Alberta Politics & Government Thread 3.0

[Ferarri]

it makes me sad and angry that there is basically a tie between UCP and NDP at this point. This government has been horrendous yet still garner support. Only in Alberta...
And yes I know people have reservations about another Notley government but the alternative has been much much worse.

[Red Slinger]

Originally Posted by Ferarri

it makes me sad and angry that there is basically a tie between UCP and NDP at this point. This government has been horrendous yet still garner support. Only in Alberta...
And yes I know people have reservations about another Notley government but the alternative has been much much worse.

I wouldn't say 'only in Alberta'. I'd amend that to something like "only in Alberta does 40% of the population vote Conservative no matter what, as opposed to 30% of the population in the other parts of Canada."

[wireframe]

Originally Posted by Ferarri

it makes me sad and angry that there is basically a tie between UCP and NDP at this point. This government has been horrendous yet still garner support. Only in Alberta...
And yes I know people have reservations about another Notley government but the alternative has been much much worse.

I knocked on some doors for my local NDP candidate, Luanne Metz. More than one person I talked to knew her personally and said she was lovely but wouldn't vote for her because she was NDP. These morons are dragging us down with them.

[Tacopuck]

Originally Posted by powderjunkie

Flip question - what's the upside? I haven't heard any examples on how this could legitimately improve lives in Alberta.

Here is the way interpret how this can be used. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Previously if the federal government implemented a law or regulation that would require provincial authorities to abide by (key being here government entities) and the AB gov thought this was not in the best interest of Albertans they would have to take the federal government to court to get it overturned in order to for those provincial authorities to not abide by said federal law or regulation.

With the Sovereignty act, cabinet can identify a federal law that in their view is not in the best interest of Albertans (which will be up for debate on a case by case basis), put to a vote in the legislature (basically an auto approval for a majority government) and then be able to direct the provincial authorities to act against or not follow the said federal law / regulation.

After this is done and if the federal government is adamant that their law / regulation must be abided by the provincial government / authority then they would take the AB gov to court in order to overturn the Sovereignty act use.

In the end its the same outcome as the supreme court of Canada has final say who has jurisdictional authority with regards to the law / regulation in question. However the difference with the Sovereignty act is instead of the province going to the courts to ask permission for AB to do what it wants, it will give the province the ability to just go ahead and then put the onus on the federal government to take the province to court to stop them.

So in this scenario the federal government has to decide if its politically worthwhile to to ask the courts to force their laws / regulations on the province in order to implement their law / regulation.

IMO it boils down to a "Easier to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission" scenario.

[looooob]

Originally Posted by wireframe

I knocked on some doors for my local NDP candidate, Luanne Metz. More than one person I talked to knew her personally and said she was lovely but wouldn't vote for her because she was NDP. These morons are dragging us down with them.

a physician leader no less, running against the current health minister

[Muta]

Originally Posted by wireframe

I knocked on some doors for my local NDP candidate, Luanne Metz. More than one person I talked to knew her personally and said she was lovely but wouldn't vote for her because she was NDP. These morons are dragging us down with them.

How people can look at four years of Notley's leadership and then be like "NOPE, THEY HAD THEIR CHANCE" while then conveniently ignoring the drunken, corrupt tomfoolery of the previous 40+ years of conservative rule before and the four years after them, giving them multiple chances over and over and over along the way as they constantly proven to fail, and repeatedly taking it in the financial / health care / education / social / environmental butt, is beyond me.

Albertan conservatives must've been the original inspiration for that Lemmings game.

Spoiler!

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by Tacopuck

Here is the way interpret how this can be used. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Previously if the federal government implemented a law or regulation that would require provincial authorities to abide by (key being here government entities) and the AB gov thought this was not in the best interest of Albertans they would have to take the federal government to court to get it overturned in order to for those provincial authorities to not abide by said federal law or regulation.

With the Sovereignty act, cabinet can identify a federal law that in their view is not in the best interest of Albertans (which will be up for debate on a case by case basis), put to a vote in the legislature (basically an auto approval for a majority government) and then be able to direct the provincial authorities to act against or not follow the said federal law / regulation.

After this is done and if the federal government is adamant that their law / regulation must be abided by the provincial government / authority then they would take the AB gov to court in order to overturn the Sovereignty act use.

In the end its the same outcome as the supreme court of Canada has final say who has jurisdictional authority with regards to the law / regulation in question. However the difference with the Sovereignty act is instead of the province going to the courts to ask permission for AB to do what it wants, it will give the province the ability to just go ahead and then put the onus on the federal government to take the province to court to stop them.

