

00:44:02.280 the indigenous people because that was viewed as assimilation and that would violate the treaty

00:44:08.380 rights that had been ignored up to that point treaty rights that they signed in good faith

00:44:13.580 in the 17th and 18th and 19th century right and so i think that's an issue that has been

00:44:21.500 largely ignored in this debate except by the courts so that's just a bit of my rebuttal

00:44:27.660 thank you you've got one minute derek to respond

00:44:30.700 Your analogy that every one of Donna's children, sons, probably thinks that mom loves them

00:44:39.400 the most is perhaps apt.

00:44:41.400 I can see how the Canadian family feels that way sometimes.

00:44:44.400 But in this case, one kid has had to drop out of school and work to support all the

00:44:48.940 others.

00:44:49.940 That kid deserves a little more love.

00:44:55.020 Dwayne is right in principle about a referendum being more definitive and being more irreversible

00:45:08.160 than a regular election. Except for this referendum. This is a referendum to hold a

00:45:13.940 referendum. This is a referendum to decide not to declare independence but to declare

00:45:19.920 if Alberta wishes to go down the road of independence. That starts a process of

00:45:23.780 negotiations this allows everyone to see the facts what is our share of the debt

00:45:28.520 going to be that we have to take how are we going to deal with assets and

00:45:31.280 liabilities like national parks military hardware they can keep most of that we'll

00:45:34.600 get our own but this is a referendum to have a referendum and start the process

00:45:39.280 thank you

00:45:45.160 all this talk of my three sons reminds me that this is being live streamed and so

00:45:52.500 all my sons are watching I love you all but but it is being live streamed so if

00:46:00.960 you have friends at home that you think should be listening in please let them

00:46:04.500 know it's Western Standard is live streaming and CTV is here as well so

00:46:09.360 there are ways to track this my third question is to Duane it's about numbers

00:46:16.860 I'm married to a number cruncher who happens to be in the room economists and

00:46:22.080 accountants have been busy crunching the numbers on staying in confederation

00:46:25.860 versus going independent. We've talked about equalization, federal rules on

00:46:30.720 transition costs, the price of running a new country. Pro-independence voices talk

00:46:37.740 about windfalls and some even say the numbers don't matter. Independence is

00:46:42.840 worth any cost. On the other side of the equation, big city mayors and chambers

00:46:47.700 of commerce are warning us that uncertainty drives away investment and shrinks alberta's economy

00:46:55.380 my question to you duane the argument has been put forward by separatists that continuing as

00:47:01.940 a province within canada costs alberta too much do you agree or disagree i disagree i mean albertans

00:47:11.940 are the richest people in the country and if that is a way that we have been victimized

00:47:18.120 by the rest of the country, I would like to be victimized a bit more.

00:47:23.820 On the issue of cost, we simply don't know.

00:47:28.240 You're going to see contrasting documents.

00:47:30.820 We saw a document that came from State Free Alberta that outlined it would be a minimal

00:47:37.180 adjustment costs, but reading through that, there were huge misrepresentations, some double

00:47:42.360 counting, the math just didn't add up. Likewise, the premier has said it would cost $400 billion

00:47:50.640 in adjustment costs, but no numbers backing that up. Now, the School of Public Policy

00:47:57.620 has been asked to do a more full-scale analysis, but it can only be temporary because ultimately

00:48:05.580 we don't know. What we do know is comparisons. We know the impact that Brexit has had on Britain

00:48:13.040 economically and the drop in GDP that occurred there. And that was breaking up a trade agreement,

00:48:21.520 not a country. And we saw what happened in Quebec with the movement of people and dollars and

00:48:30.360 companies there's a reason that the bank of montreal is now based in toronto toronto was

00:48:36.040 the great winner of this referendum debate long series of debates in quebec so there is going to

00:48:43.160 be a cost um and even quebec when they produce their documents jacques perizot was an economist

00:48:51.240 he acknowledged the uh the economic hit that quebec would take but there it was about identity

00:48:58.760 It was about language, it was about culture, it was about history, it was about tradition.

00:49:03.460 When I hear the arguments about Alberta separation, including by Mr. Phil DeBrand, the focus is on money.

00:49:11.440 Are Albertans willing to pay an economic cost for separation?

00:49:16.820 I don't think so.

00:49:18.260 So we do know that there will be a cost, and it could be ongoing cost, not just a temporary cost, but we don't know what those numbers are.

00:49:27.600 Thank you.

00:49:28.760 Derek, your response to that.

00:49:33.760 Dwayne, you talked about the uncertainty that came with Quebec's two referenda on independence

00:49:43.200 or sovereignty association, whatever they were calling it at the time, and the flight

00:49:47.580 of capital that took place.

