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The 2019 lore that may decide today's NDP leadership race
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The federal NDP leadership race is on, and with the recently-harrowed federal party's strongest remaining power base right here in Alberta this may be a very Alberta-focused campaign. Former Alberta environment minister Shannon Phillips joins us on the pod to talk about the lore you'll need to understand this race—the lingering resentment over candidate Avi Lewis's attempt to introduce the LEAP manifesto at the 2019 Alberta NDP convention.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Progress Report Podcast
00:00:10
Speaker
to the episode of the Progress Report Podcast. I'm your host, Jim Story, recording on Friday, October the 10th from Emiskuchiwa Skygen, otherwise known as Edmonton in Treaty 6 territory in Alberta, Canada.
00:00:23
Speaker
The Progress Report Podcast is listener funded and runs no ads. Please join us as a patron at theprogressreport.ca slash patrons. Our co-host Jeremy Apparel is away working on his new book, and it may be a while before he's back on the mic again.
00:00:38
Speaker
But if you enjoyed his last book, Kennyism, a biography of Jason Kenney, I think you're going to like what he's cooking up this time.
Impact of Labor Strikes in Alberta
00:00:47
Speaker
ah For thousands of families across Alberta this season, I think it's safe to say that Thanksgiving this time around is a pain in the ass.
00:00:56
Speaker
because many of those people are dealing in one way or another with a complete breakdown in labor peace, both at the provincial and the federal level. Postal workers with CPW or are out on strike.
00:01:09
Speaker
Transit workers with ATU are gearing up for action of their own. Municipal workers in Coaldale, represented by AAP, are still locked out. And in something Alberta hasn't seen in decades, the whole public school system is completely on halt, as all of the teachers are out on strike too.
00:01:26
Speaker
If you're trying to manage child care right now in the absence of a school season, I feel for you. but who I'm worried most about are the teachers themselves because they're not getting any strike pay. And so the government has every incentive to play hardball and you know try and wait these people out, do a battle of attrition.
00:01:44
Speaker
We've got this massive trench of education workers who for years were seeing their wages ground down against inflation over and over, year after year, zeroes, zeroes, years. And now they're out of work for however long it takes this strike to resolve.
00:01:59
Speaker
Now, obviously it's great to show up and join a picket and where the other unions are concerned, that's a great way to get involved. I would definitely recommend browsing over, for example, to CIPW's website. You can see where the posties are striking.
00:02:13
Speaker
And if there's a picket near you, I definitely encourage you to show up with a coffee, you know, some donuts for the fellas and walk the line for them with them for a bit. But the ATA is not picketing.
00:02:25
Speaker
And their campaign to date seems to have been built around rallies and marches instead, which are mostly focusing on marshalling teachers and and not really pulling anyone else in.
00:02:37
Speaker
So what I would recommend to you is this. If you know any teachers who are striking right now, skip the middleman and just call them up yourself and see how they're doing. Show up with a casserole, take them out for a beer, be generous. And remember that these guys are not getting ah check this pay cycle. They might may not be getting a check next pay cycle.
00:02:54
Speaker
So your friends could need some help.
NDP Leadership Race Overview
00:02:58
Speaker
ah Today, we're getting a little out of the usual progress report wheelhouse to discuss a federal political topic.
00:03:06
Speaker
But it's one that I think has particular salience to Albertans this time around. And that's the federal NDP leadership race. Several candidates are in the mix so far.
00:03:17
Speaker
Heather McPherson, Avi Lewis, Rob Ashton and Yves Engler have been getting attention so far. The first three campaigns all have something interesting going on, I think. Yves, on the other hand, had about the worst launch I can imagine, making his first big media hit, a podcast chat with American fascist Jackson Hinkle, who self-identifies as MAGA communist.
00:03:39
Speaker
Never a good sign when guys start talking about putting a little more nationalism in their socialism. But I am particularly excited to hear about another of the candidates ah who is Tennille Johnston, who announced her candidacy in Nanaimo yesterday.
00:03:56
Speaker
Johnston is from the Wiwak High First Nation, whose traditional territory I grew up on as a young guy out in Camel River, BC. I got to enjoy a lot of summertime out at the Cape Mudge Reservation on Quadra Island as a kid.
