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Alberta Politics

Is the Sky Blue? Conservatives crush in Medicine Hat-Cardston-Warner by-election

The results of the by-election, as of 10:20 p.m. on October 24, 2016.
The results of the by-election, as of 10:20 p.m. on October 24, 2016.
Glen Motz
Glen Motz

It is 10:20 p.m. and Conservative Party candidate Glen Motz has cruised to a crushing victory in the Medicine Hat-Cardston-Warner federal by-election. With 190 of 223 polls reporting, Mr. Motz had earned 69.3 percent of the vote, which is slightly higher to what the Conservative candidate earned in the October 2015 federal election. This is not unexpected, as voters in this sprawling southeast rural Alberta riding have a long history of supporting conservative candidates.

Though in a distant second place, Liberal candidate Stan Sakamoto is set to have achieved a high-water mark for the Liberals in this riding by earning the highest share of the vote for the Liberals since since 1974. An impressive mid-campaign splash by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, a first by a sitting prime minister since 1993, also prompted a visit by Conservative leader Rona Ambrose, a first by a Conservative Party leader since before 2006.

Meanwhile, the New Democratic Party candidate, Bev Waege, is sitting at an embarrassingly low 1 percent of the vote, down from the 2015 candidate’s 9 percent. Neither the federal nor provincial parties appear to have put much, if any, effort into this by-election campaign. The lack of an NDP candidate until midway through the campaign also likely pushed NDP supporters towards Mr. Sakamoto’s campaign.

The results are undoubtably a reflection of how voters in this deep southern rural Alberta riding (the heart of Wildrose Party territory) feel about the federal NDP opposition in Ottawa and the provincial NDP government in Edmonton (which is not encouraging news for Medicine Hat NDP MLA Bob Wanner).

I expect Wildrose MLAs will try to blame Premier Rachel Notley for this poor showing, but anyone who has been paying attention to rural politics in this province over the past 17 months will not be completely shocked by this result.

Shorter version: Not much has really changed. Carry on with politics as usual.

The final results of the by-election can be found on the Elections Canada website.

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Liberal underdog versus Conservative favourite in Medicine Hat-Cardston-Warner by-election

A crowd of more than 2,000 showed up to see Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Medicine Hat on October 13, 2016 (photo by @braedencaley on Twitter)
A crowd of more than 2,000 showed up to see Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Medicine Hat on October 13, 2016 (photo by @braedencaley on Twitter)
stan-sakamoto-liberal
Stan Sakamoto

Today is election day in the federal riding of Medicine Hat-Cardston-Warner. Polls are open from 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m.

What was expected to be a sleepy by-election campaign in this long-time Conservative-held riding in southeast Alberta turned out to be surprisingly exciting. More than 2,000 Albertans showed up to see Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at a rally for local Liberal Party candidate Stan Sakamoto, marking the first time a sitting prime minister has visited Medicine Hat since 1993.

Mr. Sakamoto is a well-known local businessman and appears to be fairly popular in the city.

glen-motz-conservative
Glen Motz

Conservative Party candidate Glen Motz is a retired police officer and also appears to be a fairly well-liked figure in the community. The Conservatives won this riding with 68.8 percent of the vote in October 2015 and Mr. Motz is expected to win. Interim party leader Rona Ambrose was in the riding last week and was met by a crowd of 500 local Conservatives.

Mr. Trudeau has said “I know that this is one we can win,“ but the odds of Mr. Sakamoto winning the by-election still feel like a long-shot. I expect that Conservatives know this, but the strong turnout to Mr. Trudeau’s rally in this southern Alberta city has likely spooked the Conservative establishment.

Not a headline I ever would have expected to read from a newspaper in Medicine Hat.
Not a headline I ever would have expected to read from a newspaper in Medicine Hat.

A Liberal win in this by-election would send shockwaves through the Conservative Party, but a strong second place would be a success for the Liberals, who last earned more than 20 percent of the vote in this riding in the 1993 election.

Meanwhile, despite being officially connected, neither the federal or provincial New Democratic parties appear to have put much public effort or resources into supporting candidate Bev Waege during this by-election campaign. As Toronto Star columnist Chantal Hebert noted today, “this byelection has illustrated the dysfunctional nature of the relationship between the federal NDP opposition and Alberta’s New Democrat government.”

This is a race between a Liberal underdog and a Conservative favourite.

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Alberta Politics

PCs don’t need the Wildrose to win, NDP should watch their Liberal flank

Premier Rachel Notley speaks to a crowd of 700 at the Jack Singer Concert Hall in downtown Calgary earlier this week.

Uneventful weeks have become rare in Alberta politics and this week in particular has been uniquely interesting.

We started with the release of political party fundraising data from Elections Alberta showing the NDP raised more funds in the last quarter than any of the conservative parties combined, a first. This news was followed by a State of the Province address from Premier Rachel Notley and an oddly curious poll showing the Progressive Conservatives with a 13 point lead in support ahead of the NDP and the Wildrose Party.

