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Alberta Politics

Disappointed Wildrosers sit outside as Redford Tories abandon Klein-era financing.

Danielle Smith Rob Anderson Heather Forsyth Wildrose
Wildrose leader Danielle Smith (centre) with MLAs Heather Forsyth and Rob Anderson in 2010.

Alberta’s opposition parties are traditionally notorious for being unforgiving towards leaders who fail to meet or beat electoral expectations.

Take for example former Edmonton Mayor Laurence Decore, who after leading his Liberal Party to its best showing in more than 70 years, was driven out by MLAs and members who were disappointed to be sitting in the opposition benches. Now in 2012, will Wildrose Party leader Danielle Smith‘s leadership end with a similar fate? Not likely anytime soon.

As I said on election night, despite her party’s strong showing and newly acquired official opposition status, one of Ms. Smith’s biggest challenges will be to deal with many of her party’s supporters and MLAs who will be disappointed they did not form government. With 17 MLAs and a strong record of fundraising, I expect that Ms. Smith’s party and the powers that finance it will allow her to have a second chance, rather than destabilizing the delicate coalition of fiscal hawks and social conservatives they helped her build.

Last week, an anonymous online video emerged that made waves in the ranks of the Wildrose Party. Borrowing music from Michael Bay‘s Transformers 3: Dark Side of the Moon, the anonymous creators of the online video clumsily detailed the threat that certain individuals posed to the “grassroots” of the Wildrose Party and suggested the chance of a potential coup d’etat against leader Ms. Smith (the video is now removed from the Dailymotion site).

Like blogger David Climenhaga, I hesitate to read too much into the twisted innuendo of internal party politics that this online video delved into. And I would not be surprised if, at their upcoming AGM, Ms. Smith begins taking a more hard-line approach to party discipline, similar to the approach taken by Stephen Harper when he became leader of the Conservative Party of Canada.

For the first time in decades, conservative supporters of the Wildrose Party are sitting outside to the ruling coalition of which they had previously been a pillar constituency. As Premier Alison Redford builds a new moderate political coalition, she will not have to dwell on the every-want of the “Socred Retreads,” as she called them in her speech to last weekend’s PC AGM.

Despite Wildrose MLAs relentlessly criticizing Premier Redford in the media, it must be frustrating for many Wildrose Party supporters to now watch their former party, the long-governing Progressive Conservatives, turn away from the anti-debt orthodoxy that defined former Premier Ralph Klein‘s era in Alberta politics. Without the hype of personality politics behind it, the short-sighted policies of Premier Klein’s govermnent look and feel like they are from a by-gone era. Gone are the days when even a hint of long-term investment was sacrificed in favour of short-term balanced budgets or at-any-cost debt reduction.

Premier Redford, like Premier Ed Stelmach before her, is talking about taking an adult approach to long-term financing of capital projects and maintenance of public infrastructure. With the bulk of the hard-line fiscal conservative hawks sitting in the opposition benches, Premier Redford and Finance Minister Doug Horner are afforded more fiscal flexibility.

Instead of waiting for “cash-in-pocket” to build and maintain important public infrastructure, the Tories are pushing forward with capital financing. Their newly discovered fiscal flexibility could give the Tories an opportunity to fix the problems created by their predecessors.

This of course does not mean they will not face opposition within their own caucus when charting this new fiscal course or creating a new narrative for their party. Like Premier Stelmach before them, neither Ms. Redford or Minister Horner had the support of the majority of their fellow MLAs during last year’s leadership selection.

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Premier Redford poses for photo with Calgary-Centre Liberal Harvey Locke.

Alison Redford Harvey Locke Calgary Centre Liberal
Premier Alison Redford and Calgary-Centre Liberal candidate Harvey Locke at this weekend’s PC AGM in Calgary.

There has been a lot of media attention over the past week focused on the  split between federal and provincial Conservatives in the Calgary-Centre by-election. While most Tories appear to be supporting Conservative candidate Joan Crockatt, many Progressive Conservatives remain unhappy with Ms. Crockatt’s tacit support of the Wildrose Party in the recent provincial election.

PC Premier Alison Redford has tried to downplay the rift between the two parties in the by-election, even admiting that she has a giant Conservative sign on her lawn.

Whatever campaign sign occupies her front lawn, a photo of the Premier posing with federal Liberal candidate Harvey Locke at this weekend’s Progressive Conservative convention will surely fuel more speculation about a split between federal and provincial Conservative parties.

The attendance of Mr. Locke at the convention also raises questions about whether the federal Liberals are trying to forge new political ties with the provincial Tories in Alberta.

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Alberta Politics Satire

Social Credit celebrates 77 years in government.

Social Credit Party Alberta
Supporters celebrate 77 years of Social Credit rule in Alberta.

CALGARY STAR-TRIBUNE

In 1935, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers’ hit song “Cheek to Cheek” topped the music charts and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers became the first western Canadian team to win the Grey Cup. It was also the year that the Social Credit Party formed government in Alberta.