00:49:49.720 The evidence, I mean this is pointed up by the state federalists very often, but the

00:49:54.600 evidence shows that capital and people fled Quebec not because it was seeking

00:50:00.660 to be an independent polity but because they feared what that independent polity

00:50:05.340 would be it would be a anti-English speaking ethno state run by socialists

00:50:13.320 who would be explicitly anti-business that has been the mo of most Quebec

00:50:20.640 governments since the quiet revolution no one wants to be in a place run like that independent

00:50:26.880 or sub-national i have a hard time imagining so uh you know some oilman in texas looking about 0.93

00:50:33.440 where to put his map and he sees this thing you know it's funny little shape some kind of redneck 0.70

00:50:38.480 switzerland with the lowest taxes north of the 49th parallel with the freest enterprise open 0.80

00:50:45.040 approvals, to drill new wells and dig new oil sands mines. That is not going to drive

00:50:50.600 away capital unless we're going to ban every other language from existing here and start 0.98

00:50:56.280 taxing people to death the way it was proposed to take place in Quebec. In 2024, the last

00:51:04.280 year for which we have the full final numbers, Alberta paid $77 billion into Ottawa. We got

00:51:12.480 53 back in net transfers and spending in Alberta. That was a $25 billion loss in one year. That

00:51:20.600 works out to $12,727 per household. Who would like to buy a boat this year? Who would like

00:51:30.120 to buy a boat every year? It's Alberta. Alberta has the fourth largest energy reserve on the

00:51:36.920 planet. And it is trapped. When I talk to Americans in the energy industry, they are flabbergasted that we do this to ourselves. Our per capita GDP as an independent country, assuming we did not improve our per capita GDP, which I absolutely believe we would, but even if we just stayed where we are, we would be ranked eighth richest country in the world. We'd be in a club with Liechtenstein and Switzerland, two landlocked countries, I would have you.

00:52:05.820 and Canada would drop from 16th to 18th.

00:52:10.720 But this is not just about the money, as Dwayne has said.

00:52:13.700 And sometimes our side has made this too much about the money.

00:52:16.040 It's not actually about that anymore.

00:52:18.220 It's about having a place that is still recognizably ours

00:52:22.480 when our children inherit this place, and we pass from it.

00:52:26.420 And we can see what's happening right now in Canada,

00:52:28.860 and we know that Canada's already gone.

00:52:30.840 We have to save Alberta before it's too late.

00:52:35.820 Okay, back to Duane here for a minute.

00:52:43.480 So, Mr. Fildebrand said that the reason that there were people and money leaving Quebec

00:52:49.480 was not due to referendums, but the fear that an independent Quebec would discriminate against

00:52:56.840 minorities, in this case the English minority.

00:53:01.320 Rewind the live stream back to Mr. Fildebrand's opening statement.

00:53:05.820 where he seemed to strongly attack immigration.

00:53:10.060 I'm looking around this room.

00:53:11.560 I don't see a whole lot of non-white Albertans in here. 1.00

00:53:16.000 Right? 0.88

00:53:17.240 So when we talk about, no, seriously, here.

00:53:21.960 When you hear about mass immigration as a reason to leave Canada

00:53:28.280 and you are first generation, second generation, third generation immigrant to Alberta,

00:53:33.960 What do you think you're hearing?

00:53:36.520 Likewise, the comment that Alberta is a conservative place.

00:53:40.760 What if you don't vote conservative, which in the last election was well over 40 percent?

00:53:46.800 Are we being told that we're not welcome here?

00:53:50.460 That's the same thing as the English community felt in Quebec, and quite frankly, the Alphonse community in Quebec felt.

00:53:57.740 So I'm going to make an observation here that, you know, there is a lot of talk about

00:54:08.820 numbers out there.

00:54:11.140 It's on every radio station, it's in every report, but this discussion, as I mentioned

00:54:16.540 at the very beginning, is very emotional.

00:54:20.200 And we don't really have great skills in talking about emotional issues.

00:54:24.380 a gross generalization many of you probably do but part of the questions

00:54:29.420 I'm asking tonight are geared to that kind of a conversation because we can

00:54:35.900 argue about numbers forever but that's not going to solve the problem us us

00:54:42.800 figuring out a pathway forward so I did this intentionally not to be mean but I

00:54:49.280 really think that this is the part of the conversation that we need to get

00:54:53.480 better at okay so my fourth question they get my rebuttal right I got one

00:54:59.820 minute no that was Dwayne's question do you have something else you want to say

00:55:05.300 of course actually I'm gonna give you another question because you're gonna

00:55:11.600 like this one too this one's to Derek governing a brand new sovereign country

00:55:20.060 isn't a simple endeavor. What will it be? Constitutional monarchy, a republic, or something

00:55:26.840 invented on the fly? How would immigration rules be decided? You've already talked about

00:55:32.160 that. Rebuilding trust with Canada, the world, and even our own citizens will be a steep

00:55:38.160 climb, and add in indigenous rights and the Trump factor. Trump's potential willingness

00:55:45.180 to recognize Alberta's unilateral declaration of independence and all that

00:55:50.220 chatter about joining the United States. My question to you, governance of a truly

00:55:56.180 independent Alberta would be extremely challenging and very risky without

00:56:03.860 Canada. Agree or disagree? I would agree with the first premise, first half of the

00:56:11.940 your question the second half no the first half I agree with that it would be difficult it would

00:56:23.180 not be easy there is ways to address it but I do not believe we could not do it without the rest

00:56:27.660 of Canada we have learned from Canada's great history how to govern ourselves as a province

00:56:34.820 we've had prime ministers even we know how to do this just as the Dominion of Canada knew how to

00:56:41.320 to govern itself because it had training wheels on as the crown colonies of the

00:56:45.560 United Province of Upper and Lower Canada, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, later on

00:56:49.500 Prince of Rhode Island, British Columbia and everyone else from there. Canada

00:56:54.400 learned from the great British Empire and our Westminster traditions how to do

00:56:59.060 these things. We know these things. We're ready to take the training wheels off.

