Shouldn’t Scoundrels Pay the Price for Inciting Insurrection?
Alberta’s Premier unleashes a revolt against the legitimate powers of Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada
Losing public faith and support because of his foolish and reckless policies, Alberta’s Premier is taking an extraordinary gamble to save his political skin.
He does so in the full knowledge that he is stoking civil unrest.
Perhaps to the point of inciting insurrection.
Premier Jason Kenney wants Albertans to rise up against the sovereign tax power and authority of Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada, which is used to fund a better life for all of us.
As a province, Alberta has no legal basis to do so. But that doesn’t restrain a flailing Premier focused on hanging on to power, by any means and at all costs.
Will Albertans see their Premier as a slick schemer and spurn his knavish tricks?
Or will they give their Dear Leader the Yes vote he wants: to enrage and unleash a mob to assail a legitimate federal power completely outside Alberta’s jurisdiction?
We will find out in October, when Albertans are to vote in a referendum Premier Kenney ginned up to take public focus off his government’s myriad failures.
Legally and Constitutionally, the right of the federal government to levy taxes is firmly established.
A province cannot challenge the taxation powers vested in Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada.
Unless it revolts, and secedes from Canada.
Yet the current Alberta government isn’t putting revolution and secession in the referendum it has set for October.
For the moment, it is content with lighting the flames of Insurrection: by denouncing Equalization, the framework where the federal government uses federal taxes to provide all Canadians similar public services.
These are federal taxes, collected and distributed by Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada to support a similar standard of living for all Canadians, regardless of where they live.
Yet the current Alberta government is plotting to whip up resentment and hatred, by claiming that the federal government is stealing and wasting money that rightfully belongs to Albertans.
The idea that the Crown is taking money that would otherwise have stayed in Alberta, and giving it to freeloader provinces, is a myth. It is not a fact.
It is a myth perpetuated by foaming radio hosts and rabble-rousing politicians.
All Canadians pay the same rates of federal income tax, no matter where they live. The Crown uses those revenues, to serve the agenda and the policies of the government of the day.
If Albertans disagree with the policies of that government, they can elect a different one.
Yet the federal taxation power will remain unchanged, no matter who holds office.
More federal taxes are collected in Alberta, per person, because Albertans earn more, per person.
And the federal government gives provinces ample taxation powers to raise whatever revenue they see fit, to serve the agenda of provincial governments in their areas of jurisdiction.
There’s no issue here.
Except in the scheming of scoundrels who seek political gain in riling folks up for no good reason.
This is how Parliament defines Equalization, from a publication by the Library of Parliament:
“Equalization is a federal transfer payment program that was first introduced in 1957 and is designed to reduce the differences in revenue-generating capacity across Canada’s 10 provinces. By compensating poorer provinces for their relatively weak tax bases or resource endowments, Equalization helps to ensure that Canadians residing in provinces have access to a reasonably similar level of provincial government services at reasonably similar levels of taxation, regardless of which province they call home. … Equalization is financed entirely from Government of Canada general revenues. The provinces are uninvolved in the transfer except to the extent that they may qualify for Equalization payments; provincial governments do not contribute financially to the Equalization program, and each province’s ability to raise tax revenues is unaffected by the transfer.”
It is worth repeating this last fact: “provincial governments do not contribute financially to the Equalization program, and each province’s ability to raise tax revenues is unaffected by the transfer.”
The Equalization formula has been regularly reviewed and modified since 1957. Usually it is reviewed every five years, and adjusted if necessary by the federal Parliament, to make sure all Canadians continue to receive similar public services.
Yet on a ballot inserted into municipal elections come October, Albertans will be asked by their provincial government to vote “Yes” or “No” on the following referendum question:
“Should Section 36(2) of the Constitution Act, 1982 — Parliament and the Government of Canada’s commitment to the principle of making equalization payments — be removed from the Constitution?”
It doesn’t matter how Albertans answer.
To remove the Section requires a Constitutional amendment. Which means that seven provinces representing at least half the population of Canada would have to agree. Which means that either Ontario or Quebec, Canada’s two most populous provinces, would have to agree.
It seems inconceivable that they would.
Which leaves only one, deeply dangerous, outcome: a Yes vote offering ammunition for Premier Kenney’s government to play the Victim card.
To rail against the federal power structure. To claim that the federation is stacked against them. And to invite the Second Act: a referendum on secession from Canada.