Fresh from celebrating the party’s 21st consecutive election win, Premier Rob Anderson will join party faithful this weekend to celebrate the Social Credit Party’s 77th year in government.

 Long abandoned are the social credit monetary policies that defined the party when it formed government in 1935. Social Credit in 2012 embraces what political watchers have called the Conservatism of the New Albertan Century.
Rob Anderson MLA Wildrose
Rob Anderson

“One of the regular talking points of the Official Opposition is to claim that after 77 years of Socred rule, the province of Alberta is some grim, dark, horrible place to live,” said Premier Anderson. “It’s entirely untrue, of course. And it doesn’t say much for the Opposition that they say such terrible things about this great province.”

“Alberta is the best place to live, work and play in Canada,” said the Premier.

On Friday night, Premier Anderson will join Traditional Family Values Minister Rob Anders, Telecommunications Minister Ezra Levant and Treasurer Jason Kenney in paying tribute to former Premiers William Aberhart, Ernest Manning, Harry Strom, Preston Manning, Stockwell Day, and Monte Solberg.

Only once in the party’s 77 year history has it faced the threat of electoral defeat.

Harry Strom Alberta Premier
Harry Strom

While the history books record Premier Harry Strom as the great conciliator of Canadian confederation, he led the dynasty to its narrowest victory the 1971 election. New to the office, Strom fought back young Peter Lougheed‘s liberal-minded Progressive Conservatives, leading his party to form a small majority government.

Four years later, Strom led Social Credit to a decisive victory over the Tories.

Many historians credit Social Credit’s survival in 1971 to the failure of the Daylight Savings Time plebiscite.

Lingering in the opposition benches in the 41 years since 1971, the PC Party has been unable to topple the long-standing government.

Current PC Party leader Raj Sherman has called the Social Credit Party old and out of touch.

“The simple fact is that over the past 77 years the government has backed itself into a corner on revenue and desperately needs to find a way to return to solid financial ground,” said Sherman, an emergency room doctor.

“While Albertans deserve to have a say in all matters of public policy, I am troubled by this administration’s penchant for government by polling – particularly when they are so selective about the feedback that they choose to heed,” said Sherman.

NDP leader Rachel Notley has called on Premier Anderson to tear down the economic “Firewall” that divides Alberta from the rest of Canada. “Too often the Socreds make poorly studied, reactionary decisions based on industry lobbying”, said Notley.

“As things stand now, we are closing our eyes, crossing our fingers, and hoping for the best,” Notley said.  “Albertans deserve better,” said Notley.

Albertans can follow the weekend’s celebrations using the Twitter hashtag #after77years.

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Alberta Conservatives can relate to Tea Party “bozos eruptions.”

Tea Party
Angry Tea Party supporters rally against President Barack Obama.

Glued to my television last night, I, like probably millions of other Canadians, watched as the blue states and red states were tallied until President Barack Obama defeated former Governor Mitt Romney.

Last night and over the course of the American election campaign, I could not help but think of the similarities between the missed opportunities of the Republican Party in this election and Danielle Smith‘s Wildrose Party in Alberta’s recent provincial election.

Admittedly, the comparison is not perfect, but as someone who has immersed himself in Alberta politics and, for the past few months, American politics, I could not help but notice some similarities.

Both parties likely had opportunities for significant electoral gains, yet both suffered or were seen to have suffered electorally because of the extreme elements of their electoral coalitions.

Just as the “bozo eruptions” made by Reverends Allan Hunsperger and Ron Leech drove moderate Alberta voters away from Ms. Smith’s party earlier this year, the cruel and mean-spirited “rape” comments made by extreme right-wing Tea Party Republicans Todd Akin in Missouri and Richard Murdock in Indiana appear to have driven moderate voters away from the Republican Party. As some pundits have suggested, the American bozo eruptions may have cost the Republicans the opportunity to win back states that they narrowly lost to the Democrats in 2006.

It was promising to see that moderate American voters rejected this type of politics. It was also promising to see American voters support ballot initiatives to legalize same-sex marriage in a handful of states, turning the tide back against years of electoral attacks on marriage equality. In Wisconsin, Democrat Tammy Baldwin became the first openly gay Senator, which is made more exciting because her sexual orientation does not appear to have even be an issue during the election campaign.

For those of you who did not have the energy to stay awake into the early hours of the morning to listen to President Obama’s victory speech, you can watch it in the video below.

If only our political leaders could work up an ounce of President Obama’s charisma and powerful speaking skills, Canadian politics could be so much more inspiring.

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Calgary-Centre By-Election: Accusations and high-profile visits.

The by-election in Calgary-Centre is in full-swing with accusations and high-profile visits becoming a distinguishing characteristic of the campaign in advance of the November 26 vote.

1CalgaryCentre, the group bidding to unite progressive voters behind a single candidate, is becoming the source of much online frustration by both conservative and non-conservatives involved in this by-election.

On Twitter last weekend, Conservatives Pat Walsh and Cody Battershill, who are supporting Conservative candidate Joan Crockatt, accused the 1CalgaryCentre group of being backed by well-known Conservatives Stephen Carter and Rob Hawkes in an attempt to undermine Ms. Crockatt’s campaign.