So in this scenario the federal government has to decide if its politically worthwhile to to ask the courts to force their laws / regulations on the province in order to implement their law / regulation.

IMO it boils down to a "Easier to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission" scenario.

That does point to another flaw. The liberals can win what... 4 seats in Alberta in their best day. Losing votes in Alberta is just a non factor for them.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by Ferarri

it makes me sad and angry that there is basically a tie between UCP and NDP at this point. This government has been horrendous yet still garner support. Only in Alberta...
And yes I know people have reservations about another Notley government but the alternative has been much much worse.

If Smith has climbed that much in the polls, it tells me that Notley has to do a much better job of getting her message out. All she does is attack Smith at every opportunity. Maybe offer Albertans an alternative and give us details of how you plan to do it.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I dunno, jumping ship seems more honourable than supporting this disaster. Though he should have sat as an independent. And the real blame for your lack of representation lies with Smith, not Doug.

I don’t agree with this. If Schweitzer had a spine he would have tried to make a change from within or sit as an independent. What he did was a cop-out that let him save face with his base.

[MBates]

Originally Posted by Tacopuck

Here is the way interpret how this can be used. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

Previously if the federal government implemented a law or regulation that would require provincial authorities to abide by (key being here government entities) and the AB gov thought this was not in the best interest of Albertans they would have to take the federal government to court to get it overturned in order to for those provincial authorities to not abide by said federal law or regulation.

With the Sovereignty act, cabinet can identify a federal law that in their view is not in the best interest of Albertans (which will be up for debate on a case by case basis), put to a vote in the legislature (basically an auto approval for a majority government) and then be able to direct the provincial authorities to act against or not follow the said federal law / regulation.

After this is done and if the federal government is adamant that their law / regulation must be abided by the provincial government / authority then they would take the AB gov to court in order to overturn the Sovereignty act use.

In the end its the same outcome as the supreme court of Canada has final say who has jurisdictional authority with regards to the law / regulation in question. However the difference with the Sovereignty act is instead of the province going to the courts to ask permission for AB to do what it wants, it will give the province the ability to just go ahead and then put the onus on the federal government to take the province to court to stop them.

So in this scenario the federal government has to decide if its politically worthwhile to to ask the courts to force their laws / regulations on the province in order to implement their law / regulation.

IMO it boils down to a "Easier to ask for forgiveness than ask for permission" scenario.

Apologies in advance for a bit of a long and dense post...

What you set out above is the reason why people who care about the rule of law are speaking very loudly against this. A law that says you shall ignore laws you know apply to you so long as a group of people you know have no legal authority tell you to ignore the laws?

All as a method to get politicians in Ottawa to...respect the parameters of the law?

There is a reason Alberta is coming out of this looking like a laughing stock.


Best I can tell, there are a couple major deceptions that are being employed to give this approach its appeal to a large swath of the population who do not understand how our system works.

One major problem with the scheme of the 'Alberta Sovereignty Within a United Canada Act' is apparently even recognized by the name of the Act: federal laws apply to all persons throughout the united federation called Canada.

Your relationship with the federal government is between you and it...not one by proxy via the Edmonton Legislature or the UCP Cabinet.

For example, if you refuse your legal obligation to remit your federal taxes you pay the penalties and go to jail - not some performative buffoon politician trumping up the idea it is better to ask for forgiveness than permission to ignore the Income Tax Act.

Individual police officers in Alberta have swore an oath of allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen and her heirs successors and assigns and are duty bound to enforce federal laws. If the UCP cabinet orders police services to ignore certain laws the cabinet ministers are not the ones who have to choose to betray their oath or disobey the purported "lawful" orders. This will all fall on the shoulders of individual officers - most of whom have no desire to become political pawns.

So, the mighty Premier Danielle Smith Government is less 'standing up' for Albertans than it is hiding behind them as human shields for fights they want to start with the feds. Kind of like a bad friend, drunk and disorderly at closing time at the bar somehow getting you punched with his big mouth.


Another major problem is the premise of creating and using this Act is a set of bad talking points including the claim that Canada is a collection of individual sovereigns.

This is inaccurate. There is one sovereign power of the Canadian Monarchy divided into jurisdictions in the Constitution Act 1867. Premier Smith has a well-polished talking point that the Provinces are 'sovereign' in their specific 'lanes' and Ottawa is separately 'sovereign' in theirs...and they can validly be forced to 'stay in their lane'.

Well, ok. Section 91 and 92 of the Constitution Act 1867 do set out the division of powers with language of exclusive jurisdiction. But you cannot only read the sections you like and ignore the others. Nor in a common law nation state can you ignore the common law interpretations of the original text. In other words, the lanes have been defined by the Courts and the Courts decide what is in or outside of said lanes. Not MLAs or MPs.

