When Danielle Smith was on the campaign trail this summer to become Alberta’s next premier, she promised something she called the “sovereignty act.” Ms. Smith envisioned Alberta refusing to enforce federal laws if the province believed Ottawa had overstepped its jurisdiction.
The idea was widely, from left to right, lambasted. Jason Kenney, the former premier, called it “cockamamie” and “catastrophically stupid.” In October, after Ms. Smith squeezed out a victory for the United Conservative Party leadership and became Premier, she seemed to back down and concede the obvious – that the Supreme Court of Canada is indeed the final arbiter of the Constitution.
On Tuesday, however, Ms. Smith looked ready to brawl as she tabled her first piece of legislation, the fancifully named Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act. It does indeed aim to conjure the right for Alberta to ignore Ottawa – to “not enforce specific federal laws or policies.” For Albertans skeptical of this gambit, the province provided a handy fact sheet. Rest assured: The bill is “likely” constitutional, the province says.
But Ms. Smith – who faces a general election next spring – seems worried. The bill explicitly curtails legal challenges against any use of the new act, by aggressively tightening the rules around a judicial review. That alone seems like an open admission that Ms. Smith knows she is, on purpose, treading on constitutional quicksand.
The bill purports to allow cabinet, as backed by the legislature, to take on anything from Ottawa deemed, in its opinion, unconstitutional – or, to make things easier, “harmful” to Alberta, with no definition of harm. If the UCP feels it’s harmful, it’s harmful. Cabinet can then by fiat rewrite existing Alberta legislation and order an array of provincial entities to do its bidding and ignore federal law. But, again, rest assured, cabinet would only issue diktats that were, in its view, constitutional.
On Tuesday, Ms. Smith outlined various areas she wanted to “push back” on, starting with the federal law that reviews some major industrial projects. The first skirmishes are set for Alberta’s spring legislative session.
What this looks like in reality is guesswork. Further, not much might actually occur between the initial volleys under the new act, which will surely be challenged in court, and the spring election. In some ways, it sounds like promotional bluster. The fourth point of rationale the province presented Tuesday was to “create opportunities for building national awareness of federal intrusion.”
It is an amped-up song sheet of grievance that Mr. Kenney followed in his 3½ years as premier, always fighting and often losing. Alberta is enjoying a windfall of many billions in cash from fossil fuels, but the province isn’t necessarily in a better place after all the scrapping. Yet Ms. Smith chooses to escalate.
This is not leadership. Polling suggests a lot of her ideas do not have broad traction. Fifty per cent disagree with Alberta seeking more sovereignty and independence from Ottawa, compared with 46 per cent who agree. Other possible proposals, such as an Alberta pension plan (getting out of the CPP) and a provincial police force, are strongly opposed.
Ms. Smith’s seven weeks as Premier have been topsy-turvy. On her first day, she insisted people who refused COVID-19 vaccines were the most discriminated against she had ever seen. She promised to protect the unvaccinated in the province’s human rights code but this week backed down. Earlier this year, she had controversial views of the Russia-Ukraine war, but eventually recanted. She is upending health care, firing the entire board that oversaw Alberta Health Services, which she had implausibly accused of manufacturing staff shortages. Last week, after reporting a $12-billion surplus, Alberta pulled back on modest plans to invest in the long-term Heritage Savings Trust Fund.
In September, the province’s lieutenant-governor went so far as to say she might eye a bill along the lines of the sovereignty act with special scrutiny. That’s the sort of chaos Ms. Smith courts. Alberta could be focused on investing its billions in its economic future. Instead, the province sails straight for the dark clouds of stormy political waters, led there by the captain of the ship herself.
Come spring, Albertans will have their say at the ballot box about all this tumult.