Stephen Carter Calgary Conservative
Stephen Carter

Mr. Carter is best known for the roles he played in Mayor Naheed Nenshi and Premier Alison Redford‘s successful election campaigns. Mr. Hawkes is a prominent Calgary lawyer, son of former Progressive Conservative Member of Parliament Jim Hawkes, and ex-husband of Premier Redford. According to 1CalgaryCentre, the two men have not been involved with the group.

A partisan rift between many provincial and federal Conservatives was perpetuated when many federal Tory supporters, including Ms. Crockatt, were seen by provincial Tories as tacitly supporting the right-wing Wildrose Party in their bid to unseat the long-governing PC Party. A prolific tweeter and political commentator until her recent candidacy, Ms. Crockatt has avoided the online fray created by her supporters.

Meanwhile, supporters of Liberal Party candidate Harvey Locke are claiming that the 1CalgaryCentre group will inevitably endorse author and urban sustainability advocate Chris Turner, the Green Party candidate. While a recent poll suggests Mr. Locke is the leading opposition candidate, Mr. Turner’s campaign is generating more online buzz and excitement than any of the the candidates.

A recent IVR poll conducted by Forum Research showed Ms. Crockatt with a wide lead of 48% support in the riding. Mr. Locke had 28%, Mr. Turner had 11%, and New Democrat Dan Meades had 8% support.

Results of the Forum Research poll are based on the total sample of 343 voters had a margin of error of +/- 5% 19 times our of 10. As we all know, polls are a snapshot of voters opinion at a certain moment in time. There is still twenty days left until the by-election day.

Harvey Locke Darshan Kang Calgary-Centre
MLA Darshan Kang and Harvey Locke (photo from Mr. Locke’s Facebook Page).

Mr. Locke was joined on the campaign trail by Calgary-McCall Liberal MLA Darshan Kang last week and has been campaigning on the slogan “entrepreneurial progressive voice for Calgary-Centre.” Liberal leadership candidate Justin Trudeau brought some star power to Mr. Locke’s campaign when he visited the riding last month and sources suggest that he may stop by again when he is in Alberta later this month (he will be holding a rally in Edmonton on November 20).

Elizabeth May Chris Turner Calgary-Centre
Chris Turner (standing on a soapbox) and Elizabeth May (photo from Mr. Turner’s Facebook Page).

Green Party leader and British Columbia MP Elizabeth May paid her second visit to support Mr. Turner’s campaign and attended a “soapbox” event in Central Memorial Park. On November 17, Ms, May and famous environmentalist David Suzuki will be attending a “Turning Point” rally supporting Mr. Turner’s candidacy at Scarboro United Church.

Joan Crockatt Diane Ablonczy Jonathan Denis
MP Diane Ablonczy, candidate Joan Crockatt, and Justice Minister Jonathan Denis (photo from Ms. Crockatt’s Facebook Page).

Calgary Conservative MP Diane Ablonczy and provincial Justice Minister Jonathan Denis hit the campaign trail with Ms. Crockatt last week. While a few Conservative politicians have stopped by the campaign in Calgary-Centre, political watchers are beginning to quietly speculate about Prime Minister Stephen Harper‘s absence from the campaign in the downtown Calgary riding.

Davenport NDP MP Andrew Cash was in Calgary last weekend to help out Mr. Meades’ campaign. The official opposition Heritage critic, Mr. Cash attended a town hall forum on internet privacy and pub night jam session at the Marda Loop Community Association Hall.

Also running in the by-election are Progressive Canadian candidate Ben Christensen and Independent candidate Antoni Grochowski. A perennial election candidate, Mr. Grochowski ran unsuccessfully for Alderman in the 2010 municipal elections, as an Independent candidate in  in Calgary-Southeast during the 2011 federal election, and an EverGreen Party candidate in Calgary-Acadia during the 2012 provincial election.

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Beyond Question Period: Debating Bill 1.

If you pay attention to political pundits or follow the #ableg hashtag on Twitter, you will have read about how nasty and partisan the fall sitting of the Legislative Assembly has been. But if you logout of Twitter for a bit and ignore the embarrassing theatrics of Question Period, you will find some substantial debate and even more interesting (and sometimes confusing) politics at work on the floor of Alberta’s Legislative Assembly.

Rachel Notley MLA Edmonton-Strathcona NDP
Rachel Notley

Take last week’s debate around Bill 1 as an example.

Introduced during the six-day long spring sitting earlier this year, the Workers’ Compensation Amendment Act, 2012 (pdf) was the flagship legislation of the first term of Premier Alison Redford‘s elected government. Each year, a new Bill 1 is introduced and typically tends to be a feel-good piece of legislation tailored to the government’s immediate public relations program.

This year’s Bill 1 meant to extend “presumptive coverage” to first-responders – police, firefighters, peace officers, and emergency medical technicians – to access treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) through the Workers’ Compensation Board. As explained in the Edmonton Journal, presumptive coverage means that anyone working as a first responder who is diagnosed with PTSD is presumed to have developed that condition as a result of their job.

