Quote:
Originally Posted by Slava
While I don’t think they’ll all succeed, it is hilarious that they’re at 14 recall petitions now.
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I just saw this while heading over to the Operation Total Recall website:
You are not alone
Over 265,124 visitors have accessed this page in the last 30 days.
That is pretty solid traffic for a 30 day website. Definitely says something about the level of interest in recalling MLAs.
Thinking about how many recalls may or may not succeed. I would probably look at it like this:
- Calgary-North West = Very likely to succeed. Sawhney barely won the riding to begin with and is very unpopular
- Calgary-North = Very likely to succeed. Yaseen barely won the riding to begin with
- Calgary-Bow = Very likely to succeed. Nicolaides barely won the riding to begin with and is hugely unpopular as Education Minister
- Morinville-St. Albert = This is a bit of a tougher riding, UCP won by 1744 votes and they need 15,700 signatures
- Calgary-Fish Creek = Fairly tough riding as the margin was 2489 but being in the city they may be able to mobilize to get enough signatures now. Possible
- Calgary-Hays = McIver had a pretty strong win margin but the petition only needs 12,820 signatures and McIver sucks. I think this is likely to succeed.
- Airdrie-East = Pitt sucks but she took the riding by a huge margin (6518). Getting 14,813 signatures will be a tough one in that riding
- Grande Prairie = Dyck won by over 50% but they only need 9427 signatures. This might be successful because of the lower threshold
- Highwood = This seems like an impossible task. Sigurdson won by 10,450 votes and they need 15,788 signatures. It would be an amazing feat to get this petition through
- Lethbridge-East = I think this is likely. The margin was pretty small 636 and the NDP do pretty well in Lethbridge.
- Red Deer-South = I think this one is not very likely
- Spruce Grove-Stony Plain = Also not very likely
- Camrose = Not very likely
- Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock = Not very likely
So I think 6/14 are likely to go ahead with a few on the bubble. The others would be surprising but I think it will come down to how people feel about the various uses of the notwithstanding clause and scandals that are piling up. The momentum that the Forever-Canadian petition built may actually clear the way for some of these harder ridings to collect signatures that might not have been possible 6 months ago.
Also, there are a couple of easier ridings (Calgary-East and Calgary-Cross) that would get the recalls to the magic number 8 once they are in motion. Calgary-East has their paperwork submitted, so it is really just a matter of when paperwork goes in against Amery in Calgary-Cross.
At that point, it is a race between the recalls and Smith calling an election.
On the one hand, I do not think she can really get away with tinkering with the recall legislation that her party just put in place I am also curious if changing the process would work as these recalls are already in motion. The precedent has been set with the Forever-Canadian petition having to move ahead under the old rules, I think all of the active recalls would be grandfathered and have to run their course as they were implemented under the laws at the time. Tinkering would not be enough, they would have to eliminate the recall process entirely which is a political landmine as their base wanted the recall legislation to be implemented.
On the other hand, I also do not see her letting the government slide into the hands of the NDP based on recalls. Once 8 UCP MLAs are recalled, the LG could make the NDP the governing party without going to an election (if the two independents support them). I would bet that Smith would call an election before that scenario ever plays out.