The telephone poll conducted by the Citizen Society Research Lab at Lethbridge College, which was in the field from from October 1 to 8, 2016, showed the formerly governing PCs with 38.4 percent support. The survey showed the Wildrose Party in second place with 25.7 percent and the NDP in a distant third-place with 19.7 percent. It is important to look at polls with a grain of salt, especially ones which deviate dramatically from other polls, but it is important to recognize that polls can be indicative of trends.

Here are a few thoughts and observations:

1) NDP electoral coalition is fraying
We are still two or three years away from the next election so the NDP are smart to avoid focusing on any horse race polls but they should be concerned.

There are signs that moderate voters, who were a key part of the NDP’s winning coalition in 2015, are migrating to the PCs and Liberal parties. The NDP need to ask themselves why, only 17 months after their election, they appear to have lost nearly half their supporters.

Ms. Notley tried to bolster support for her government’s agenda through the State of the Province Address delivered to a crowd of 700 at downtown Calgary’s Jack Singer Concert Hall. She used the opportunity to reiterated her commitment not to make the sort of funding cuts to health care and education that Albertans could expect her Conservative opponents to make if they were in government.

The NDP need to take a hard look at why key elements of their government agenda, including some of their flagship policies, might not be resonating with the Albertans who voted them into office. This may require a more thoughtful and aggressive communications strategy and putting Ms. Notley front and centre is a good start to remind Albertans why they voted NDP. She is their greatest asset.

2) PCs don’t need to merge with the Wildrose Party to win the next election 

Having the NDP drop into third place in the polls weakens the argument promoted by Jason Kenney and groups like the Manning Centre that the PC and Wildrose parties need to merge in order to defeat the NDP in the next election.

It is probably more true that the Wildrose Party needs to merge with the PC Party in order to break the ceiling it has reached under Brian Jean’s leadership. But this poll would suggest that the PCs do not need to merge with the Wildrose Party in order to win the next election.

Despite both parties being conservative in philosophy, the PCs and Wildrose hold fundamentally different views on issues ranging from climate change to social issues to education and health care. The strength of the PC Party during its 44 years as government was its ability to attract a broad coalition of conservative, moderate and liberal voters. Everything the Wildrose Party has done over the past 17 months indicates the leadership of that party is not interested in building a broad coalition of Albertans.

We should expect support for the PCs and Wildrose Party to fluctuate over the next few months as the PCs choose their next leader. If the PCs anoint a more right-wing social conservative leader on March 18, 2017, they could drive moderate voters back into the NDP coalition.

3) Watch out for the Liberals

An unexpected result of a decline in NDP support could be a resurgence in support for the Alberta Liberal Party, which will be choosing a new leader in early 2017. According to the survey, Liberal support is at 9 percent up from an abysmal 4 percent in the May 2015 election. The popularity of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is likely part of the provincial Liberal Party’s small boost, which saw the party’s candidate place a close third in a by-election earlier this year.

A significant part of the NDP’s winning coalition from the 2015 election was made up of former Liberal voters who abandoned their party in favour of the PCs in the 2012 election (in order to stop a Wildrose victory). It appears that many of those moderate voters may have become disenchanted with the NDP and have migrated back to the Liberals, and the PCs, for the time being.

As AlbertaPolitics.ca blogger David Climenhaga wrote earlier this week, the loss of this vote may signal to the NDP that “[m]aybe it’s time to start talking about uniting the left again.”

Speaking of Liberals, it was announced today that Edmonton lawyer Kevin Feehan has been appointed as a Judge on the Court of Queen’s Bench of Alberta. Mr. Feehan was serving as co-chair of the Alberta Liberal Party’s leadership selection process, a position he will likely have to vacate due to his judicial appointment. Mr. Feehan is the brother of Richard Feehan, the NDP MLA for Edmonton-Rutherford and Minister of Indigenous Relations.

The Liberals replaced Calgary leadership co-chair Nirmala Naidoo last month when she resigned to join the campaign team trying to elect Sandra Jansen to the leadership of the PC Party.

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Stephanie McLean wants more women to run in next year’s municipal elections

Stephanie McLean
Stephanie McLean

Alberta’s Minister for the Status of Women Stephanie McLean is heading on a four-city tour to convince more women to run for elected office in next year’s municipal elections. The tour will feature events in Edmonton on October 18, Medicine Hat on October 20, Calgary on October 24, and Lethbridge on October 27.

Despite a record number of women being elected to the Alberta Legislature in May 2015, including nearly a majority in the governing New Democratic Party caucus, and the majority of provincial cabinet ministers being women, the number of women elected to municipal office remains low.

According to the Alberta government website that promotes the tour and includes an online campaign toolkit, women hold an average of 26% of elected seats in municipal politics and Albertans elected 490 women out of a possible 1,874 municipal positions during the 2013 municipal elections.

At the Edmonton event on October 18, the only woman elected to our City Council, Bev Esslinger, will join Ms. McLean and Métis Nation of Alberta President Audrey Poitras for a discussion about how women can launch campaigns for municipal office. The discussion will be moderated by Edmonton Journal reporter Elise Stolte.