No government or opposition Members of the Legislative Assembly publicly voiced any opposition to the bill. The most interesting debate about Bill 1 occurred around two amendments introduced by Edmonton-Strathcona NDP MLA Rachel Notley that proposed to include two other professions to be covered in the Bill – corrections officers and social workers.

The first amendment, to include corrections officers, received strong support from the opposition benches. Ms. Notley and ten other opposition MLAs – New Democrat David Eggen, Liberal David Swann, and Wildrose MLAs Jeff Wilson, Joe Anglin, Rob Anderson, Bruce Rowe, Ian Donovan, Kerry Towle, Blake Pedersen, and Heather Forsyth – rose to speak in favour of the first amendment.

Only Human Service Minister Dave Hancock and backbench Tory Rick Fraser rose to speak against.

Dave Hancock MLA Edmonton-Whitemud
Dave Hancock

The two Tory MLAs speaking against the amendment praised the work done by corrections officers but spoke against including them in the bill, claiming that it would be unfair to pick and choose between professions (which is what the Bill did). At one point in the debate, Mr. Fraser presented the strange argument that they should not be included because police, firefighters, peace officers, and EMTs cannot “lock down” a city like some correctional institutions can be “locked down.” The two Tories made strong arguments why police, firefighters, peace officers, and EMTs should be included in Bill 1, but they struggled to explain why presumptive coverage should be limited to those four professions.

“The associate minister [Frank Oberle] talked about sort of the conflicting arguments that exist when you say, on one hand, that you shouldn’t be picking and choosing certain professions, and then, of course, he anticipated correctly that we are going to move forward with amendments to identify certain professions.” – Rachel Notley

The amendment to include corrections officers received the support of the NDP, Wildrose, and Liberal MLAs in the Assembly, but was defeated by the large Tory majority.

Ms. Notley’s second amendment, to include social workers, received strong support from NDP and Liberal caucuses. In a strange twist, most Wildrose MLAs spoke against the amendment with only Wildrose MLA Mr. Anglin breaking from his caucus and speaking in favour of including social workers in the Bill.

Presenting similar points as Tories had used only minutes before to argue against including corrections officers, Wildrose MLAs praised social workers while arguing against including them Bill, claiming that it would be unfair to pick and choose between professions.

So, it came as little surprise that Ms. Notley’s second amendment was defeated, with only the NDP, Liberals, and Mr. Anglin voting in favour.

Bill 1 passed third reading on November 1, with MLAs from all parties voting in favour.

(Read transcripts of debates in Alberta’s Legislative Assembly using Hansard)

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Alberta PCs propose uninviting federal Tories to annual meetings.

A Conservative Split in Alberta
A Conservative Split in Alberta

An amendment proposed to the constitution of the Progressive Conservative Party by party supporters in Calgary-Glenmore would remove the automatic invitation and voting privileges of federal Conservative Party Members of Parliament at PC Party annual general meetings.

The explanation for the proposed amendment was listed in documents circulated by the PC Party this week (pdf):

The Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta should be a distinct entity form the Conservative Party of Canada. During the last election we saw several federal cabinet ministers and their staffs actively support ‘other party’ candidates. This does not bode well for the future of Alberta.

Members of the federal Conservative party, specifically MP’s should not be allowed by tradition to be invited to our party’s annual general meeting and have any voting privileges. They can only vote if they have a valid PCAA membership.

The PC Party constitution as it is currently written invites federal Conservative MPs as voting delegates to PC Party annual meetings, which is likely a holdover from a time when the federal PC Party dominated Alberta’s representation in the House of Commons and Senate. The federal PC Party dissolved in 2003 and merged with the Canadian Alliance to form the Conservative Party of Canada.

The decision by numerous federal Conservative Party organizers and MPs, including Vitor Marciano, Tom Flanagan, Jim Armour, Rob Anders, Brian Storseth, and cabinet minister Jason Kenney, to support Danielle Smith‘s right-wing Wildrose Party in the recent election has cooled relations between the two conservative parties. In June of this year, Minister Kenney apologized after hitting reply-all on a an email that harshly criticized Deputy Premier Thomas Lukaszuk.

Perhaps it is not surprising that this proposal comes from PC supporters in Calgary-Glenmore. The recent election saw a pitch battle in Calgary-Glenmore between Wildrose MLA Paul Hinman, who narrowly won a 2009 by-election, and PC candidate Linda Johnson. When the votes were counted, Ms. Johnson defeated Mr. Hinman by 1,936 votes. The provincial constituency borders Premier Alison Redford‘s Calgary-Elbow constituency and is within the boundaries of Prime Minister Stephen Harper‘s riding of Calgary-Southwest.

Other proposed changes to the PC Party constitution that will be debated at that party’s annual general meeting on November 9 and 10 in Calgary include overhauling the executive structure and the process in which party members select a new leader.

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Wildrose MLA’s “panties” comments recorded in Hansard.