One struggles to understand why a seasoned politician like Premier Kenney, respected as a federal cabinet minister when he served in the Government of Canada, would stoop to such cynicism: seeking political gain by inciting insurrection against Her Majesty the Queen in Right of Canada. Especially considering he served as a Member of Her Majesty’s Privy Council.
Premier Kenney’s Equalization referendum amounts to handing torches and pitchforks to riled-up folks, and asking them to lash out at the power and authority of the Crown firmly established by the Rule of Law.
Alberta might just as usefully unleash a referendum on Saskatchewan’s policy for potash extraction.
Or create an Alberta referendum on Ontario’s regulations for boating on Lake Huron.
Or set an Alberta referendum forcing Newfoundland to replace Screech, with white rum cocktails adorned with a frilly umbrella and a slice of fruit.
All those would be just as effective as an Alberta referendum to abolish federal tax powers.
An Alberta referendum on Canadian Equalization is nothing more than an exercise in toxic politics.
Kenney is betting that after the Covid pandemic, people would rather hate one another than get along.
Maybe he’s right. Love takes work. Hatred doesn’t. Especially if it’s rooted in the whiny grievance culture of Perpetual Victimhood.
That may be the reason Alberta’s “smartest guy in the room" Premier is launching a vote designed to incite and divide citizens for the most cynical political gain.
It is wrong.
It is foolish.
Worst of all, it risks leaving Albertans with the feeling that there’s nothing they can do to change an unfair power structure.
In fact, there is something they can do.
In fact, Albertans do have a voice in Equalization.
And the power to change the Equalization formula.
They have it through their federal government.
Through the Members of Parliament they elect.
The current equalization formula was set for a five-year term by the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, in 2013.
It was renewed, exactly as Harper set it, with no change whatsoever, for another five-year term in 2018 by the current federal government, led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
That means the Harper Equalization formula will be due for review in 2023.
This review will happen, referendum or not.
If you think the Harper Equalization formula is bad for Alberta, reach out to your Member of Parliament.
Make your voice heard.
Remember, Harper did not impose the 2013 Equalization formula on Alberta against its will.
Harper was a Prime Minister from Alberta. He had Conservative MPs from nearly every constituency in Alberta.
His cabinet included senior Canadian government ministers who were elected from Alberta, by Albertans.
Alberta had representation.
Albertan voices were heard, by the MPs who represented them. You could even argue that the Harper Equalization Formula was made by Albertans, and for Albertans.
Yet these facts are no constraint on the scoundrels who stir up trouble and rile up folks.
The 2013 cabinet that debated and set what it considered a fair and balanced Equalization formula gave a starring role to Harper’s Minister of Employment and Social Development: one Jason Thomas Kenney.
Readers unfamiliar with Canadian politics might wonder whether this person is somehow related to the lovely and talented Jason Thomas Kenney, who now serves as Premier of Alberta?
Why, Yes, by happy coincidence!
They are one and the same!
Surely the Minister of Employment and Social Development in 2013 wouldn’t have imposed an unjust and unfair equalization formula on his home province, designed to betray Alberta to the benefit of everyone else?
Actually yes, according to the 2021 Alberta government which launched the referendum.
As the federal minister directly responsible for jobs and social development in 2013, Jason Thomas Kenney royally screwed Alberta with his Equalization formula — so complains the government led by Jason Thomas Kenney, Premier of Alberta.
And the current federal government is equally complicit, according to Premier Jason Thomas Kenney. That’s because it renewed without question the Equalization formula devised and imposed by Jason Thomas Kenney while he was Canada’s Minister of Employment and Social Development.
Alberta’s Premier Jason Thomas Kenney wants a Yes vote in the referendum, so he can challenge the federal government.
A Yes vote would rally Albertans to overthrow the Equalization formula imposed by Canada’s Employment and Social Development Minister in 2013, Jason Thomas Kenney.
And if the referendum, with no legal or Constitutional relevance, predictably does nothing to change the federal Equalization formula?
With any luck, hopes the Kenney government, an angry and resentful electorate will use the 2023 provincial election to vote another mandate for Premier Jason Thomas Kenney.
Of course, some may wonder whether a cornered politico enjoying 21 per cent support in the polls, is inciting insurrection in a desperate effort to save his own skin.
But surely no one would be that scurrilous a scoundrel. Would they?