The Lethbridge event will feature Maryanne Sandberg, Councillor from the Municipal District of Willowcreek. The Medicine Hat discussion will include past mayoral candidate Milvia Bauman, Newell County Reeve and past provincial election candidate Molly Douglass and moderator Christy Pick from Shaw TV Channel 10.

The Calgary event discussion will include Piikani Nation Councillor Angela Grier former Calgary City councillor Gael MacLeod and will be moderated by radio host and former Wildrose and PC MLA Danielle Smith.

2016 marks 100 years of women’s suffrage in Alberta. As we can see in the current American presidential race, women candidates face many challenges when it comes to seeking office, least of all still having to campaign hard against an opponent who is grossly under qualified. I have heard it said that women have to be asked five times to run for office before accepting, while it usually only takes men one ask. It is my hope that more women will seek election, and will be elected throughout the province. After all, it is 2016.

On the topic of women running in municipal elections, Miranda Jimmy launched her campaign for Edmonton City Council in the southwest Ward 5. She will be facing incumbent Michael Oshry, should he choose to run again.

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Alberta Politics

Alberta NDP raised more money than the Wildrose Party in Q3 of 2016

NDP leader Rachel Notley speaks to a crowd of more than 2,000 Albertans at a May 4 election rally in Edmonton.
NDP leader Rachel Notley rallies a crowd of more than 2,000 Albertans at a May 3, 2015 election rally in Edmonton.

Elections Alberta has released the results of political party fundraising from the third quarter of 2016 and it shows that the Alberta NDP raised more money than the Wildrose Party for the first time since the second quarter of 2015. This marks the second best fundraising quarter for Rachel Notley‘s NDP since the party was elected to government in May 2015.

2016 Third Quarter Fundraising from July 1, 2016 to September 30, 2016
Alberta Liberals: $39,187.98
Alberta NDP: $425,437.9
Alberta Party: $15,511.5
Green Party: $2,127.5
PC Party: $48,209.16
Wildrose Party: $330,666.45

The results for the Wildrose Party represent a significant drop in fundraising for the official opposition party. This is the first time since the third quarter of 2015 that the Wildrose Party has raised less than $400,000 in a quarter.

With Wildrose supporter Jason Kenney a contender for the Progressive Conservative Party leadership, it will be interesting to see whether traditional Wildrose donors have decided to shift their financial support.

And in the midst of a leadership race, the PC Party increased their fundraising income to $48,209.16, up from $27,376 in the second quarter of 2016. The PCs have struggled to raise funds since the NDP banned corporate donations to political parties in 2015.

Here is a breakdown of political party fundraising in Alberta in the first three quarters of 2016:alberta-political-party-fundraising-2016

 

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Very sad news today

Jim Prentice speaks at the podium of his campaign rally on April 14, 2015.
Jim Prentice speaks at the podium during an election campaign rally in Edmonton on April 14, 2015.

Very sad news today. My condolences to the families and friends of former premier Jim Prentice and the three other passengers killed in the plane crash on this very difficult and tragic day.

Mr. Prentice served as Premier of Alberta from September 2014 until May 2015. He was elected as the MLA for Calgary-Foothills from October 2015 to May 2015 and as the Member of Parliament for Calgary-Centre North from June 2004 to November 2010.

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Remember that time 2,000 people showed up to see Justin Trudeau in Medicine Hat? Yeah? That was tonight.

A crowd of more than 2,000 showed up to see Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Medicine Hat on October 13, 2016 (photo by @braedencaley on Twitter)
A crowd of more than 2,000 showed up to see Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Medicine Hat on October 13, 2016 (photo by @braedencaley on Twitter)
Stan Sakamoto
Stan Sakamoto

More than two thousand Albertans showed up to see Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tonight at a rally in the southern Alberta city of Medicine Hat. Mr. Trudeau was in town to support Liberal candidate Stan Sakamoto, a popular local businessman, in his bid to become the next Member of Parliament in the Medicine Hat-Cardston-Warner riding in the October 24, 2016 by-election.

The riding is believed to be a very safe seat for the Conservative Party, whose candidate earned 68 percent of the vote in the 2015 election. Candidate Glen Motz is expected to win the election but the huge turnout at a Liberal Party rally should raise some eyebrows.

While a group of protesters, some carrying Alberta separatist banners, made an appearance at the rally, the large turnout certainly defies the Conservative and mainsteam media narrative about the hostility Albertans may feel toward Mr. Trudeau and his government.

Four Liberal MPs were elected in Alberta in the last election but before forming government, the Liberals had racked up an impressive record of increasing their party’s support in a series of Alberta by-elections, most notably in Calgary-Centre and Fort McMurray-Athabasca.

The Medicine Hat News on October 25, 1993 reporting on Kim Campbell's visit to the city.
The Medicine Hat News on October 25, 1993 reporting on Kim Campbell’s visit to the city.

There is a possibility that many of those Hatters who turned out tonight are voting for Mr. Sakamoto, but many may have just been curious to see Mr. Trudeau in person and listen to what he had to say.

I was surprised to learn that this was the first time a sitting Prime Minister has visited the city since Progressive Conservative Prime Minister Kim Campbell stopped by Medicine Hat during the 1993 election campaign.

