Now that we have before us an actual copy of the United Conservative Party’s first bill of the fall 2024 sitting of the Legislature, the new and improved Alberta Bill of Rights with secret sovereignty sauce, serious commentators are bound to start commentating seriously about it.
Indeed, to set the tone, the government’s press release about Bill 24 began by talking about the importance of protecting of fundamental rights.
So it bears repeating that that Alberta Bill of Rights Amendment Act, 2024, is a fundamentally unserious document.
Whereas the 1972 Alberta Bill of Rights passed in Premier Peter Lougheed’s first term was well meaning and aspirational, although not of much significance as history has proved because it was not a constitutional document that outweighed other legislation in any way, the 2024 amendments are merely performative, intended to appeal to a UCP fringe that now holds Premier Danielle Smith’s political fate in their hands.
And while the 1972 bill indeed talked about timeless and universally acknowledged fundamental rights, even if it did little to actually protect them, the 2024 version would have us believe it has added fanciful new categories of rights driven by the ephemeral fashion of the perpetually aggrieved American Right.
So in 1972 we tipped our provincial cap to freedom of speech, religion and assembly; in 2024, the UCP would have us salute the right to say no to vaccinations we need, no matter whom we infect, and yes to owning assault rifles we don’t, as long as we do so “in accordance with the law.” (Whatever that means, it would be fair to add.)
“The proposed amendments to the Alberta Bill of Rights address issues important to Albertans and reinforce that Alberta’s government is committed to protecting their rights,” said Justice Minister Mickey Amery in the government’s press release, a quote about as meaningful as this entire exercise.
Alas as for the would-be law-abiding assault-rifle collectors fooled by this performance, University of Alberta law professor Eric Adams told the CBC, “really nothing is being provided of substance that I can see.”
He did, however, suggest the prohibition on requiring immunizations could lead to legal challenges against vaccine mandates, although such mandates seem unlikely as long as the UCP continues to cart off the furniture and pull out the phone lines at Alberta Health Services.
Surely the risk of legal consequences is greater from people infected or otherwise made to suffer by irresponsible unvaccinated health care employees who come to work when they’re ill, and the negligent bosses who allow such behaviour, just sayin’.
Anyway, these fashionable new “rights” seem fundamentally contrary to the notion of peace, order and good government that is firmly entrenched in the actual Canadian Constitution – so they would likely prove ephemeral even if they were included in a constitutional document, which the Alberta Bill of Rights emphatically is not.
So while the commentariat may be tempted to wring its hands about the possibility of costly legal challenges caused by the changes to the Bill of Rights, it is said here, again, that the risk is low, and likely to be short-lived.
Meanwhile, the drafters of the bill appear to have contorted their language into legal pretzels to find ways to allow the UCP keep coercive policies that violate fundamental rights – for example, imprisoning people in “drug treatment” centres and forcing them to take treatment – while insisting they must be able to refuse vaccinations.
Regardless, no matter how fine its words are, and they aren’t all that inspiring, Alberta’s Bill of Rights remains just another organic statute, passed by a simple majority by a provincial Legislature, without any logical legal reason whatsoever for a court to give it precedence over another provincial law, let alone a federal one.
As I noted last month, prime minister John Diefenbaker’s 1960 Canadian Bill of Rights suffered from the same fatal flaw. Courts can only strike down a law by appealing to a higher law, and the Alberta Bill of Rights does not meet that standard.
In real life, you don’t draft a constitution – even for a country that will never exist – by giving three goofs from the Free Alberta Strategy word processors and letting them sit down and start typing. You might even get a better result if you tried to implement the Infinite Monkey Theorem instead of leaving to job to Ms. Smith’s new chief of staff Rob Anderson and his pals.
Thankfully, as NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi pointed out back in September, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms remains the supreme law of the land, including the Alberta part of it, so that will continue to be the best place to challenge unconstitutional laws, including the ones passed by the UCP majority in the Alberta Legislature.
CORRECTION: Embarrassing, but all my own, I referred to Bill 24 as Bill 1 in the first draft of this story and left it that way over night and through the morning. DJC
This is the UCP version of what they sometimes dismissively call virtue signaling. Or maybe more accurately, leadership review signaling, as the extremists still harbour doubts about what our former libertarian and current Premier really believes.
Heck, who knows what she really believes, her political journey over the decades seems like a twisted one from minimal government to a more interfering one now. Perhaps her views have also evolved as her predecessor once claimed, but these additional rights, some of which are actually the right to oppress others, are rather toothless in so far as the courts do not have to give them any consideration over any other law.