00:57:04.360 We're ready to run. We know how to do this. How, what, what this looks like?

00:57:08.860 these are tough questions and they're fair for the other side to ask are we a

00:57:13.180 republic are we a constitutional monarchy if Alberta pursues independence

00:57:18.040 we would have to have a constitutional convention of some kind I think it

00:57:22.240 should be separate from the legislature itself the legislature will be too

00:57:25.580 self-interested you don't let the politicians write their own rules as

00:57:29.560 much as you can and so we should elect a separate constitutional convention the

00:57:33.660 way the Americans did after the American Revolution replacing the articles of

00:57:36.940 confederation. And we would have to address these very real, very tough

00:57:41.320 questions. I'm partial actually to a constitutional monarchy. In fact we could

00:57:46.380 even keep the same monarchy. When Canada became the Dominion of Canada, okay some

00:57:52.560 of you, I don't like Charles either, but we'll get past them. When the Dominion of

00:57:56.740 Canada was created, we didn't become somehow separate actually from Britain.

00:58:02.800 We grew. We evolved. We could still actually, if we wished, retain the same head of state in our constitutional monarchy. I know there's a lot of Republic of Alberta shirts here. So I'm not picking a fight with you, don't worry. But Republic is also an option.

00:58:19.240 But Canada grew from these separate colonies into the Dominion of Canada.

00:58:23.540 We had the Statute of Westminster, I believe, in the 1930s,

00:58:26.460 and then the final patriation of the Constitution, the Constitution Act, 1982.

00:58:31.540 That was a slow evolution of things.

00:58:34.120 There was no worry that Canadians weren't really ready to do it.

00:58:37.840 We've been Alberta since 1905, over 100 years.

00:58:42.380 We're ready to run.

00:58:48.300 I'm going to turn this over to Dwayne, but I do have to point out, and I want you to think about this, Derek,

00:58:53.440 is you didn't respond to the Trump factor, and I think you need to.

00:58:56.660 Okay.

00:58:57.560 So, Dwayne.

00:58:59.060 Yeah, so this is a very important question.

00:59:03.080 What would an independent Alberta look like?

00:59:07.200 And we didn't get much of an answer because they simply don't know.

00:59:11.480 So you want to vote to separate, and you can't even figure out if you're going to be a constitutional monarch or a republic.

00:59:21.800 And Mr. Felderbrand mentioned, look at the evolution of Canada.

00:59:25.100 We started with responsible government in the 1840s and then confederation in 1867 and the statute of Westminster and the patriation of the Constitution in 1982.

00:59:34.800 So, I guess the answer is, let's separate and we'll figure it out within the next 100 years.

00:59:41.800 I don't think that's a very good answer.

00:59:44.640 This is an important question.

00:59:45.920 What would the Constitution look like?

00:59:47.640 Would it be the same as what the Canadian Constitution, maybe throw in a clause protecting

00:59:52.560 guns?

00:59:53.560 Yeah.

00:59:54.560 Absolutely.

00:59:55.560 Like, you know, would we have section one, right, about a, that limits can be restricted

01:00:03.440 in a demonstrable country?

01:00:07.260 We'll have to see.

01:00:08.200 So these are important questions.

01:00:10.020 I didn't hear an answer.

01:00:11.020 Are we gonna have an upper chamber?

01:00:13.180 What will the electoral system be like?

01:00:16.080 Will this just be conservative rule?

01:00:18.820 I don't know.

01:00:20.200 Mr. Phil DeBrand doesn't know.

01:00:21.940 Everyone in this room doesn't know.

01:00:23.720 You may have ideas, but we don't know.

01:00:28.880 Okay, back to Derek.

01:00:30.260 So just quickly to bring Dwayne's part, then I'll come to you.

01:00:36.440 The United States, we're at 250 years of American independence, but when they declared independence,

01:00:41.880 they didn't know.

01:00:45.040 They thought of making George Washington king.

01:00:48.460 They could have had a parliament.

01:00:50.140 They could have had a king.

01:00:51.140 They could have had a king and a parliament, or they had the divided system as they did.

01:00:54.620 But they achieved independence first, I think a bit tougher than it would be for us.