Even during his nine years as Prime Minister, Conservative Stephen Harper never made the quick trip south of Calgary to visit the The Gas City!

Here is the full list of candidates running in the by-election:

Rhino Party: Kanye Cooper
Libertarian Party: Sheldon Johnston [Twitter]
Conservative Party: Glen Motz [Facebook, Twitter]
Liberal Party: Stan Sakamoto [Facebook, Instagram, Twitter]
Christian Heritage: Rod Taylor
New Democratic Party: Beverly Ann Waege

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Oklahoma’s Oilfield Prayer Day and The Gospel According to Alberta

The text of the proclamation of Oilfield Prayer Day in the State of Oklahoma.
The text of the proclamation of Oilfield Prayer Day in the State of Oklahoma.

Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin has declared October 13, 2016 to be Oilfield Prayer Day, and praying for a the price of oil to recover is something the Republican Governor says people of all faiths, not just Christians, can do.

Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallin
Mary Fallin

Oklahoma is an oil state. The State Legislature in Oklahoma City sits on top of an oil field and is the only state legislature grounds in the United States with active oil rigs. Intense use of fracking by the oil and gas industry is suspected to have caused a 5.6 magnitude earthquake in the state in September 2016.

Similar to the economic situation we currently face in Alberta, the sharp decline in the international price of oil has created a bleak situation in Oklahoma.

The Washington Post reports:

Falling oil prices have sapped the state’s economy in the past year and have caused companies to eliminate tens of thousands of industry jobs. The state has made a number of attempts to revive the sector, including giving oil companies huge tax breaks, but the outlook remains bleak.

When it comes to praying for higher oil prices, we Albertans are familiar with a few verses. Our prayer originates from a mythical 1980s bumper sticker and it has even been condensed into a single sentence:

“Dear Lord, please give us another oil boom and we won’t piss it away.” – Alberta, 20:16

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Trump Never Had A Chance

Guest Post by Chris Henderson

Seemingly every day, someone tells me that they’re worried Donald Trump will win the election. Aside from the natural anxiety that comes with a  potentially catastrophic (yet still remote) possibility, I really don’t believe Trump winning is even remotely realistic. Here’s why:

1. Trump has no ground game.

Every modern election is won on ground game. Candidates can’t rely on speeches and cable news appearances. They need an army of people and tools to reach out to millions of voters throughout the election, collect data and guide campaign decisions. This matters. It defines your strategy and it helps you convert voters on the margins – the ones that you need to help you win swing states.

Building this infrastructure is essentially the modern-day purpose of the US primary nomination system. Parties believe that the successful nominee will emerge with (and because of) a sophisticated and mature ground game infrastructure to head into the general election. Trump didn’t do this. He coasted on a unique mix of populism and the anger of 13 million voters to help him rise to the top of a diverse and crowded GOP nomination field. He went into the General with no ground game, he has failed to build one since. In fact, he’s been piggybacking on the (comparatively weak) Republican infrastructure to get him through. That was a bad strategy in the first place and now after the GTBTP (Grab Them By The *cat emoji*) debacle, that resource appears to be out of his reach.

2. This is not a professional campaign operation.

Professionalized politics starts at the very top – with the candidate. A candidate sets the tone, drives the policy and starts the strategy. They attract and retain talented staff to make it all real and turn it into votes. The campaign staff create diverse and smart opportunities for the candidate to go out and represent and augment that strategy and policy. While a candidate is in charge of the campaign, a professional staff will set limits. Professional campaigns do not allow candidates to rant on Twitter at 3am. They don’t allow a candidate to skip debate prep. They don’t film half-apologies at midnight. They don’t allow a candidate to spend a week fixated on a single non-campaign issue. They don’t allow the rest of the party to abandon its Presidential candidate. They don’t outright insult and alienate people like Mitt Romney and John McCain. Trump’s campaign is completely bereft of all of these qualities.

3. He’s checkmated himself with his own rhetoric and bluster.

Donald Trump has built a campaign on a style that attracts a large number of voters who, by and large, are disenfranchised with the direction of America and the type of people who have been traditionally tasked with leading it. That’s fair enough. And it was a smart strategy to win the GOP primary, especially with Obama in office. Applying that strategy to the General election has brought him within close to striking distance of a chance at winning.

Here’s his biggest problem. He needs more than this relatively reliable cohort to win. He needs to capture the votes of more moderate, independent voters who are mailable or undecided. With the stark nature of the offence in his GTBTP video, he needs to work harder to access those particular voters. But what he needs to do to access those voters threatens to alienate his original base of voters, which he also needs in order to win. They don’t want to vote for a guy that apologizes for “locker room talk.” That puts Trump in an impossible position that a talented, experienced candidate and team might be able to navigate out of – but, as discussed, Trump doesn’t have that.

4. He’s only been ahead for a fleeting moment in this election.

Take a quick look at polling aggregators. Only once – after the GOP Convention – has he ever been polling better than Hillary Clinton. And that peak was followed with his steepest decline of the last year. His polling has been over the place, but it hasn’t crossed Hillary Clinton’s horizon. And, at this point, it seems extremely unlikely that it will. Only the most charismatic, skilled politician could make up that structural polling deficit. He doesn’t have either.