Nearly every word uttered during debates on the floor of Alberta’s Legislative Assembly is recorded into the official transcript known as Hansard. Sometimes, Members of the Legislative Assembly make odd comments, and those odd comments are recorded into Hansard.

During debate on Bill 6, the Protection and Compliance Statutes Amendment Act, 2012 on October 25, some odd comments made by Wildrose Party MLAs Rob Anderson and Ian Donovan were recorded into Hansard:

Rob Anderson MLA Wildrose
Rob Anderson

Edmonton-Centre MLA Laurie Blakeman: …This is an area where the government consistently underfunds and/or cuts. The first thing that’s going to get cut, the first thing on the chopping block is any monitoring staff, and that is true for any department here. If we want to go through and look at SRD, if we want to look at tourism, anything that has a monitor involved with it or some monitoring capacity is what gets cut. Then everybody, you know, puts their panties on their head and runs around when a disaster happens going: how did we miss this? Well, you missed it.

Airdrie MLA Rob Anderson: I have never run around with panties on my head.

Ian Donovan Wildrose
Ian Donovan

Ms. Blakeman: Well, that’s a good thing, and I’m glad to hear that from the hon. member. But, you know, we don’t want it to reach that stage. Honestly. We don’t want it to reach that stage.

…

Little Bow MLA Ian Donovan: I want to run around with my panties; I can’t wait.

Ms Blakeman: No. Honestly, you guys. It’s funny, but you do not want to be doing that because that’s when disaster has struck, and you look like fools. …

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A History of recent Federal By-Elections in Alberta.

The November 26 by-election in Calgary-Centre will be the fourth federal by-election held in Alberta in the past twenty-six years. In that time, only one of the by-elections saw the election of a candidate not from the incumbent political party. All three by-elections were won by candidates representing conservative parties.

Walter Van De Walle
Walter Van De Walle

Pembina By-election
(September 29, 1986)
Progressive Conservative Member of Parliament Peter Elzinga jumped into provincial politics and was elected as an MLA that year, vacating the riding he had represented since 1974. Longtime Sturgeon County councillor and reeve Walter Van De Walle faced a high-profile main competitor, New Democrat Ivor Dent, in a closely fought by-election. Mr. Dent had served as Mayor of Edmonton from 1968 to 1974.

When the votes were counted, Mr. Van De Walle defeated Mr. Dent by a narrow margin of 274 votes. Although Mr. Dent did not win the by-election, the strong showing for the NDP foreshadowed that party’s first federal electoral win in Alberta two year’s later when Ross Harvey was elected in Edmonton-East.

Deborah Grey Beaver River MP
Deborah Grey

Beaver River By-election
(March 13, 1989)
Tory MP John Dahmer died five days after he was elected in the November 21, 1988 election, triggering a by-election in this safe Tory riding. Reform Party candidate Deborah Grey earned a distant 4th place finish in the 1988 general election and carried the young protest party’s banner in the by-election only months later.

Riding a wave of western Canadian discontent with Prime Minister Brian Mulroney‘s PCs, Ms. Grey surprised the nation when she defeated PC candidate Dave Broda by 18%, becoming the first Reform Party MP. (Mr. Broda would later serve as the PC MLA for Redwater from 1997 to 2004). Ms. Grey was re-elected with 58% of the vote in the 1993 election along with 51 other Reform Party candidates.

Stephen Harper
Stephen Harper

Calgary-Southwest By-election
(May 13, 2002)
While he served as the Reform Party MP for Calgary-West from 1993 to 1997, Stephen Harper was not a sitting MP when he replaced Stockwell Day as leader of the Canadian Alliance in 2002. With a by-election expected in the riding vacated by former Reform Party leader Preston Manning, Mr. Harper managed to convince a reluctant Ezra Levant to step aside as his party’s already nominated candidate.

Mr. Harper was elected with 71% of the vote, more than 10,000 votes ahead of United Church Minister Bill Phipps, his NDP challenger. The Liberal Party declined to run a candidate in order to not oppose the new party leader’s entry into the House of Commons.

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A case for finance reform: Reclusive billionaire allegedly donated $430,000 to PC Party.

Canadian Money
Money

“Mr. Katz declined requests for comment” was probably the least surprising sentence printed in the Globe & Mail this week as the national newspaper published reports that reclusive billionaire Daryl Katz had allegedly donated $430,000 to Alberta’s Progressive Conservative Party during the recent provincial election. The maximum contribution limits allowed under elections financing laws are $30,000 during the election, which makes these allegations against Mr. Katz and Premier Alison Redford‘s governing party absolutely shocking.

Daryl-Katz
Daryl Katz

Initial reviews of the recently released Elections Alberta financial disclosures from the election period showed that Mr. Katz, his wife, his parents, his company and its top executives donated a combined $300,000 to the PC Party. This number was increased yesterday when the Globe & Mail reported that a source close to the PC alleged that “Mr. Katz provided a cheque for $430,000 to the PCs, a donation that was broken up into smaller pieces.” If true, Mr. Katz’s donations would represent a significant amount of the $1,522,581 raised through donations by the PC Party during the recent election.