01:01:00.140 I like to think. But then they had a constitutional convention and they allowed people in a proper

01:01:05.540 democratic process to decide. To Donna's question, I didn't mean to dodge it actually,

01:01:11.580 I just kind of forgot about that part. With Trump and a unilateral declaration of independence,

01:01:17.640 I know, geez, this is probably a whole question on its own right here. Ultimately, we should

01:01:22.440 attempt to follow the process set down in the Clarity Act, but the Clarity Act is set down

01:01:27.360 intended to fail. I do not believe at the end of the day we would have good faith

01:01:31.680 negotiations with Ottawa and get unanimity of Ottawa and the ten provinces

01:01:35.520 or nine others. At the end of the day we would have to seek international

01:01:39.600 recognition from foreign governments and I believe that the first customers door

01:01:44.160 we show up with would be the United States. I'm gonna turn this back over to

01:01:51.200 Dwayne to respond. Before I talk about the threat from the United States, Mr.

01:01:57.200 Vildebrand mentioned how the U.S. declared independence, fought a war, and then developed

01:02:03.900 their constitution after. That was the second attempt, right? Is that something that we

01:02:08.480 want to go through, especially given the communication and transportation changes that exist in the

01:02:14.560 21st century that didn't exist in the 18th century? Do we want to leave, screw it up,

01:02:20.560 and then try again? And especially given that the people that the U.S. was leaving were

01:02:26.720 an ocean away, and the people that Alberta would be leaving are right next door to us.

01:02:31.500 So I don't think that's a fair and equal representation. On the threat from the United

01:02:37.080 States, and this is a problem, and I'm not saying that this is Mr. Fildebrand's problem,

01:02:42.540 but we don't have a united federalist position. We don't have a united separatist position,

01:02:47.480 but there are separatists who want to join the United States, who say that this is step one

01:02:53.440 of a two-step process and even if you think not five million people surrounded

01:03:00.200 by 35 million surrounded by another 350 million that largely trades with that

01:03:07.840 American Empire the movement is going to occur right and so you may not like it

01:03:14.540 when it happens but that is what is going to draw in and I do think that

01:03:18.880 between now and October 19th I'm gonna wake up one morning and Donald

01:03:23.360 Trump will have put out some sort of tweet that says,

01:03:26.680 we don't want Canada as a 51st state, we only want Alberta.

01:03:31.480 And what's going to be the reaction in this province?

01:03:33.820 Some will cheer that.

01:03:35.420 I think the vast majority will be horrified.

01:03:39.700 So I'm going to exercise my latitude here to keep this one going one more time.

01:03:45.380 Back to Derek, and that will be the closure.

01:03:47.200 One minute.

01:03:47.580 Thank you.

01:03:49.800 There is a very small number who want to become a U.S. state.

01:03:53.360 I'm not one of them, and I don't imagine most independent supporters are.

01:03:57.360 I don't want to trade one distant imperial capital for another.

01:04:06.360 List of countries that unilaterally declared their independence,

01:04:10.360 and then held constitutional conventions to decide their own constitutional structure.

01:04:15.360 Poland, Yugoslavia, and then subsequent states succeeding Yugoslavia.

01:04:20.360 Czechoslovakia, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, and a country that I imagine federalists are fairly uniform in supporting the independence of right now,

01:04:31.940 which declared its own independence and then decided its constitutional structure, Ukraine.

01:04:37.560 They all did it.

01:04:41.240 If Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia can do it, I'm pretty sure Alberta, which is larger than France,

01:04:48.320 nearly twice the size of Norway and Japan, twice the size of Germany, and three times the size of

01:04:52.720 the UK, and would have the eighth largest economy on the planet. I'm pretty sure we can figure it

01:04:57.680 out too. I think somewhere in there we touched on something we agreed on, so that was good.

01:05:11.760 My next question is to Duane. It's fair to say that Albertans are watching the Carney

01:05:17.840 government's next moves on the energy mou as a litmus test of trust there's been progress for

01:05:25.600 sure premier smith has been very clear she wants the expanded tmx west coast pipeline

01:05:31.920 on the national project list by october however this isn't clear sailing recent fraser institute

01:05:39.840 study warns that the energy mou's carbon tax and carbon capture conditions make alberta's oil and

01:05:46.800 gas uncompetitive. My question to you, Duane, Albertans ballot box decision this

01:05:53.040 October will be heavily influenced by whether and how a new West Coast oil

01:05:59.520 pipeline actually moves forward. Do you agree or disagree? I think that's a major

01:06:05.640 part of it, but I would hope that the fate of the country does not rest on one

01:06:09.720 pipeline, but I do think it's important. So let's look at what Prime Minister

01:06:15.660 Carney has done on day one of becoming prime minister even before the April 2025 election

01:06:22.200 he removed the consumer based carbon tax now yes he did he did and who instituted a consumer

01:06:32.400 based carbon tax in Alberta it was the Alberta government who introduced the industrial carbon

01:06:39.200 tax in Alberta, it was the provincial government.

01:06:43.440 So Kearney removes what had become a major irritant, not just in Alberta but across the

01:06:49.220 rest of the country.

01:06:51.820 And then the first bill was Bill C-5 which said any project in the national interest

01:06:59.020 would supersede a whole series of environmental regulations.

01:07:04.220 Let's see what Kearney comes with now that the MOUs have been signed, now that the pipeline submission to the Major Projects Office has occurred.

