Danielle Smith’s Party Conked by Its Own Boomerang

Trying to challenge the United Conservative Party government’s misuse of the Charter’s notorious notwithstanding clause may be a waste of time and money, but using the UCP’s ridiculous recall legislation as a strategy against the perpetrators is clearly rattling Premier Danielle Smith and her ministers and MLAs.

This is an example of asymmetrical political warfare that deserves to go down in history. It is all the more remarkable since it is a popular citizens’ uprising. The Opposition NDP appears to have nothing to do with it.

Alberta Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides was on CBC’s Alberta at Noon call-in program yesterday complaining again about that recall petition that’s been approved by Elections Alberta in his riding.

“The spirit and the intent behind recall of course was for your local residents and local constituents to be able to hold an MLA accountable if they’ve done something significantly egregious, and that doesn’t seem to be the case with what we’re seeing now,” he claimed.

“We’re seeing really co-ordinated efforts to recall every single MLA, which seems to smack in the face of what the purpose was at the very onset,” he continued, overstating the situation somewhat but doubtless illuminating the UCP’s fears.

“The spirit was for situations where there’s an egregious breach of trust, someone’s broken the law, someone has engaged in misconduct,” Nicolaides insisted.

“Here in Calgary-Bow... the petitioner has not suggested that I’ve broken the law in any way, has not suggested that I’ve behaved unethically, or engaged in any kind of misconduct whatsoever.”

Putting aside the fact that many of us consider suspending the fundamental rights to freedom of association and freedom of speech for a whole class of citizens is in fact an egregious act, let’s concede Nicolaides’ point that, as Alberta’s unofficial provincial motto states, No Laws Were Broken.

But we can also acknowledge that whinging about the spirit of a law is, literally, a loser’s strategy; that is to say, you’re going to lose the argument in a court of law if you bother to take it there. So, it must be added, would be a legal argument that the UCP’s use of Section 33 of the Charter violated the spirit of the drafters of the Constitution.

I don’t know if Nicolaides believes the pish-posh he’s peddling, but if the minister and the UCP want us to imagine that was the spirit of Jason Kenney’s intention when his government drafted that law in 2021, it’s a step too far. If that had been the intended spirit, it would have been included in concrete provisions to be passed by the legislature.

The obvious circumstantial conclusion is that the UCP intended to use the Recall Act for political purposes against the NDP. If they imagined it would never be turned back against them, that is the very definition of hubris and they deserve whatever happens next.

When the Smith government passed its Election Statutes Amendment Act last May, boasting that included changes to the Recall Act would “make it easier to recall an MLA,” it had the chance to fix the problems Nicolaides is now whining about. It didn’t. We all understand why.

The party even boasted on social media that “Alberta’s United Conservatives will give voters the power to fire their MLAs if they break promises.” So the spirit of the legislation was obviously never to hold MLAs accountable only for “something significantly egregious,” as the education minister redundantly put it.

Nicolaides also tried to claim non-residents of his riding are signing the petition. When he was called on that nonsense by the moderator, who pointed out that Elections Alberta’s job was to check the eligibility of signers, Nicolaides pivoted to echoing the premier’s claim that outsiders are violating the law by coming into the riding as canvassers.

Both are extremely unlikely. The first, as noted, because Elections Alberta checks signatures when the petition forms are handed in. Well, they don’t check them all, Nicolaides responded weakly.

The second, because Elections Alberta checks canvasser applications before issuing ID. And count on it, they’ll now be going over every one with a fine-tooth comb, whether or not the UCP gives Elections Alberta the additional $13.5 million chief electoral officer Gordon McClure says the agency needs to do the job properly. If an applicant hasn’t lived in the riding for at least three months, you can count on it they’re not going to be allowed to collect signatures. Nicolaides certainly knows this too.

Nicolaides is right to be worried, though. His margin of victory in the 2024 provincial election was only 2.4 per cent. That sets him apart from the only other UCP MLA against whom a recall petition has been approved by Elections Alberta. Airdrie-East MLA Angela Pitt, by contrast, won with a 27 per cent margin.

Two MLAs, it must be added, aren’t quite “every single MLA,” as claimed by Nicolaides. But more are said to be in the works.

For example, in his Calgary Herald column Monday, political commentator Don Braid reported that “a recall campaign is shaping up” in Premier Smith’s own Brooks-Medicine Hat riding.

Braid said no papers have been filed with Elections Alberta. However, a website calling for Smith to be recalled indicated last night that “at this time the application has not been approved by Elections Alberta.” So that sounds as if there is in fact paperwork somewhere.

It would likely be pretty hard, even with the widespread anger at the UCP for its egregious attack on the fundamental rights of teachers, to gather the required signatures in the premier’s Brooks-Medicine Hat riding.

Still, these are interesting times — for everyone, it would seem — so you never know for sure.

This will certainly give Smith something to think about when she should be concentrating on how to keep her party’s MAGA-influenced and openly separatist lunatic fringe sweet at the annual general meeting now only 17 days away.

Less than a week ago, Smith told the legislature that no changes are coming to the Recall Act just yet. But it seems probable that no matter how foolish it makes the government look, the UCP is going to be forced to recall easy recalls sooner than later.

The Recall Act is bad law, drafted and enacted for bad reasons. But there can be no sympathy for Smith and the UCP for the way it’s being used now.