However the danger is they may be used to bludgeon provincial institutions into carrying out Smith’s extreme agenda. It will be hard to insist hospital staff have vaccinations and school teachers will have to watch their pronouns. But I suppose when comes to guns, Federal law will still prevail regardless of what laws the UCP passes. Although, if it is any consolation to Smith, this bill may also provide some distraction from the looming fiscal deficit due to weak oil prices. And I suspect we can now forget about that tax cut she promised in the last election. But maybe we’ll be too busy dealing with Bill 1 to notice that too.
Peter Lougheed was there to protect the underdogs and the marginalized. He undid cruel policies of the Social Credit Party, such as eugenics. Here we see the UCP as a 2024 version of the Social Credit Party.
Anon: I agree. I think the line from Manning Social Credit to the Wildrose Party to the UCP is pretty clear and direct. DJC
Albertans, especially in rural areas, love bending over for their political masters. Sadly, greedy and selfish rural Albertans never learn any lessons.
Cool: just a reminder that commercial farmers and ranchers are less than two percent of the population spread across Alberta. The right-wing yappers you hear from the farm community largely cycle between the various Ag Checkoff groups (known as “Commissions”) which take millions in production taxes from actual farmers and ranchers. They swan around promoting multinational corporations and free market ideology. Something most of us hate. The other 99% of rural Albertans commute to cities and towns for work or are in the oil and gas service sector.
I heard Professor Adams on CBC’s Alberta At Noon yesterday. I was busy with something else, so I hope I got this right.
Professor Adams made the point that the Bill of Rights only applies to provincial agencies, so only workers for the provincial government, or something under its authority like a hospital, could invoke the Bill of Rights to refuse a vaccination. It does not apply to the private sector, so the owner of a plumbing shop could still require his employees to be vaccinated. The ironic example Professor Adams used was that of a fitness trainer; one working for the provincial government could not be compelled by his employer to get a vaccination, while one working for the YMCA could.
What I thought was really interesting, however, was that Professor Adams then went on to say that the government could have put their ‘No Vaccine Mandate’ clause in the Alberta Human Rights Act, and then it would have applied to private businesses as well, just like restaurants are not allowed to refuse to serve patrons because of their ethnicity or religion.
Assuming I heard the professor correctly, this really begs the question why didn’t the Smith government put their no mandated vaccines law in the Human Rights Act? Do they not bother consulting government lawyers before they write their legislation? (This would fit in with their antipathy towards people with expertise) Alternately, is this exercise intended to be a nothing burger whose only purpose is to mollify the UCP base this weekend?
It’s so unserious that the premier dressed up in Halloween colors for its debut. Ghoulish and mean-spirited? Yes, but at least she wasn’t carrying a broom or wearing a brown shirt.
Anyone else staying tuned for the first round of mandatory drug treatment arrests? Is there a 1-800-rat-line for people wishing to have their neighbors arrested under false pretences? Dude across the way smokes weed, then bizarrely moves my garbage cans. Maybe I could start with him. Let me know, Dani. Might as well join in, ’cause I’m tired of watching this show and eating popcorn.
It’s comforting to know that Albertans can now spread smallpox and polio with the UCP’s blessings.
Lars: And count on it, they will. DJC
Super nit-picky but while the bill is the first bill of the fall sitting the bill number is Bill 24 since we’re still in the same session as the spring sitting (no throne speech).
Lucy: Thanks very much. Not nit-picky at all. In fact, super embarrassing. I own it all myself, too, this time. As I’ve said many times, though, writing a blog like this is the editorial equivalent of performing on a trapeze without a safety net I’m grateful for your intervention. DJC
So really, how much longer can this amateur theatrical government last, before people come to the realization that the government is a rather bad farce? Albertans cannot be so slow.
FA: For a gloomy answer to your question, look at Saskatchewan. DJC
Oh! Yes they can! And they undoubtedly are.
True to form, the UCP simply can’t wait to ram more garbage down our throats, now at a blistering pace.
Perhaps these idiots would see things differently if they had a heart attack and had to wait 12 hours at emergency to be seen by a doctor, because the waiting room is overloaded with those stupid people that refuse to get vaccinated. That’s what happened to me 3 years ago. Funny how COVID has diminished somewhat, but the 12 hour wait is still there.