These are all critical problems. Each of them would need to be rectified in order for him to be victorious in this election. No single debate performance, Clinton scandal, rally speech or publicity stunt can save him from these serious systemic problems.

Breathe easy – Hillary Clinton will be the next President of the United States.

Chris Henderson has been working on campaigns since he was 11 years old. He once successfully convinced Dave Cournoyer to shave his beard. Today, he is a Strategist at Calder Bateman Communications.

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Thank you to the teachers who helped spark my interest in Alberta politics

Dave Cournoyer (left) with two teachers who helped spark my interest in Alberta politics, Andrew Kaczynski (centre) and Al Meunier (right).
Photo: Me (left) with two teachers who helped spark my interest in Alberta politics, Andrew Raczynski (centre) and Al Meunier (right), at a 2014 rally featuring Liberal leader Justin Trudeau in Edmonton.

Today is World Teachers’ Day, which is held annually on 5 October as part of a UNESCO initiative to appreciate, assess, and improve the educators of the world. In this spirit, almost everyone can name a teacher they had in school who played an important role in inspiring, encouraging and challenging them to further their interests and studies.

I am blessed to have had many great teachers during my K-12 and university education in Alberta but there are two Social Studies teachers who I credit for playing big roles introducing me into the world of Alberta politics.

During the 1997 provincial election, as part of my Grade 8 Social Studies course at École Georges H. Primeau School in Morinville, we were given an assignment that required us to collect news paper clippings of media coverage of the election. Each evening, after my parents had finished reading the papers, I studiously cut out relevant news stories from the Edmonton Journal, the Morinville Mirror and St. Albert Gazette, and glued them into a scrapbook.

I cannot remember whether I was asked or if I volunteered, but my teacher, Al Meunier, was organizing an all-candidates forum at the school and was looking for student volunteers. Each of the election candidates was to be introduced by a student at the start of the forum and I was chosen to introduce and read the biography of Tom Turner, the local New Democratic Party candidate. I remember not completely understanding the differences between the candidates, but I do remember starting to pay more attention to Alberta politics after that event.

Three years later, Andrew Raczynski, an excellent teacher who had taught my Grade 9 Social Studies and English courses announced that he was running for the nomination to become the local provincial Liberal candidate in the next election. Unlike most rural areas in Alberta, the community I grew up in had a unique history of electing Liberal MLAs (Nick Taylor in 1986, 1989 and 1993 and Mary Anne Balisilie in a 1996 by-election). The PC candidate had only narrowly captured the constituency in 1997.

I had become more politically aware after the Progressive Conservative government attempted to ram through a law allowing for increased privatization of health care in Alberta. As a budding politico and soon-to-be voter, I was a impressed when I received personalized responses to letters I had sent to Liberal leader Nancy MacBeth and NDP leader Raj Pannu about my concerns with increased privatized health care.

I eagerly jumped at the opportunity to volunteer on Mr. Raczynski’s campaign. I was elected as a director on the local constituency association board and over the next year I campaigned alongside the candidate in communities across the sprawling rural Redwater constituency. I knocked on doors in every hamlet, village and town in the constituency and attended more rodeos, parades, town fairs and demolition derbies than I ever imagined existed.

It was a great time. I learned a lot about politics and about the people in that area of Alberta. And even though the campaign was not successful in getting Mr. Raczynski elected (not for lack of hard-work, it was a really bad election year for Liberals in Alberta) it was a worthwhile experience. I was hooked on politics.

Soon after the campaign ended, I moved to Edmonton and began studying Political Science and History at university. I continued my involvement in party politics and became active with the Students’ Union at the University of Alberta, which led to an increasing interest in communications and media.

Mr. Meunier and Mr. Raczynski were two teachers who played a big role in sparking my interest in Alberta politics.

Without them, I might have become involved in politics in some role but likely not through the same path. I thank them for challenging me to think critically about my own views, giving me an opportunity to become involved and encouraging me to pursue my interest in Alberta politics.

Photo Above: Me (left) with two teachers who helped spark my interest in Alberta politics, Andrew Raczynski (centre) and Al Meunier (right), at a 2014 rally featuring Liberal leader Justin Trudeau in Edmonton.

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NDP hires political strategist Corey Hogan to run the Public Affairs Bureau

Thousands of Albertans packed the Legislature Grounds to watch Premier Rachel Notley and the NDP cabinet be sworn-in.

Political strategist Corey Hogan has been hired as the government’s new managing director of the Public Affairs Bureau. He replaces Mark Wells, who announced last week that he was leaving after a year in the job. Mr. Wells previously served as director of communications with the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees, the province’s largest public sector union.

Corey Hogan
Corey Hogan

The two sentence biography included in today’s government press statement does not do Mr. Hogan justice.

Corey Hogan has more than a decade of experience in communications, advertising and engagement. Most recently he served as the Chief Strategy Officer at Northweather, a digital communications consultancy based in Calgary.