Mr. Katz, the billionaire pharmaceutical retail company magnate and owner of the Edmonton Oilers, had previously only made small contributions to the PC Party and the Wildrose Party. In 2007, Mr. Katz’s company donated $15,000 to Mayor Stephen Mandel‘s re-election campaign.

This debacle comes only weeks after Mr. Katz’s attempted to renegotiate through the media the rich deal his company had already negotiated with the City of Edmonton to fund construction of a new sports arena. When City Councillors justifiably asked Mr. Katz to meet with them to discuss his new demands, the billionaire refused and then claimed through the purchase of an expensive full-page advertisement in a local newspaper that Councillors were being unreasonable.

Alison Redford Alberta Election 2012 Conservative leader
Alison Redford

One of the big sticking points of the original funding agreement between the City and the Katz Group was the $100 million missing from the proposed funding formula. While Mayor Mandel has been reported as saying he was confident the provincial government would fill the funding gap, Premier Redford, Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths, and Finance Minister Doug Horner have been firm in their comments that the province would not provide the $100 million (likely due to similar funding demands that would emerge from Alberta’s other major urban centres).

Mr. Katz’s past donations to provincial political parties, which have been relatively small, makes these large donations suspect. Did Mr. Katz believe that these contributions would help his company’s chances of receiving funding from the provincial government for their proposed sports arena? Alberta’s opposition politicians seem to believe so.

New Democrat leader Brian Mason, who was a city councillor when Edmonton’s last cherished (sic) sports team mogul, Peter Pockington, threatened to move the Oilers unless the municipal government caved to his demands, has been speaking out for the past few years against provincial funding for the arena.

Brian Mason Alberta NDP leader Election 2012
Brian Mason

Mr. Mason, official opposition leader Danielle Smith, and Wildrose MLA Rob Anderson questioned Premier Redford and her cabinet ministers in Question Period yesterday. Not surprisingly, Premier Redford downplayed the allegations, saying that her party would cooperate with any investigation into the matter and that the PC victory in the recent election showed Albertans had confidence in her government.

In the months before the provincial election, Premier Redford’s Tories were criticized for accepting donations from municipalities and public institutions, which are banned under political finance laws. The slow response and lack of transparency of the investigations carried out by Elections Alberta made a strong case for stronger enforcement and reform of Alberta’s election finance laws. Mr. Katz’s alleged donations makes the case even stronger.

Who raised how much?

Elections Alberta released the financial disclosures this week, giving Albertans a chance to view how well funded Alberta’s political parties were during the recent election.

Raj Sherman‘s Liberals raised $112,407 in individual and corporate donations during the election campaign, the New Democrats raised $517,165, the Alberta Party raised $36,967, and Ms. Smith’s Wildrose Party raised a staggering $2,935,008 and spent more than $3 million during that period.

The governing Progressive Conservatives only raised $1,522,581 in financial contributions during the election period and spent $4,663,202, running a deficit of more than $3 million.

It is important to note that these disclosures only include the funds raised by the political parties during the election. Individual candidates raised significant amounts during the election campaign.

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Pharmaceutical billionaire Daryl Katz gave $430,000 to PC Party, Globe & Mail reports.

I am still processing this news and will have more to say soon. In the meantime, kudos to Globe & Mail reporters David Ebner and Dawn Walton for digging this up.

From The Globe & Mail:

Billionaire entrepreneur and Edmonton Oilers owner Daryl Katz gave Alberta’s Progressive Conservatives nearly half a million dollars – almost one-third of the party’s total fundraising in a single donation – as Premier Alison Redford’s cash-strapped campaign was staring down defeat at the ballot box in the spring election.

Documents made public by Elections Alberta on Wednesday record $300,000 in donations from Mr. Katz, his company, his family and business associates.

But a source close to the campaign told The Globe and Mail that Mr. Katz provided a cheque for $430,000 to the PCs, a donation that was broken up into smaller pieces.

The maximum allowable donation to a political party in Alberta from an individual person or company during an election campaign is $30,000. Elections Alberta said splitting donations is allowed in some circumstances.

Mr. Katz declined requests for comment.

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Danielle Smith and “the hungry.”

Danielle Smith XL Foods Beef Tweet
Danielle Smith’s Tweet

Wildrose Party leader Danielle Smith apologized today for comment and a retweet she made on Twitter suggesting that E.coli tainted beef from the XL Foods meat packing plant in Brooks be fed to “the hungry.”

Many of Ms. Smith’s critics compared her ‘let them eat tainted beef’ attitude to former Premier Ralph Klein‘s unfortunate late night visit to a homeless shelter in 2001. While Ms. Smith’s comments were awkward and misinformed, I do not believe they were meant to be malicious. It is a shame that so much meat from the XL Foods plant was contaminated with E.coli and that it needs to be disposed of.

Danielle Smith Wildrose Party Alberta Election 2012
Danielle Smith

It did not take long for Ms. Smith to apologize for her comments, likely hoping the comments would not derail her caucus’ first opportunity to criticize government ministers in the fall Legislative session beginning today in Edmonton.