Premier Smith and her supporters just conveniently skip all of the overlaps - and what happens in the situation of overlaps. I am baffled nobody (journalist or political opponent) has just flat-out asked her (or her group of constitutional 'experts') to tell Albertans what the 'double aspect doctrine' is. We are talking first year law school stuff here (or, a reasonably educated Google search for that matter):

https://www.constitutionalstudies.ca...double-aspect/

The double aspect doctrine is a tool of constitutional interpretation used when both levels of government have an equally valid constitutional right to legislate on a specific issue or matter. Double aspect represents the modern notion of co-operative federalism, which abandons the out-dated idea that every subject matter falls under the exclusive control of either the federal or provincial government.[1]

Double aspect fosters respect for the decisions of the elected legislatures of both levels of government. As the name indicates, the double aspect doctrine acknowledges that both Parliament and the provincial legislatures can pass valid legislation relating to the same subject depending on the aspect from which the subject is being approached.[2]

In case the Premier and the Albertans blindly saying this legislation is going to be so great for us would like a recent example of how the double aspect doctrine applied to confirm the Federal government indeed has a legal, constitutional 'lane' that it shares and can legislate overlapping with Alberta...it is in the same article:

Another, more recent, example is in References re Greenhouse Gas Pollution Pricing Act.[4] The double aspect doctrine was discussed at length in the GGPPA Reference, where the SCC was tasked with deciding whether the federal government’s plan to establish a national pricing system for greenhouse gas emissions was valid law under the national concern branch of its peace, order and good government (POGG) power. The 6-3 majority found that the double aspect doctrine can apply when federal jurisdiction is grounded in POGG, but whether it does will depend on the facts of the case.[5] The SCC noted that this approach conforms to the modern approach to federalism, which favours flexibility and a degree of overlapping jurisdiction.[6] The doctrine should be applied cautiously, however, to avoid “eroding the importance attached to provincial autonomy.”[7] The federal law in this instance only imposed a minimum national standard, and allowed the provinces to legislate above it – the federal and provincial laws apply concurrently, but the federal law is paramount. In cases such as this, to ensure the protection of provincial autonomy, the court must be satisfied that there is a “compelling interest” in enacting rules over the federal matters which interact with provincial ones, and that “multiplicity of aspects is real and not merely nominal.”[8]

In my view the only one who cannot stay in her lane is the Premier and her now enthusiastically supportive government.

The rule of law cannot be optional. When a judge makes an error in a ruling, the ruling stands until an appeal court overturns it. You are not allowed to just say - that order is stupid and I am pretty sure it is wrong so I will not follow it.

If Premier Smith claims to be able to declare sovereignty from laws she thinks are dumb, what is stopping any of us from doing the same with respect to laws her government passes? We have the same amount of authority as she does to declare laws not worthy of being followed.

Extreme anti-science activists and Covid mandate protesters have already shown us the harm that can be caused by a population emboldened to ignore laws when they decide the laws infringe their rights (conveniently ignoring the rights of everyone else and not bothering to use the courts). Will less Freemen on the Land show up in Alberta now? Or will they flock to a place that now officially follows their playbook? Self-declare laws invalid and dare authorities to do something about it. Sounds like a utopia.

And a number of the legal battles the Premier apparently wants to fire up with this unserious legislation are constitutional battles that have already been lost and settled. I've noted the Greenhouse Gas reference above. How about reclassification of firearms interfering with the 'exclusive jurisdiction' of the provinces over property and civil rights? Alberta lost almost that exact fight in the SCC more than 20 years ago...and a quick look online shows over 30 lawyers listed as appearing in the SCC (which does not include all the others who work on the file but do not make the appearance list).

So perhaps a less abstract harm of what some might be inclined to see as a harmless flipping of the rule of law on its head - will ultimately be endless millions of public funds wasted fighting guaranteed loser court battles.

But I am sure the families being displaced from children's respite care will understand it was for their own good that those funds could not be used to assist them.

Or the women's shelters currently turning hundreds of people away because lack of provincial funding.

Or the collapsing Legal Aid program due to - you guessed it - lack of provincial funding.

Pretty sure the food banks are flush with extra cash these days so definitely don't need it for them.

And the list can go on and on...

[Johnny Makarov]

Originally Posted by Dion

If Smith has climbed that much in the polls, it tells me that Notley has to do a much better job of getting her message out. All she does is attack Smith at every opportunity. Maybe offer Albertans an alternative and give us details of how you plan to do it.

