Now we know most Albertans distrust Ottawa, despise the very name Trudeau and otherwise loathe all things federal. But there’s a suggestion looming in our neighbouring province that could threaten the very rule of law itself.
The United Conservative Party leadership race is finally over.
And the winning candidate, Danielle Smith, has proposed the Alberta Sovereignty Act, which would allow the provincial legislature to ignore court rulings that find the province in violation of Canada’s Constitution by not enforcing federal legislation.
They could pick and choose from any federal legislation they find “problematic” and explain the harm to Alberta, and then basically set out how they would not enforce that legislation.
So basically, even if Ottawa sues the Alberta legislation as unconstitutional, Alberta could just turn around and ignore it as long as they could frame it as harming Alberta.
So many questions. So many.
The first being, if you plan to ignore all federal laws you don’t like, why are you still a part of the country?
Even Jason Kenney, who has been wrong more often than he has been right on many issues — which as an aside, is what got us to this leadership race in the first place — came out and said the act would make Alberta look like a “banana republic”. And being Kenney, his main concern was that investors wouldn’t like the instability it brought. He’s not wrong.
Smith, being Smith, blamed all the kerfuffle on “woke” media and the use of fear-mongering and disinformation to say mean things about her very fine proposal.
“What’s a police officer supposed to do when you’ve got one level of government saying ‘Don’t apply that law,’ the Parliament of Canada saying ‘That is the law’ and citizens throwing their hands in the air saying, ‘I’m just not sure what system of law governs what anymore,’” Eric Adams, a law professor at the University of Alberta told CBC News.
Others argue that a province has no choice but to do something when they feel the feds have over-stepped.
So what do voters think?
According to Angus Reid, our old friend and pollster, Albertans were likely to believe the impact of a win by any of three UCP leadership frontrunners – Danielle Smith, Travis Toews, and Brian Jean – will be more bad than good for Alberta.
Two-in-five (42 per cent) Albertans believe it would be “terrible” for the province if Smith won the UCP leadership race and became premier.
Half of Albertans (54 per cent) oppose the Alberta Sovereignty Act; one-in-three (34 per cent) support it. That splits along party lines but not as sharply as you’d think. While a majority of UCP supporters like the act, that majority is only 56 per cent, so not a booming endorsement. A for NDP voters, 91 per cent are against it.
But, on the other hand, 52 per cent of Albertans say that Rachel Notley of the NDP winning next spring would be bad for the province. In fact 45 per cent say it would be “terrible”. So you’ve got 42 per cent of voters saying Smith would be “terrible” and 45 per cent saying Notley would be “terrible”. Not great for either party.
UCP popularity has risen some according to Angus. They now lead the NDP by about six points, just outside the margin of error. And most of that support for the UCP is coming from voters who have decided that they won’t support the Wildrose Independence Party, whose ratings have fallen sharply in the last year.
And the two other UCP front runners Travis Toews and Brian Jean had better “terrible” ratings. Only 16 per cent of Albertans think Toews would be “terrible” and 21 per cent think Jean would be “terrible”. Nonetheless they went with the more “terrible” Smith.
Those are all quite terrible ratings, which leaves Alberta voters in a bit of a pickle. We now know which one of these “terrible” choices appealed to UCP voters the most. But there is another terrible decision to make next spring.
carolyn.grant@kimberleybulletin.com
Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter