Grievance politics spawns push for Alberta Separatism

SYNDICATED REPRINT: Source: Victoria News
By Matthew Claxton

Politics makes strange bedfellows, but there can be few stranger than B.C.’s NDP Premier David Eby, Prime Minister Mark Carney, and Ontario Premier Doug Ford.

Yet all three — the left-leaning former civil rights lawyer, the resolutely centrist banker/polician, and the conservative, populist businessman — have been on the same side in recent days.

That side: holding Canada together against separatism.

It looks like there will be a referendum on Alberta separating from Canada sometime this autumn. Which is at least a change from the Quebec variant (although we may get another of those in 2027, too).

Alberta’s secessionists exist because of grievances. They say the province, one of the nation’s wealthiest in Canada, is being robbed blind by Ottawa, despite 1) being gifted the expansion of the Trans Mountain pipeline at federal expense and 2) being offered a chance to build another, by Carney.

Never mind those mere facts.

Alberta is bent on leaving, say its would-be world-beating secessionist forces. (Polls show their support at 30 per cent.)

This is led to the very Albertan diplomatic kerfuffle that recently erupted after it emerged that Alberta separatists had met with American State Department officials.

Eby said that the separatists’ actions amounted to treason. Ford asked Alberta Premier Danielle Smith to “stand up” to them. Carney had to say that he expects the majority of Albertans like being with the rest of Canada.

Canada — and then went on to claim that they province had been “federalized,” under Justin Trudeau’s government.

Yeah, trumping the size of their oil pipeline to the Pacific, at federal expense, was a real slap in the face.

Smith went on to characterize Alberta’s separatists as just poor, beaten-down folks who have “lost hope” after all this federal abuse.

“I’m not going to demonize or marginalize a million of my fellow citizens when they’ve got legitimate grievances,” she said.

Whether they’re cranky with Ottawa or not, going to secede, laud a war on one’s own country is not going to endear them to Canadians like being with the rest of Canada.

Smith’s problem is that the call is coming from inside the house.

At last year’s UCP conference Smith drew a chorus of boos after she spoke about the Carney government endorsing her party members who then said she hoped her party members felt “more confident that Canada works.”

The UCP’s base hates Ottawa, or at least Liberal governments, more than they love oil and paying PST.

In her remarks on Jan. 29, Smith said that Albertans needed hope.

But she’s the one who refers to the support of an angry, anti-Canadian movement.

Smith threw her lot in with grievance-Smith. She’s got a chance, not hope. Now she’s got a wolf by the ears.

Matthew Claxton is a journalist based in British Columbia.