Known to political watchers most recently for his contribution to the popular The Strategists podcast, which released its final episode last week, Mr. Hogan was already a fixture in Alberta politics before the podcast was launched. He made a name for himself as an organizer for Stephane Dion during the 2006 federal Liberal leadership convention and later in provincial politics when he worked as the campaign manager for Calgary MLA Dave Taylor‘s 2009 leadership bid and executive director and campaign strategist for the provincial Liberal Party until after the 2012 election. Two years later he was a strategist for Alberta Party leader Greg Clark’s campaign during the 2014 Calgary-Elbow by-election.

He later worked for the global public relations firm Hill & Knowlton before founding a new company, Northweather.

Not always a backroom strategist, Mr. Hogan aspired for public office in 2009 when he ran, unsuccessfully, for the Liberal Party nomination ahead of the Calgary-Glenmore by-election. That campaign saw former Wildrose MLA Paul Hinman eke out a narrow win over Liberal Avalon Roberts, providing a spark that helped propel the then-fledgeling fringe party to Official Opposition in 2012.

He was spotted earlier this year attending the NDP’s convention in Calgary and was jokingly referred to as “the Orange apologist” by podcast co-contributors Zain Velji and Stephen Carter for his progressive views on The Strategists podcast.

I admit to being initially surprised when I heard that Mr. Hogan was hired for this role. This is not because I do not believe he is capable, I expect he is, but I half expected that the new managing director would be a former NDP staffer from Manitoba, Ontario or British Columbia, where many of this government’s top political talent hails from. Mr. Hogan is a smart political operator, comes from outside the traditional NDP establishment, and has experience in Alberta politics.

As a progressive Calgarian, he will bring a different perspective into the halls of government in Edmonton and a new focus on digital communications that past Public Affairs Bureau directors may not have had. He recently launched the Canada15 online campaign, which asked the question: why can’t the federal government bring in $15 national minimum wage in every province all across Canada?

Clear and strategic communications has been a source of weakness for Premier Rachel Notley‘s NDP since it formed government in 2015. Significant communications failures around issues such as changes to farm safety legislation and a court challenge to power purchase agreements have caused the government embarrassment and cost the NDP support in the polls.

Mr. Hogan is joining a government that must simultaneously climb a steep hill and fight an uphill battle if it wants to successfully convince Albertans to embrace and accept the long list of aggressive policy changes, including the NDP’s flagship Climate Leadership Plan.

The NDP have hired a smart and strategic political operator in Corey Hogan. Now they would do well to listen to his advice.

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Notley searches for her Lougheed moment by demanding pipelines for Trudeau’s carbon tax

Pierre Trudeau Peter Lougheed Alberta NEP
Former Premier Peter Lougheed and former Minister Pierre Trudeau, sometime political adversaries in the disputes over Canada's oil development in the 1980s.

Demanding the federal government help “break the landlock” and support the construction of oil pipelines from Alberta, Premier Rachel Notley and Environment and Parks Minister Shannon Phillips drew a line for Alberta’s support of the Justin Trudeau government’s proposed national carbon pricing plan. In a statement released today, Ms. Notley stated that the Alberta government would not support the federal carbon pricing plan without federal support for increased “energy infrastructure” (a.k.a. oil pipelines).

Rachel Notley Alberta NDP leader
Rachel Notley

There is nothing more Albertan than a good old fashioned political battle between the provincial government and Ottawa over energy issues. Premier Notley may be hoping this standoff could be reminiscent of the heated political disputes that took place between the governments of Premier Peter Lougheed and Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau in the 1970s and 1980s. In the case of Mr. Lougheed, an iconic figure in Alberta politics, political fights with Ottawa can help boost a politician’s popularity at home.

When Progressive Conservative leader Jim Prentice began casting the New Democratic Party as “extremists” during the 2015 election, Ms. Notley frequently turned to quotes by Mr. Lougheed to support her party’s positions on issues like raising corporate taxes.

Ms. Notley’s NDP have been vocal supporters of the expansion of the Kinder Morgan Trans-Mountain Pipeline and the TransCanada Energy East Pipeline since she became party leader in 2014. Now, as government, the Alberta NDP’s support for oil pipeline expansion has contributed to an increasingly deep divide between the national and provincial NDP in this province. The national NDP, with strong support in anti-pipeline constituencies in British Columbia, Ontario and Quebec, has played a much less supportive role in advocating for Alberta’s oil industry.

Brad Wall
Brad Wall

The Alberta government’s criticism of the federal government puts Ms. Notley in the company of conservative Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall, a constant critic of Ottawa. But unlike Mr. Wall’s government, which has dragged its feet on tackling climate change, Ms. Notley’s government cannot be accused of doing nothing to address climate change. Alberta’s NDP government has led the charge with its flagship ‘Climate Leadership Plan‘ which includes its own carbon tax and an aggressive phasing out of dirty coal-fired power plants.

The Alberta NDP plan enjoys the support of environmental groups and oil and gas industry heavyweights like Cenovus, Suncor, CNRL and Shell.