01:07:15.380 So I think Mark Kearney has made significant strides in dealing with some of these perceived anti-energy policies.

01:07:24.840 And I would argue against Mr. Polyev, who says, well, just do it.

01:07:30.740 Just do it.

01:07:31.560 Forget about regulations. Forget about indigenous consultation. Just do it. It is so easy.

01:07:37.560 It is not easy to do these things, and it would not be easy in an independent Alberta if you accept the rule of law.

01:07:47.560 If you don't accept the rule of law, then it's really easy to do things.

01:07:51.560 Hence the comparison that you often hear with the Trans-Canadian Railroad of the 19th century.

01:08:00.560 There's no way that we would be able to build a project like today, nor do we want to.

01:08:06.940 The amount of people that were killed, that were displaced in building that, it's simply

01:08:11.580 intolerable today.

01:08:13.080 So I think the current federal government has made an outreach, the provincial government

01:08:18.840 has made an outreach, and they are working together.

01:08:22.760 I think in some cases for different reasons, I think Mark Carney's major motivation is

01:08:28.120 to diversify trade away from the United States in the case of some of that in the next question

01:08:36.040 okay he's on a roll I hate to interrupt you I'm going to turn it over to Derek here

01:08:41.100 Mark Carney is admittedly at least somewhat of an improvement on Trudeau I'm flying to Munich in

01:08:51.640 a few days. And in German, we have a word, Bekfeifengesicht, which translates roughly

01:08:57.420 as a punchable face. The new Prime Minister does not have a punchable face. That is an

01:09:02.660 improvement. But Mark Carney has a career-long history as being a radical opponent of anything

01:09:14.560 to do with oil and gas. He advised Justin Trudeau on these things. Now, it is possible

01:09:20.080 He has seen the Lord on the road to Damascus and is genuinely on our side.

01:09:27.160 I don't know the question.

01:09:28.300 People do change their stripes and opinions on things over time.

01:09:31.720 For instance, I used to be a Federalist.

01:09:34.020 So it is possible.

01:09:36.120 But one way or another, the conditions that have been attached in this MOU for a new West Coast pipeline are exorbitant.

01:09:46.240 Now, will it still make money at the end of the day?

01:09:48.480 Possible.

01:09:48.920 But it will mean a lot less than if we were living under any kind of rational regime that had wealth buried beneath its feet and would dig it up and sell it for as much money as possible, as fast as possible.

01:10:04.100 But I actually do agree with Duane on a point here that the fate of the country should not rest on a single pipeline.

01:10:12.020 But we probably disagree about why.

01:10:13.860 We could build 10 pipelines, but until Alberta is treated with respect, until we have equal democratic representation in the Senate and the House of Commons, until our freedoms are respected and we can't be arrested for waving a Canadian flag on Parliament Hill, disagreeing with the government, no, it's not about a pipeline anymore. It's about a hell of a lot more.

01:10:43.860 I'm going to turn this over to Duane, but I have to observe that these two guys are anticipating the next question.

01:10:50.720 So expect more on this.

01:10:53.520 So the comment that we can't judge Mark Carney on his actions, the regulatory actions, the legislative actions, the MOU actions.

01:11:03.880 Instead, we have to judge Mark Carney on speeches and books that he wrote five or six years ago.

01:11:08.840 That is quite different. That is quite interesting, that we can't judge actions. We have to judge words from the past. I'm going with the actions. And you may imply that the previous Prime Minister had a punchable face.

01:11:21.840 that the previous Prime Minister had a punchable face.

01:11:29.040 I don't know if either of us want to get into a boxing ring with Justin Trudeau.

01:11:33.080 He's pretty good at that.

01:11:35.040 And for those talking about the obstacles to the pipeline,

01:11:42.220 would building a pipeline to the West Coast be easier or harder as an independent country? 0.97

01:11:49.340 Do you believe that you could force indigenous people, force the B.C. government, force environmentalists to allow Alberta to build a pipeline as opposed to the role that the federal government played, not just on this one, but on the Trans Mountain pipeline as well?

01:12:07.340 Okay, thank you.

01:12:10.220 That punchable face line really triggered people, didn't it?

01:12:13.360 I've got one more question, it's almost 7 o'clock, we'd like you to be able to return to your families, return to Stampede, return to that beautiful weather outside, so I'm going to wrap it up here with one more question, and it's going to Derek, and it's kind of a continuation of the last one, because the guys plowed right into it.

01:12:37.220 Mark Carney and the Liberals were here just before Stampede, flipping pancakes of course,

01:12:43.220 and making announcements about oil pipelines to the west coast.

01:12:49.220 But they've warned that Alberta's flirtation with separation is dangerous.

01:12:55.220 Federal Conservatives are also campaigning to keep Alberta in Canada.

01:13:01.220 my question to you Derek beyond pipelines the federal government and

01:13:06.720 federal players of all persuasion still need and can take concrete steps to

01:13:13.980 lower the temperature and reduce the risk of a yes vote in October do you

01:13:19.200 agree or disagree I agree and I genuinely want them to do it I just don't

01:13:27.680 have a very, I'm not very hopeful that they will. They can't let us go. The Liberals need

01:13:36.020 our money and the Conservatives need our votes at the end of the day.