As one of their own, Chelsae Petrovic, pointed out last year, those who end up in emergency with cardiac problems have nobody to blame but themselves. Any UCP MLA who found themselves in such a position would thus immediately acknowledge the insufficiency of their own self-reliance, and, we could expect, quietly go off somewhere and perish in expiation.
Surely.
People are using food banks in numbers never seen before. Folks are unhoused at record rates. Schools are working at over 100% capacity, Nurses are burnt out, Doctor’s are leaving the province, hospital emergency rooms are understaffed or closed and the UCP is all in for Bill 24. I ask ” what has happened to regard for the majority , why the pandering to a base of 1905’s and TBA ?”. We are a province not a cabal.
Ahhh-Oogah! Code Brown! The time travelling clown-car is in reverse, at high speed! Get the nets! Straight jackets if you have them! The UCP is day drinking at the Leg again! https://youtu.be/aXg4JU2-U2Q?t=6
My Doctor is among the 60% looking to leave. Daughter’s Doctor already gone. More of this news needs to reach Dani et. al. Did from us!
After watching the results in the Saskatchewan election it mirrors Alberta to a T. While Saskatoon and Regina citizens showed these Reformers whose boss, the Red-neck rural hillbillies showed that they love being treated liked morons just like in Alberta. They don’t care what Global Warming is doing to the planet and aren’t interested in trying to do something to help try to fight it showing no respect for their children’s future.
I think calling them “red-neck rural hillbillies” is an oversimplification. After all, while residents of Moose Jaw or Prince George or Red Deer do live in cities, they tend to vote in lockstep with their rural brethren. I think the dividing line actually has to do with population density and the economy and labour market.
Right wing parties do well in regions, either rural or small- to mid-sized cities, that are less densely populated and where the economy and labour market are dominated by extractive industries and agriculture.
More progressive parties do better — while often, in many cases, splitting the anti-conservative vote — in more densely populated regions where the economy and labour market are dominated by knowledge workers, service industry workers and the public sector.
I think this more nuanced view is more accurate and informative than “rural hillbilly” stereotypes. IMHO.
Alan K. Spiller: It sure does. Saskatchewan and Alberta seem so much alike. Wouldn’t it be nice if people infiltrated the UCP’s AGM and voted Danielle Smith out? The drawback is that whomever replaces her might be even worse. The UCP has a shallow pool of competent MLAs. There isn’t any.
Living in British-ish Colombia, as I do, it’s been a super-fortnight (or is that, ‘baker’s-fortnight’?) of political tenterhooks. The remaining one or two hooks notwithstanding, it appears New Brunswick’s Conservative government did not survive by getting all wrinkle-weenied over pronouns and all else that the furthering-right brings—but the Sask party did—wrinkles notwithstanding; and it turns out the BC Dippers actually did snatch victory out of the jaws of defeat, not the other way around, like the upstart, amateur school-library porno-police in the BC Conservative party had prayed it wouldn’t—I mean, pending a couple of judicial vote-recounts which might yet render the incumbent NDP a real minority government instead of a de facto one, depending on how well ‘who’s yo Assembly-daddy’ goes with, I guess, the defeated Green party leader who’s for now keeping the lilly-pad she missed landing on in her defeat-defying leap from the riding she’d already won twice. Kerplunk! You know, just ask Kermit: it’s not easy…being Speaker in a squeaker (I got that from my PP-Rhyming App).
But it ain’t over ‘til it’s over: there’s one more election outcome to go that’s making some politicians dodgers and others weavers. That, of course, is the US presidential election which, if pollsters are to be believed, lies somewhere between tied and too-close-to-call—and, if 50-odd state electoral authorities over federal elections can be believed, will yield a winner who either claims vote-rigging or not (one of them, even if he wins). And that, depending on what course the world’s greatest tottering democracy takes, includes one provincial, wannabe Northern Texan MAGAnaut and one federal, Quebecois son-of-a-sinful-father who are both watching that November 5th date very,very closely because rival members of their own, respective parties are watching it too.
Ergo do I speak? Well, surely I’m not the only one to notice how conspicuously louder Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s detractors are demanding his resignation the closer the US election gets—and how flatly (with a new, PET-like smirk we’ve all been waiting for since he won a HoC seat back in 2008) he insists on keeping on, plainly enjoying the protracted, tortuous tantalizing of those very same detractors. Why, it’s almost as if the US election result will represent some sort of lost opportunity for his would-be ousters. May I posit that if tRump wins, Trudeau acquires a potent rationale for staying on?