During this year’s provincial election campaign, Ms. Smith spent some time at Calgary’s Mustard Seed Shelter helping prepare supper, and now in her role as official opposition leader and self-appointed cities critic, she could benefit from exposing herself to Alberta’s less fortunate.

Last week, hundreds of Edmontonians (including myself) volunteered to enumerate our city’s homeless population in the biennial homeless count. Also held last weekend was the biannual Homeless Connect event at the Shaw Conference Centre, which helps provide free services to our city’s homeless population.

In 2010, the Homeless Count showed a decrease for the first time since the count began in 1999, dropping to 2421 from the 3079 counted in 2008. While the downward trend from 2008 to 2010 was positive news, the count also identified startling racial inequality in our cities, with 38% of Edmonton’s homeless population as being identified as having of Aboriginal heritage.

Since 2009, thousands of Albertans have been housed as a result of Housing First programs, coordinated by not-for-profit organizations in cities across the province, like Homeward Trust Edmonton and the Calgary Homeless Foundation in Alberta’s two largest cities. Housing First is a key strategy of provincial and municipal plans to end homelessness in Alberta.

Mike Lake
Mike Lake

Looking beyond homelessness to the issue of poverty in Alberta, Premier Alison Redford announced the creation of a ten-year plan for poverty reduction that would also include a five-year plan to eliminate child poverty. While Alberta is an affluent province with a strong economy, a report published by the Edmonton Social Planning Council in 2011 showed the number of children living in poverty in Alberta grew dramatically from 53,000 to 73,000 between 2008 to 2009.

Any plan to end poverty is ambitious, but it is not unrealistic considering the positive steps already taken by the Ten-Year Plan to End Homelessness.

A frequent volunteer at Edmonton’s Homeless Connect is Edmonton-Mill Woods-Beaumont Member of Parliament Mike Lake, who greets each and every guest who shows up to access the services provided at the day-long event. I cannot speak for Mr. Lake, but as a nice guy and a conservative politician, I am sure that he would he happy to show Ms. Smith the ropes at next Spring’s Homeless Connect if she would like to volunteer.

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Alberta Politics

Calgary-Centre By-Election called for November 26, 2012.

Map of the Calgary-Centre federal riding.
Map of the Calgary-Centre federal riding.

A by-election will be held in the federal riding of Calgary-Centre on November 26, 2012.

The by-election is being held to replace former Conservative Member of Parliament Lee Richardson, who resigned earlier this year to become Premier Alison Redford‘s Principal Secretary.

Four candidates have been nominated to run in the by-election: Ben Christienson (Progressive Canadian), Joan Crockatt (Conservative), Harvey Locke (Liberal), Chris Turner (Green). Three New Democrats will seek their party’s nomination scheduled for October 27 October 23. The NDP nominees are Brian Malkinson, Mattie McMillan, and Dan Meades.

To assist Calgary-Centre voters in making their decision about who to cast their ballot for, I have created a special webpage with information and links to the candidates websites and social media profiles.

(Post edited on Jan. 25, 2022)

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Alberta Politics

Alberta Liberals set to rebrand as Liberalberta, sources say.

Liberalberta Alberta Liberal Party
A screenshot of the Liberal Party website.

The Alberta Liberal Party is rebranding its image with plans to relaunch its website, adopt a new logo, change its official colours, and, according to Liberal sources, rename itself Liberalberta.

Last forming government following the 1917 election, Liberals are the constant underdogs of Alberta politics and being severely hampered by connections to unpopular Liberal governments in Ottawa.

Raj Sherman Liberal Party leader Election 2012
Raj Sherman

After three years of internal turmoil following left-leaning leader Kevin Taft‘s resignation in 2008, the Liberals selected former Tory MLA Raj Sherman as their leader in 2011. During those intervening years, the Liberals lost their position as the default opposition to the Tories and were replaced by a reinvigorated Wildrose Party led by lobbyist and former newspaper columnist Danielle Smith.

The Liberals dropped to 9% province-wide support in the 2012 election, electing only 5 MLA’s and losing Official Opposition status for the first time since the party’s high-watermark in the 1993 election.

In August 2012, the Liberals hired a new executive director, Gerald McEachern, a New Brunswick-based writer and consultant. The major rebranding, an idea that in the past has been rejected by the more orthodox Liberal crowd, is likely an attempt for the party to gain back the ground it lost – which just may require a drastic move (and perhaps they drew some inspiration from the name of a popular political blog).

As well as rebranding, the Liberal Party’s board of directors is said to have rescinded its offer to cooperate with other “progressive” political parties – namely the New Democratic Party and the Alberta Party – to prevent vote splitting.

Unfortunately for all three of these parties, the shifted political narrative in the 2012 election led many progressive and moderate Albertans to support Premier Alison Redford‘s Progressive Conservatives in order to block Ms. Smith’s Wildrose Party from forming government.