Meanwhile, opposition groups like the Wildrose Party are literally hoping to rehash the political battles of the 1980s. The official opposition Wildrose Party circulated a meme online today comparing the national carbon tax announcement to the unpopular National Energy Program of the 1980s. The Wildrose Party continues to be fierce critics of the federal Liberals and NDP but party leader Brian Jean has yet to offer any alternative solutions to reduce carbon emissions.

Brian Jean Wildrose
Brian Jean

Ironically, the Wildrose Party’s 2015 election platform proposes to “Ensure Alberta’s standards for CO2 emissions and pollutants are in line with national and international standards.” This statement was written during a time when Stephen Harper was Prime Minister and a national climate change plan was nowhere on the agenda. It is amazing how quickly politics can change in a short seventeen months.

‘Breaking the landlock,’ which I predict will become the latest political buzzword, is analogous to the “bitumen bubble” that former premier Alison Redford warned Albertans of in a televised address in 2014. Both buzzwords are part of a public campaign to build pipelines that would presumably allow for easier export of Alberta’s oil, and allow the private companies exporting the oil to sell Western Canadian Select at a lower discount rate than in previous years. This probably would not make a significant difference to Alberta until the international price of oil rebounds.

Over the past year, Ms. Notley has shown her willingness to work with Mr. Trudeau on a wide-range of issues. This may have led the Prime Minister to expect he would find an ally in Ms. Notley in his bid to implement a national carbon pricing plan. But by attaching strings to Alberta’s support for a national carbon pricing plan, Ms. Notley is playing a political game that could pay out political dividends at home. In a fight between the Alberta government and Ottawa, as Mr. Lougheed discovered, you can bet that nine times out of ten, Albertans will side with Edmonton.

Here is Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s speech in the House of Commons today announcing the national carbon pricing plan:

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Alberta Politics

PCs kick off leadership race 5 years after choosing Alison Redford

Alberta PC leadership Debate 2011
The set of the PC leadership debate in 2011, broadcast live on Global TV debate. Left to right: Doug Horner, Gary Mar, and Alison Redford.

Alberta’s Progressive Conservatives officially kicked off their leadership race on October 1, 2016 at a party event in Lethbridge. The PC Party formed government in Alberta from 1971 until 2015, when it was reduced to third-place in the Legislative Assembly behind the governing New Democratic Party and Official Opposition Wildrose Party.

As party officials celebrated the start of this leadership race, the event marked the fifth anniversary of the party’s 2011 leadership race, which resulted in first-term MLA and justice minister Alison Redford defeating former cabinet minister and establishment favourite Gary Mar. Ms. Redford defeated Mr. Mar in a third-ballot vote 37,104 to 35,491.

At the time, there was plenty of hope and optimism that the election of Ms. Redford, Alberta’s first woman premier and a lawyer with international experience, would signal the start of a new urban and progressive agenda for Alberta. The ensuing years were instead better defined by arrogance, entitlement and abuses of power. This would end up spelling the end of the PC Party’s 44 years of uninterrupted power in Alberta.

Seventeen months after Alberta’s 2015 election, this PC leadership race represents the first time since 1965 that the winner of a PC leadership race will not also immediately step into the Premier’s office.

While the defining narrative of this race until this point has been whether or not the party should merge with the further-right-wing rural-based Wildrose Party, there appears to be little discussion about why Albertans chose to replace the old PCs with Rachel Notley’s moderate NDP.

PC Leadership Candidates

Candidates have until November 10, 2016 to join the race and party delegates will choose a new leader on March 18, 2017.

As of today, the candidates include former Member of Parliament Jason Kenney, former Calgary-Varsity MLA Donna Kennedy-Glans, past candidate Byron Nelson, Town of Devon Councillor Michael Laveck, and current Vermilion-Lloydminster MLA Richard Starke. Calgary-North West MLA Sandra Jansen is also expected to join the race.

I have launched a new webpage tracking the candidates and their social media links.

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Alberta Politics

Dueling MP petitions highlight the Alberta-Quebec pipeline divide

Neil Bernard Hancock (second from left), Mark Scholz (second from right) and Shannon Stubbs (left) being interviewed on Parliament Hill.
Neal Bernard Hancock (second from left), Mark Scholz (second from right) and Shannon Stubbs (right) being interviewed on Parliament Hill.

Alberta Conservative MP Shannon Stubbs, who represents the Lakeland riding, sponsored and presented electronic petition e-216 (Oil and gas exploration) to the House of Commons calling on the Government of Canada to “vocally defend the oil and gas industry and the use of pipelines, and to make the building of oil, gas and diluted bitumen pipelines across Canada, to tidewater, and into the United States, a national priority.”

Luc Thériault
Luc Thériault

Bloc Quebecois MP Luc Thériault, who represents the Montcalm riding located north of Montreal, sponsored electronic petition e-150 (Protection of the environment) calling on the Government of Canada to “refrain from turning Quebec into an oilsands superhighway,” “respect Quebec’s environmental jurisdiction” and “put an end to TransCanada’s Energy East pipeline.”