This was your lame ass excuse for giving us all that UCP propaganda last election. Enough.

Why not hammer the deplorable?

[soulchoice]

Originally Posted by MBates

Apologies in advance for a bit of a long and dense post...

What you set out above is the reason why people who care about the rule of law are speaking very loudly against this. A law that says you shall ignore laws you know apply to you so long as a group of people you know have no legal authority tell you to ignore the laws?

All as a method to get politicians in Ottawa to...respect the parameters of the law?

There is a reason Alberta is coming out of this looking like a laughing stock.


Best I can tell, there are a couple major deceptions that are being employed to give this approach its appeal to a large swath of the population who do not understand how our system works.

One major problem with the scheme of the 'Alberta Sovereignty Within a United Canada Act' is apparently even recognized by the name of the Act: federal laws apply to all persons throughout the united federation called Canada.

Your relationship with the federal government is between you and it...not one by proxy via the Edmonton Legislature or the UCP Cabinet.

For example, if you refuse your legal obligation to remit your federal taxes you pay the penalties and go to jail - not some performative buffoon politician trumping up the idea it is better to ask for forgiveness than permission to ignore the Income Tax Act.

Individual police officers in Alberta have swore an oath of allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen and her heirs successors and assigns and are duty bound to enforce federal laws. If the UCP cabinet orders police services to ignore certain laws the cabinet ministers are not the ones who have to choose to betray their oath or disobey the purported "lawful" orders. This will all fall on the shoulders of individual officers - most of whom have no desire to become political pawns.

So, the mighty Premier Danielle Smith Government is less 'standing up' for Albertans than it is hiding behind them as human shields for fights they want to start with the feds. Kind of like a bad friend, drunk and disorderly at closing time at the bar somehow getting you punched with his big mouth.


Another major problem is the premise of creating and using this Act is a set of bad talking points including the claim that Canada is a collection of individual sovereigns.

This is inaccurate. There is one sovereign power of the Canadian Monarchy divided into jurisdictions in the Constitution Act 1867. Premier Smith has a well-polished talking point that the Provinces are 'sovereign' in their specific 'lanes' and Ottawa is separately 'sovereign' in theirs...and they can validly be forced to 'stay in their lane'.

Well, ok. Section 91 and 92 of the Constitution Act 1867 do set out the division of powers with language of exclusive jurisdiction. But you cannot only read the sections you like and ignore the others. Nor in a common law nation state can you ignore the common law interpretations of the original text. In other words, the lanes have been defined by the Courts and the Courts decide what is in or outside of said lanes. Not MLAs or MPs.

Premier Smith and her supporters just conveniently skip all of the overlaps - and what happens in the situation of overlaps. I am baffled nobody (journalist or political opponent) has just flat-out asked her (or her group of constitutional 'experts') to tell Albertans what the 'double aspect doctrine' is. We are talking first year law school stuff here (or, a reasonably educated Google search for that matter):

https://www.constitutionalstudies.ca...double-aspect/



In case the Premier and the Albertans blindly saying this legislation is going to be so great for us would like a recent example of how the double aspect doctrine applied to confirm the Federal government indeed has a legal, constitutional 'lane' that it shares and can legislate overlapping with Alberta...it is in the same article:



In my view the only one who cannot stay in her lane is the Premier and her now enthusiastically supportive government.

The rule of law cannot be optional. When a judge makes an error in a ruling, the ruling stands until an appeal court overturns it. You are not allowed to just say - that order is stupid and I am pretty sure it is wrong so I will not follow it.

If Premier Smith claims to be able to declare sovereignty from laws she thinks are dumb, what is stopping any of us from doing the same with respect to laws her government passes? We have the same amount of authority as she does to declare laws not worthy of being followed.

Extreme anti-science activists and Covid mandate protesters have already shown us the harm that can be caused by a population emboldened to ignore laws when they decide the laws infringe their rights (conveniently ignoring the rights of everyone else and not bothering to use the courts). Will less Freemen on the Land show up in Alberta now? Or will they flock to a place that now officially follows their playbook? Self-declare laws invalid and dare authorities to do something about it. Sounds like a utopia.

And a number of the legal battles the Premier apparently wants to fire up with this unserious legislation are constitutional battles that have already been lost and settled. I've noted the Greenhouse Gas reference above. How about reclassification of firearms interfering with the 'exclusive jurisdiction' of the provinces over property and civil rights? Alberta lost almost that exact fight in the SCC more than 20 years ago...and a quick look online shows over 30 lawyers listed as appearing in the SCC (which does not include all the others who work on the file but do not make the appearance list).