01:13:43.640 So, but there are things that can be done. I've spelled out some of it here. In fact,

01:13:51.340 some, not all, some of the questions that will be asked Albertans in a referendum

01:13:55.640 alongside independence October 19th, are of that nature, allowing more provincial appointments,

01:14:03.680 not just, this is unlike Quebec's asks constitutionally. Alberta's asks are for

01:14:08.240 everyone. It's not about special treatment, it's about treating us all the same. That's fundamentally

01:14:12.520 what it's about. It's about changing judicial appointments to give the provinces more power

01:14:16.320 over our own upper courts in our own provinces. It talks about the Senate. I think it's the wrong

01:14:21.080 answer I actually think we need a reformed Senate it can be on the 0.72

01:14:25.080 American the Australian or the German models any one of those are a wild

01:14:29.360 improvement over the medieval system that we have here it talks about market

01:14:36.840 access strengthening our freedoms that would be a gigantic start a gigantic

01:14:42.980 start and I'd be willing to if if Albertans voted for all of those and the

01:14:50.180 rest of the country took us up in good faith on that, I'd be willing to change my name

01:14:57.080 to Ottawa. I will change sides, and I will campaign on the Federalist side if they took

01:15:02.000 us up on it, but they never will. We had the Reform Party for the West wants in. We had

01:15:08.140 our equalization referendum in 2021, and it was crickets. There is just no prospect of

01:15:14.200 this happening and I for one I'm not going to be bought off with potentially

01:15:18.960 one pipeline and I'm not going to be bought off anymore as well by well

01:15:24.460 meaning conservatives who are willing to treat us perhaps with a bit more respect

01:15:29.020 and an act like we deserve to have a seat at the table but won't do anything

01:15:34.060 they'll cost them a vote out east it's time that we took our own side in this

01:15:38.860 debate. Okay, Dwayne. So on the, going back to the issue of the Senate, we did have Senate reform.

01:15:53.920 We brought in a triple E Senate due to the work of Don Getty and Burt Brown. It went to a referendum

01:16:00.400 as part of the Charlottetown Accord. It was defeated, including by people in Alberta. So

01:16:06.620 So there we are with the situation I already talked about a lot of different other reforms

01:16:11.060 that have been done to the Senate.

01:16:12.740 On the House of Commons, yes, Alberta is slightly underrepresented in the House of Commons based

01:16:18.500 on population.

01:16:19.500 Yeah, three seats, three seats.

01:16:23.560 So if you say we need to have Alberta have an additional three seats, fair enough, then

01:16:29.520 would you also support Ontario having an extra 14 seats?

01:16:33.800 they are the most disproportionately underserved in the House of Commons based on population.

01:16:40.460 And if you're upset with PEI having those four seats, which as I mentioned before means

01:16:46.640 that they govern confederation, are you as upset with the rural urban divide in this

01:16:52.900 country both federally and provincially where rural ridings have less people in them than

01:16:58.400 urban ridings?

01:16:59.400 I think for good reason.

01:17:01.760 But you can't say it's good reason for rural folks in Alberta, but not in PEI.

01:17:07.580 So these are manageable items.

01:17:10.600 These are not deal breakers.

01:17:13.200 Having an unequal, weak Senate is not good, but it's not worth breaking up the country.

01:17:21.440 It is not worth breaking up the country for an additional three House of Commons seats.

01:17:27.000 And I've done the math.

01:17:28.480 You can see how it looks.

01:17:31.240 And on the federal government and on the leader of the official opposition, both of them have

01:17:36.900 to speak before Canada.

01:17:38.700 You cannot want to be Prime Minister of Canada and support separatism.

01:17:43.560 That seems obvious.

01:17:46.100 But what is the Carney approach?

01:17:47.760 I've outlined the Carney approach.

01:17:49.560 The Polyam approach is simple. 0.99

01:17:51.880 Vote for the Conservatives.

01:17:54.440 And if your argument is, well, there's so many other things, but as long as a Conservative

01:17:59.200 is in Ottawa, it's no big deal. I have numerous books on my bookshelf around separation. I

01:18:07.160 don't have Cory's. I'm going to have to get that before I leave and have it signed nicely

01:18:11.500 to me. But one of the books is a history of separation in Alberta. And one of the lines

01:18:18.760 is separation is at a low ebb right now because the Harper government was in office at that

01:18:24.800 time. But he goes on to say, but if the liberals ever return, separation will rise. And I can just

01:18:31.440 imagine what he would have written if it was a liberal led by a Trudeau. So those would just be

01:18:37.960 my comments on that. Thank you. And over to you, Derek. Yeah. So Duane pointed to the Charlottetown

01:18:48.620 Accord, which followed the Meech Lake Accord, and Albertans did vote against it. In fact,

01:18:53.700 the national campaign in that referendum was led by Albertans, by Preston Manning on one side,

01:18:58.300 and then actually by Quebec Sovereignists, and Lucien Bouchard, and Perizot on the other.

