If the idea is to let citizens organize a referendum, there’s not much point in having laws that make it too hard to get a vote on the ballot. The Government of Alberta’s Bill 54, the Election Statutes Amendment Act, addresses that. Introduced into the legislature today, it will trim the number of signatures of eligible voters required to launch a referendum from 20% to 10%. (In Alberta, that’s about 300,000 names.)
This, the day after a Liberal victory in the federal general election gave a fourth term to a Liberal government that for ten years has been actively hostile to Alberta.
A coincidence?
Not at all. Many — perhaps most — Albertans are prepared to give Prime Minister Mark Carney an even break. But with the federal Conservative Party taking more than 63% of the provincial popular vote, most didn’t vote for him either.
After nearly ten years of his predecessor’s policy stupidities, regrettable personal behavior and gross condescension to Alberta, why would they? Also, incoming Prime Minister Mark Carney's ideas about fighting climate change by fighting pipelines and limiting Alberta's energy industry and the prosperity that goes with it, are well known.
So are his social views.
This is a man who said more than once during the recent election campaign that 'if you're going to be serious about crime, you have to be serious about guns.' Alberta gun owners took note of that.
There is also broad support in Alberta for the idea that children should not be allowed sex-change operations until they're 18. Carney's comments on the matter have been oblique but have been interpreted to mean he thinks the obligation on society to provide such procedures on demand should be enforced by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
And, he is surrounded by the same Liberal Members of Parliament who last year introduced and passed odious restrictions on Canadian internet use. Only the collapse of the Trudeau government prevented them from then passing the frightening Bill C-63, The Online Harms Act, that would have provided, among other things, for the pre-emptive prosecution of people who 'might' use the Internet to say politically incorrect things.
So yes, trust but verify.
On the Western Standard's election night coverage Monday, former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall was asked what came next for Western Canada, now that the Liberal Party was to form government. Implicit in the question was that the values underpinning the Liberal government described above were anathema to Western Canada and that even things that sounded acceptable might mean different things to different people.
How should Western Canada respond?
His answer: 'Wait and see what the prime minister does.' Former Alberta Cabinet Minister and University of Calgary constitutional expert Ted Morton said the same thing a few minutes later.
This is good advice.
And, if it should turn out that the Carney ministry is as grimly authoritarian as that of Mr. Trudeau, but conducted with an efficiency that was foreign to his predecessor, freedom-minded Albertans might well be grateful to Premier Smith for making it easier to decide whether they wanted a different future, perhaps even an independent Alberta.
To that point, we also take note that Preston Manning is publicizing the idea of a gathering comparable to the 1987 Winds of Change conference in Vancouver, that was foundational to the whole 'West Wants In' effort, the birth of the Reform Party and all that followed it.
The West Wants Out, this time?
As the article on the Western Standard website explains, "Polling is underway to assess whether the continuation of Liberal rule has deepened the estrangement of Western Canada from Ottawa and the rest of the country.
He noted that Carney’s assurances of a "180 degree turn" from key policies of the Trudeau government — including on climate change, pipelines, immigration, and what Manning described as “proliferate deficit spending” — remain to be tested.
Quite. So, responsible people are looking at the future of Western Canada under what could turn out to be an oppressive collectivist regime in eastern Canada — notwithstanding Mr. Carney's assurances otherwise.
It is to Premier Danielle Smith's credit that she is — again — leading her government to help Albertans help themselves, if circumstances make it necessary.