So perhaps a less abstract harm of what some might be inclined to see as a harmless flipping of the rule of law on its head - will ultimately be endless millions of public funds wasted fighting guaranteed loser court battles.

But I am sure the families being displaced from children's respite care will understand it was for their own good that those funds could not be used to assist them.

Or the women's shelters currently turning hundreds of people away because lack of provincial funding.

Or the collapsing Legal Aid program due to - you guessed it - lack of provincial funding.

Pretty sure the food banks are flush with extra cash these days so definitely don't need it for them.

And the list can go on and on...

Great post. Do not forgot the doctrine of Inter-jurisdictional Immunity. Although in theory, it is supposed to run both ways, it has never gone in the favour of any provincial law. Any decision on such usage of this doctrine has always been sided with the Federal Government(under s.91), when the courts have had to get involved.

Bell Canada v Quebec or Western Bank v Alberta are clear landmarks examples of anything that is within the Federal Governments power under section 91 will always take precedent over any provincial law.

I mean, didn’t Tyler Shandro go to Law School? He should know these basic concepts.

[Fuzz]

When your Justice Minister is a clown, all you can expect out of him are jokes. Unfortunately these ones are not funny.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by Dion

If Smith has climbed that much in the polls, it tells me that Notley has to do a much better job of getting her message out. All she does is attack Smith at every opportunity. Maybe offer Albertans an alternative and give us details of how you plan to do it.

I'd argue that the NDP should have replaced Notley. I have an extremely difficult time voting for a person that was anti-pipeline and anti-Alberta oil until she got in a position where she had to drop it for optics. She may be a more competent premier but we all know deep down she opposes the industry that puts food on the table for Albertans. It's no different than people that won't vote for Conservative because of their past position on abortion or LGBT issues.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I'd argue that the NDP should have replaced Notley. I have an extremely difficult time voting for a person that was anti-pipeline and anti-Alberta oil until she got in a position where she had to drop it for optics. She may be a more competent premier but we all know deep down she totally opposes the industry that puts food on the table for Albertans.

Except we don’t because she doesn’t govern that way and doesn’t speak that way. So you’re just coming up with excuses for why you’ll vote UCP, which is fine. You don’t have to make up lies for everybody here to justify it. Nobody will think differently of you.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I'd argue that the NDP should have replaced Notley. I have an extremely difficult time voting for a person that was anti-pipeline and anti-Alberta oil until she got in a position where she had to drop it for optics. She may be a more competent premier but we all know deep down she opposes the industry that puts food on the table for Albertans. It's no different than people that won't vote for Conservative because of their past position on abortion or LGBT issues.

I think that's a misread of what happened. When she got into power she realized the importance of the industry, and began to work with it, and defend it against Ottawa. A politician taking in information and changing their position is the sign of a good leader. If you think she is going to come into power and attack their industry, I think you're greatly mistaken.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Except we don’t because she doesn’t govern that way and doesn’t speak that way. So you’re just coming up with excuses for why you’ll vote UCP, which is fine. You don’t have to make up lies for everybody here to justify it. Nobody will think differently of you.

That's a strange response. Haven't we gone over this in the Canadian politics thread that it doesn't matter what any Conservative leader says that they won't touch those issues that many just don't believe them nor trust them. I just don't trust her. That's not a lie.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Dion

If Smith has climbed that much in the polls, it tells me that Notley has to do a much better job of getting her message out. All she does is attack Smith at every opportunity. Maybe offer Albertans an alternative and give us details of how you plan to do it.

The election is 6 months away, you don't go laying out your plan that far ahead. It's fine to attack Smith on her ridiculous positions, her gaffes, her associations with the mentally deficient. This is who she is, and going after it is fair game. When we get to a month out, that's when you roll out ideas. Not now.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I think that's a misread of what happened. When she got into power she realized the importance of the industry, and began to work with it, and defend it against Ottawa. A politician taking in information and changing their position is the sign of a good leader. If you think she is going to come into power and attack their industry, I think you're greatly mistaken.

If she had to get into power to realize the importance of the industry then I have to ask how smart she is in the first place as this isn't rocket science here. I don't think she's going to outright attack the industry but I also don't know how she can fight for an industry that she spent years protesting.

I think Smith is an idiot and don't think is fit to run a province but I'm really disappointed that the alternative is also the devil.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

That's a strange response. Haven't we gone over this in the Canadian politics thread that it doesn't matter what any Conservative leader says that they won't touch those issues that many just don't believe them nor trust them. I just don't trust her. That's not a lie.

And don’t you mock people for treating Conservatives that way?