01:19:03.180 And the reason Westerners voted against it, overwhelmingly, was, yes, it gave actually a

01:19:10.600 two-e Senate, because it got rid of the effective. It gave equal representation and elected, but it

01:19:15.480 took away most of the Senate's powers to check the lower house. It had special racial categories

01:19:21.900 for electing senators.

01:19:23.360 It wasn't just provinces anymore.

01:19:24.780 It was going to have racial categories.

01:19:27.080 The Charlottetown Accord had a whole suite

01:19:28.880 of special status for Quebec.

01:19:31.460 And I'm actually, I've changed my mind on Quebec

01:19:33.480 on a lot of things.

01:19:34.440 I actually do understand them

01:19:36.120 on their need to protect their culture

01:19:38.060 and a lot of these things.

01:19:38.860 I started to feel like that in Alberta once in a while.

01:19:40.820 But Albertans had good reason

01:19:43.520 for voting against the Charlottetown Accord.

01:19:46.260 But the Charlottetown Accord did not come about

01:19:48.660 because Alberta wanted to be treated with respect.

01:19:51.900 It came about because they wanted to keep Quebec in Canada.

01:19:56.460 Okay, there we have it.

01:19:59.360 Before we do summary statements here,

01:20:02.040 I'm going to give each of the debaters a chance to have two to three minutes

01:20:07.740 to finish up their arguments.

01:20:10.160 But I want to ask one question that's been niggling, 0.92

01:20:13.140 and I'm going to give each of you 30 seconds to answer this, 0.95

01:20:15.620 and they haven't been primed for this.

01:20:18.240 They'll never hire me.

01:20:19.980 They're not, am I being paid?

01:20:21.260 no duh oh I'm getting a beer after one of the questions I have in my mind is

01:20:29.900 there anything that Prime Minister Mark Carney could realistically do in the

01:20:35.360 next few months that would actually cause you to change your mind I mean I'm

01:20:44.360 gonna start with you Derek yeah yes call a constitutional convention bring all the

01:20:53.540 provinces together let's bring it all together let's sit down as a family of

01:20:59.120 provinces as a country that used to it's always been messy I'm not gonna 0.95

01:21:03.620 romanticize the past but we had our shit together once upon a time and if Mark 0.87

01:21:08.600 Carney can can do that I still don't believe he'll succeed but I think we 0.97

01:21:14.120 would owe it to ourselves and fellow Canadians, because we still are Canadians, even if some

01:21:20.020 of us identify most as Albertans, we would owe it to ourselves and our fellow Canadians

01:21:24.180 to sit down in good faith and see if we could hash this out. I don't believe it would come

01:21:29.720 anywhere, but I think we'd owe it to ourselves, our children, and those who came before us

01:21:34.400 to sit down and do it.

01:21:35.840 Thank you. Duane.

01:21:37.220 so a couple things one is mark carney has met much more regularly with the premiers than the

01:21:47.280 previous prime minister did on issues around u.s trade on major projects and has been working quite

01:21:54.820 nicely with those premiers including both daniel smith scott moe and doug ford all conservatives

01:22:02.520 Now, I can just imagine if Mark Carney announced that he was going to institute constitutional change, bringing in a convention, bringing in all the premiers, what the reaction would be.

01:22:14.520 What about affordability? What about trade? What about pipelines? Why are we spending our time on the Constitution?

01:22:22.520 And so the people that are chairing a constitutional convention today would be opposing a constitutional change probably the same day.

01:22:32.520 Thank you. It's a tough question. It's one you might want to ask yourself, too. I'm just putting it out there. Okay, we're going to do summaries here. Last word. I'm going to start with you, Derek.

01:22:44.000 Oh, I have the first opening one.

01:22:45.920 No, I get to decide.

01:22:47.300 Okay, you're in charge. We agreed.

01:22:50.120 Tell him what she needs to do.

01:22:51.680 Oh, yes, Mom. Okay.

01:22:54.560 Well, first of all, I want to thank Donna for doing a great job as a moderator tonight.

01:22:59.180 And Dwayne.

01:23:01.380 I wanted a roughly split room, but I think Dwayne has showed some courage here tonight.

01:23:08.120 We don't agree on the time of day generally,

01:23:10.920 but there were other people who were invited to be my opponent tonight,

01:23:15.040 and Dwayne took it up with a room that is, I think, predominantly Western Standard.

01:23:18.460 So thank you.

01:23:21.680 Ottawa plunders Alberta's wealth to buy votes in other parts of Canada.

01:23:31.360 We know this, but that is not why we support sovereignty.

01:23:35.500 Ottawa has spent a decade moving heaven and earth to stop Alberta from becoming as prosperous

01:23:40.580 as she could be.

01:23:42.340 We all know this, but still, that is not why we support sovereignty.

01:23:48.140 We must chart our own course because the Canada that once was has resigned itself to decline

01:23:53.940 and destruction.

01:23:55.560 I have always believed and continue to believe that a reformed and resurgent Canada is the

01:24:00.380 best path forward for Alberta and the West.