Update (October 19, 2012): I posted a question on Twitter to Liberal Party strategist Alex Macdonald asking whether the new “Liberalberta” wordmark logo had been focus group tested. Mr. Macdonald’s response was that the “Liberalberta” wordmark had been approved by the Liberal Party executive and executive board, and not a impartial focus group.

https://twitter.com/amacdona/status/259069611939594240

Meanwhile, Calgary Liberal Party activist Gwyneth Midgley raised concerns on Twitter that Liberal Party members were not consulted in the rebrand.

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Alberta Politics

Alberta MLAs return to Edmonton next week for the first real sitting of 2012.

Alberta Legislative Assembly Building
Alberta’s Legislative Assembly Building

The fall sitting of Alberta’s Legislative Assembly begins on October 23 and indications suggest that it will be a different than recent sittings. Aside from the brief sitting held in the spring with the almost sole purpose of ejecting retired MLA Ken Kowalski from his long-held spot in Speaker’s Chair, the newly elected Wildrose Official Opposition has had little opportunity to spar with government ministers in a formal setting.

Danielle Smith Wildrose Party Alberta Election 2012
Danielle Smith

The Wildrose Party’s gains in the April 23, 2012 election marked the first time since before the 1975 election that Alberta’s official opposition composed of mostly MLAs representing rural Alberta constituencies. Between 1986 and 2008, most opposition MLAs were elected to represent constituencies within Edmonton city limits. Due to floor crossings and a by-election, more opposition MLAs resided in Calgary between the 2008 and 2012 elections.

This scenario is new for the Progressive Conservatives, who spent 37 years dominating rural Alberta and is certainly new for the 17 MLA Wildrose opposition, which includes 15 rookie MLAs. While leader Danielle Smith has received some criticism for her three-week absence to the United States, she and MLAs Rob Anderson, Kerry Towle, Ian Donovan, and Shayne Saskiw have been some of the more prominent Wildrose media spokesmen over the course of the summer.

Alison Redford Alberta Election 2012 Conservative leader
Alison Redford

Over the course of the summer, Premier Alison Redford‘s PCs stumbled over issues in rural Alberta which in previous years would have been solved in a closed-door Tory caucus meeting. The closure of the fully-functional Little Bow Continuing Care Centre in Carmangay made the Tories look vengeful towards voters who abandoned their party and the cancellation of funding for the Fort Macleod police training centre made the Tories look foolish for ever approving the porkbarrel project in the first place.

The confusion around what exactly happened at the XL Foods meat packing plant in Brooks, the slow reaction of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency to the E.coli outbreak, and the late reaction of the slaughterhouse owners will certainly be an issue the opposition will use to tackle the government during the fall sitting. Criticisms of cabinet minster international travel and expense claims will undoubtably be met by the Tories retort that Wildrose caucus has yet to release expense claims they committed to release over the summer.

Doug Griffiths
Doug Griffiths

Due to a lack of traditional organized conservative political opposition outside the PC Party, it has been an odd and sometimes humorous sight to watch rookie Wildrose MLA’s stand side-by-side with New Democratic Party MLAs at protest rallies over the course of the summer. While some of Wildrose MLAs first appeared awkward and uncomfortable gripping a megaphone, some of them looked like they were getting the hang of it by summer’s end. In the past, the Liberal and NDP opposition have leaned on groups like the Friends of Medicare and Public Interest Alberta to rally supporters outside the Assembly, but the main conservative voices, like the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, have tended to rely on press conferences and media releases rather than rallies on the steps of the Legislature Building.

Doug Horner
Doug Horner

The legislative agenda presented by the government during this fall sitting will also give Premier Redford an opportunity to shape her defining narrative, which has been absent since she was elected Premier earlier this year. The government will return to its only bill introduced in the short spring sitting, the Workers’ Compensation Amendment Act, to provide additional support to police officers, firefighters, emergency medical technicians, and peace officers dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths is expected to introduce amendments to the Local Authorities Elections Act, which would extend terms for municipal elected officials from three years to four years. Eduction Minister Jeff Johnson could introduce an Education Act, which would mark the third time the Tories have attempted to introduce a consolidated piece of education legislation in the past few years.

Raj Sherman Liberal Party leader Election 2012
Raj Sherman

Finance Minister Doug Horner will face criticism over Auditor General Merwan Saher‘s investigation into whether the government violated the Government Accountability Act by releasing shortened versions of financials documents during the 1st quarter update of the provincial budget this summer. Minister Horner was criticized by journalists and lobbyists for not releasing more detailed documents.

The decision to not release detailed documents could signal a desire for the government to shift away from the public quarterly budget updates, which are meaningless in terms of fiscal planning due to the province’s dependence on fluctuating natural resource commodity prices and have become little more than public relations exercises for the government over the past two decades.

While his party has not had much to celebrate over the past year, Liberal leader Raj Sherman earned a small victory this week. Health Minister Fred Horne announced that the anti-smoking bill introduced by Dr. Sherman and passed before the last election will be proclaimed into law by the Lieutenant Governor Donald Ethell. Dr. Sherman’s bill would ban adults from smoking in vehicles where children under the age of 18 are present.

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