Okay, then. First, if tRump wins, JT may then argue that he’s the only one with actual hands-on experience dealing with the boorish man-child and, therefore, for the good of the country, he must stay on as PM. Second, his Conservative rival (see PP of the CPP) would be substantially disadvantaged if two-thirds or more of Canadians recoil in horror at the prospect of another tRump presiduncy —which would very probably be more disastrous than his first one; PP does, after all, spout very tRump-like rhetoric, enough name-calling and slogan-rhyming to make two-thirds of the Canadian electorate recoil from him too. JT’s Liberal detractors know this and are thus panicking that they might not be able to preclude their leader from reaching that mementos decision-point—and then be stuck with him. Of course PP has been trying his darnedest to foment an early election before the possibility of a tRump victory becomes a hard reality for PP’s party. And why did Bloc Québécois leader Yves-Francois Blanchet set his confidence ultimatum for October 28th? Was it merely coincidence that it falls as close to the final results of three provincial elections as possible to leave as large a window as possible between there and the US election? Before I stop myself from getting too theoretically conspiratorial, I’ll just ask: why is Trudeau smiling so much lately?
I must also ask—only half rhetorically or “C-word” theoretically—whether the timing of the UCP confab on November 1st&2nd has anything to do with the fixed date of the US presidential election. Is the pending review of Danielle Smith’s premiership by the radicalized Take-Back-Albetaria faction (which controls the party she’s supposed to be leader of) related in any way to the outcome of the US election? —that is, would the prospect of TBA giving her the thumbs’ down (like they did to former leader and founder of the UCP midway through its first term) be any different if tRump won or lost? Put another way, would it be any different if her review happened after the US election result is known?
I leave it to those with bigger crystal balls I have to figure these wonderments out.
Although I’ve often observed that the only politics the UCP appears capable of doing is that of keeping its polarized membership altogether in the same party, on the same page, in the same Assembly, in the same province, and—dare I say—in the same country, instead of doing the politics of getting good public policy done, at least it’s good practice for doing, maybe one day, the real “art of the possible.” If Smith’s attempts at constitution-writing is any indication, it could come in handy for governing a new, independent Alberta—I mean, if that’s still as much of a thing as the UCP keeps hinting at. So I hope TBA doesn’t take my observations as anything other than encouragement. Keep it up, guys, and prove to yourselves how the impolitic pans out psephologically —uh, I mean —for those who prefer to keep themselves unfamiliar with undrained-swamp-talk—‘at the ballot box.’
Finally, as the Great Oz famously said, “Never mind that man behind the curtain” after Toto blew his cover. As much as the partisan right feigns being chuffed—like Saskatchewan’s Scott Moe for winning a fifth straight majority and BC’s John Rustad who’s BC Conservatives made a remarkable stride from nowhere to crossing the finish line a close second (with that disheveled, ‘dog-ate-my-homework’ look)—and even the tRumpublicans for also making the US contest so tight (if pollsters there can be believed) despite tRump’s plain unfitness for the job—these supposed worthy accomplishments should not be taken as exaggerated reports of the neo-right’s demise but, rather, as regress-reports of its demise only delayed. The descriptor, “dead-cat-bounce,” comes to mind. Maintaining the illusion of recuperation after a bad patch (which some would begin with Obama’s win in 2008, perhaps more would estimate, since 2015 when two of Canada’s most once-powerful Conservative governments were defeated, but definitely since elections in BC on the 19th of October, NB on the 21st, and Saskatchewan on the 28th) is getting almost impossible. Smith won with a much-reduced caucus in 2023; this year, Higgs’ lost his own seat as his NB Cons fell to the Liberals, BC’s Dippers, tired and wobbly after 7 difficult years in power, to hold off the upstart BCCons, and Moe’s Sask party had its incumbent majority considerably reduced by the Opposition NDP. Ontario’s D’ohFo, Quebec’s Legault, and Nova Scotia’s Tim Houston—who was just granted an snap election (for November 26) might try to put a good face on their electoral prospects, but are plainly worried about the apparent trend. I’ll demystify it for them: since the neo-right everywhere has had to resort to furthering-right demagoguery to win power by ever-shrinking margins, or lose it the same way, it’s demise is assured. To quote the inimitable Brook Benton, “It’s just a matter of time.”
Be safe in flu season, my friends!
Because you wouldn’t I will. https://youtu.be/gVpaXi5kuXA?t=3