01:24:04.200 Real change to things like market access, equalization, representation in the House

01:24:08.740 of Commons and the Senate, protecting our liberties, these all require reopening the

01:24:13.460 Constitution.

01:24:15.180 Quebec holds a veto over any reforms

01:24:17.660 and will never agree to receiving less money

01:24:20.320 and would come with a grab bag of its own demands

01:24:22.880 for special treatment.

01:24:24.520 The Atlantic provinces likewise

01:24:26.040 will never agree to end equalization

01:24:28.100 or their over-representation in both Houses of Parliament.

01:24:32.120 Who here remembers the referendum

01:24:33.780 on ending equalization in 2021?

01:24:36.460 Show of hands.

01:24:39.920 Now, who here remembers the response

01:24:42.200 from Ottawa and the other provinces?

01:24:45.180 No, you don't. There was none. It was silence. Deafening silence. Canada will not take up the call that the West wants in. And to those who stand against independence, I ask you, what is your proposal?

01:25:03.040 What will you do to fix this country beyond negotiate with Liberals and vote for Conservatives?

01:25:11.320 Is it more of the same?

01:25:13.280 Do we continue down the path of national destruction?

01:25:18.180 Albertans, Albertans, we're not going to vote our way out from this under the federal system.

01:25:27.100 That is why we have but two options left.

01:25:30.200 We accept going down with the ship, or we take our destiny into our own hands, and we declare independence.

01:25:49.340 Over to you, Duane.

01:25:50.840 So just on equalization, I can't believe it's at the end of the debate and we barely touched on equalization.

01:25:56.420 it wasn't just that the federal government and the other provinces didn't respond,

01:26:00.220 neither did the Alberta government.

01:26:02.200 And quite frankly, you don't even need a referendum for the Alberta government

01:26:06.520 to put equalization on the agenda.

01:26:09.640 And the current government hasn't done that.

01:26:12.000 The last government didn't do that,

01:26:14.140 whether that is removing it from the Constitution or adjusting the formula.

01:26:19.660 And if you don't like the idea of equalization

01:26:22.360 and you don't like relatively equal schools and health care systems across the country,

01:26:29.340 which is what equalization is,

01:26:31.780 then you might not like equalization in the province of Alberta that does the same thing.

01:26:38.220 The onus is not on me to show why we need to stay in Canada.

01:26:44.740 The onus, given the risk, is on Mr. Fildebrand to convince you why you need to go.

01:26:51.020 Now, I will acknowledge it's a lot more fun to be a separatist.

01:26:56.020 As we saw in the Quebec referendums, as we saw in the Brexit referendum,

01:27:00.020 you get your videos, you get your memes, you have your fun rallies, you get your emotion.

01:27:06.020 No matter what the issue or question is, the answer is always separation.

01:27:11.020 And you can promise a utopia and very different types of utopia.

01:27:16.020 But there are consequences to these false promises as we have seen in Brexit.

01:27:23.020 Canada is great because of Alberta. Alberta is great because of Canada.

01:27:30.020 Canada is one of the longest democracies in the world.

01:27:34.020 We have been a democracy since 1867 that is longer than Germany, longer than Japan, longer than France, longer than Italy.

01:27:44.020 We are a peaceful country. We are economically prosperous country.

01:27:50.780 There's 195 countries. We're in the top 15 just on GDP and per capita income and on wealth.

01:27:59.000 That is pretty good.

01:28:01.220 We have personal freedoms.

01:28:04.660 We live in a great country.

01:28:07.560 Now, for the separatists in the room, everything good about Alberta is due to the hard work and ingenuity solely of Albertans.

01:28:17.760 Everything bad is due to Ottawa and other provinces.

01:28:22.360 But you can't disentangle them.

01:28:25.580 You can't say, well, mobility rights and educational mobility have strengthened Alberta, but those don't count.

01:28:34.360 What we need to focus on is the things that we don't like, as opposed to the things that have benefited us.

01:28:44.120 Well, folks, that is it for the evening, and I think we should have a round of applause for both of these debaters.

01:29:04.360 and before you get up and leave I just want to tell you that I'm grateful for

01:29:11.600 the civility in this room tonight this is what we need to take out into the

01:29:17.420 rest of Alberta and the rest of the country this is emotional there's

01:29:21.540 nothing more emotional those three boys I talked about those sons they all live

01:29:25.520 in Alberta so to my grandkids this matters to every one of us that's why

01:29:30.680 I'm here we have to figure out a way to talk about these issues and make

01:29:36.840 decisions because this is incredibly polarizing and we're all Albertans so we

01:29:43.460 need to figure this out and your being here is a step in the right direction so

01:29:49.220 thank you okay thank you very much to our contestants as well as to Donna

01:30:01.600 Kennedy glands for moderating we just want to do a quick plug if you want to

01:30:07.580 subscribe to the Western Standard please visit actually the QR codes right on

01:30:12.720 that screen if you want to scan it I'll leave it up there for a second and then

01:30:16.480 check out our merchandise booth on the way out the door. Thank you for coming and have a great night.

Western Standard - July 10, 2026

Independence Debate (with Derek Fildebrant and Duane Bratt)

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Summary

Transcript