The petition sponsored by Ms. Stubbs collected 34,537 signatures, compared to 16,822 signatures for Mr. Thériault’s petition. The breakdown of which provinces the signatures came from are interesting, and demonstrate an increasingly obvious geo-political divide in the national oil pipeline debate. This is especially evident by the number of signatures each petition collected from Alberta and Quebec. Alberta signatures represent more than half of those collected for Ms. Stubbs’ petition while Quebec signatures represent 96 percent of those collected for Thériault’s petition.

Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr responded to Mr. Thériault’s petition on June 14, 2016.

Ms. Stubbs’ petition was initiated by Canadian Association of Oil Drilling Contractors president Mark Scholz as part of the lobby group’s ‘Oil Respect’ campaign (which included appearances by actor/roughneck Neal Bernard Hancock).

Here is the breakdown of signatures on the two petitions by province:

signatures-per-province-epetition-pipelines-oil

Here is the full text of the two petitions:

Petition e-216 (Oil and gas exploration)

Whereas:

  • Much of Canada’s economy comes from oil and gas exploration, extraction, transport, upgrading, refining and processing;
  • Hundreds of thousands of Canadians work directly in the oil and gas sector;
  • 100,000 oil and gas workers are now unemployed;
  • Millions more benefit from the jobs and profits created by oil and gas development;
  • Canadian governments collect $17 billion dollars annually from the oil and gas industry which is used to fund essential government programs and services;
  • Canada is a world leader in the responsible development of its oil and gas resources;
  • Pipelines are the safest mode of transportation for oil, gas and fluids; and
  • A lack of pipelines to new markets means Canadian producers often receive far less than market rates for their oil.

We, the undersigned, citizens of Canada, call upon the Government of Canada to vocally defend the oil and gas industry and the use of pipelines, and to make the building of oil, gas and diluted bitumen pipelines across Canada, to tidewater, and into the United States, a national priority.

Petition e-150 (Protection of the environment)

Whereas:
  • The Alberta-based company TransCanada would like to build a pipeline that would cross Quebec from west to east to transport more than 1.1 million barrels of crude oil per day, or 121,500 litres per minute, and that would go through more than 80 distinct watersheds, 600 waterways and various agricultural areas;
  • A study carried out by the École polytechnique de Montréal, commissioned by the Government of Quebec and published in late December 2015, revealed: that the pipeline’s route poses a serious landslide risk for various waterways, including around 30 rivers and the St. Lawrence River and its estuary; that the soil along the shoreline of the St. Lawrence River is too unstable to support a pipeline; that there is no such thing as zero risk, and the incidents involving pipeline crossings are usually found after many years of use; and that the only way to prevent all environmental repercussions is to not cross waterways;
  • Quebec would be assuming all environmental risks, and the cost is not worth the risk; and
  • Quebeckers should decide what happens within Quebec’s borders.

We, the undersigned citizens of Quebec, call upon the Government of Canada to: respect the wishes of Quebeckers and the National Assembly of Quebec; refrain from turning Quebec into an oilsands superhighway; respect Quebec’s environmental jurisdiction; and put an end to TransCanada’s Energy East pipeline.

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Alberta Politics

Byron Nelson to announce PC leadership bid, pans Kenney’s hostile takeover bid

Calgary lawyer Byron Nelson will soon announce his plans to seek the Alberta PC Party leadership.

Calgary lawyer Byron Nelson is expected to announce his plans to seek the leadership of Alberta’s third-place Progressive Conservative Party tomorrow in Calgary. Mr. Nelson was his party’s candidate in Calgary-Bow in the 2015 election and was defeated by New Democrat Deborah Drever.

Early in August, Mr. Nelson took to Facebook to share his thoughts on Jason Kenney’s plans to take over the PC Party and merge it with the Wildrose Party. Here is an excerpt:

“It is, in a sense, the low-effort method of getting rid of the NDP. It is the method of taking two parties whose visions were resoundingly rejected in the last election, and hoping/assuming that there were enough people clinging to those rejected visions to beat the NDP and form government.

It involves no new vision for Alberta, as has been repeatedly seen by the comments and responses of those who tout it. It merely answers that it will govern in a “conservative manner”. Surely we can all understand and agree, based on the elections of the past 15 months, that simply trying to unite a large group, and promising to govern in a “conservative manner” is a roadmap to electoral defeat. Voters need to be inspired by a vision and a plan. When you don’t have a vision and a plan, you will not get people to vote for you.

The fact that he “unite the right” option for the PC party is countered by the “rebuilding the party” option, is an interesting study in sharp contrasts. The former involves no effort, just a suggestion that we can duct-tape two parties together and win. The latter involves maximum effort by many people. The former offers no vision for the future other than a bland promise of governing conservatively. The latter produces a specific vision and a plan.”

Mr. Nelson joins Mr. Kenney and former Calgary-Varsity MLA Donna Kennedy-Glans as the third candidate in the PC leadership race, which officially kicks off on October 1, 2016. Another Calgary lawyer, Doug Schweitzer, announced his was not entering the race last week. The party will host an all-candidates forum during its policy meeting in Red Deer on November 4 to 6, 2016.

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