00:04:09
Speaker
Shout out to my old buddy in Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, Dungeon Master Duane, good times. The race right now, though, seems to be largely between McPherson and the Lewis, who are getting the most attention.
00:04:23
Speaker
On McPherson's side, I think the reason why is pretty obvious. The federal ah NDP was recently electorally decimated. McPherson, the MP for Edmonton Strathcona, is one of the few people the NDP have got in Parliament right now.
00:04:39
Speaker
Lewis, on the other hand, is bit of a scion, has a bit of a family connection, and also has been involved in kind of NDP-adjacent politics, I would say, for several years.
00:04:54
Speaker
You may remember him coming to town a while back trying to pitch a different direction for the NDP in line with the Leap Manifesto, that's something we're going to be talking about quite a bit of this episode.
00:05:11
Speaker
Something is struggling to be born to the leftist center, I think, a viable electoral vehicle for the eco-socialist movement. Many parties, the NDP, the Greens, UK Labour, even the American Democrats have at times over the past 10, 15 years been sites for this struggle.
00:05:31
Speaker
Today, we've seen most of the attempts slap down In McPherson's pitch at her campaign launch, she spent some time talking about the idea of purity tests, of the party needing to cast a wide net rather than being militant about specific policies.
00:05:50
Speaker
And that raised some hackles, I think, from people who, like myself, would like to see a strident eco-socialist alternative, of a viable eco-socialist electoral project.
00:06:05
Speaker
but that we can take part in and support.
00:06:11
Speaker
But I don't think that's directly what MacPherson was taking a swipe at, at those comments. I think that there's more lore you need to know to understand the full context here. Because MacPherson, I don't think, was referring to that conflict, at least not directly,
00:06:28
Speaker
we have to take into consideration is that McPherson's audience for that pitch was a room of not just NDP members and not just at NDP members in Alberta, but Alberta NDP supporters, people from the provincial party side.
00:06:45
Speaker
And McPherson, I think, was referring to specific and incident that a lot of them will remember the Alberta NDP's conflict with Avi Lewis in 2019 when he came to town with the Leap Manifesto.
00:07:01
Speaker
There is a lot of bad blood between the Alberta NDP establishment and Lewis over Leap. And if this leadership race continues to be mainly between the two of them, which is where it's at today, you're not gonna understand a lot of what's going on if you don't know the history of that fight over Leap.
Interview with Shannon Phillips: Alberta's Role in Federal Politics
00:07:19
Speaker
Hopefully we can get Lewis and McPherson on the mic soon to explain things in their own words. But today I'm interviewing someone else who was right in the thick of it, Shannon Phillips, the environment minister during the Notley government, who was one of the Alberta NDP politicians pushing back very hard against the LEAP in 2019.
00:07:37
Speaker
And will caution that this ah is only one side of the story. We're only hearing Shannon's and the Alberta NDP side today. But I hope that what she has to say sheds some light on just why there is so much resentment from the ndp from the Alberta NDP set towards Lewis and why so much of this between them seems personal.
00:07:58
Speaker
Shannon Phillips, good afternoon. Welcome to the pod. How are you? I'm great, Jim. Thanks for having me. Well, the topic for discussion today is the federal NDP leadership race, which is a little out of the wheelhouse for us here since we usually cover ah predominantly Alberta provincial and municipal news.
00:08:19
Speaker
But I feel like the federal NDP race this time around is going to be really, really Alberta focused. um Maybe my first question is, is ah do you think I'm on to something there? Is this going to be a bit of Alberta-focused race? Because right now, the only frontrunners we've got are Avi Lewis and Heather McPherson.
00:08:45
Speaker
A lot of the federal NDP presence is just Heather at this point. So that's why i'm I'm looking at this one as an Alberta-focused race.
00:08:57
Speaker
ah do Should we cancel the interview or do you think that I'm onto something there at least? No, I think you're absolutely right. If only because ah you have a big ah chunk of the membership of the party is out out of Alberta and so one of the two ah declared candidates, or I guess so Rob Ashton's declared now too, sorry.
00:09:17
Speaker
ah But um one of the, yeah, i one of the three candidates, I guess, is is a more fair statement. It comes from Alberta and the one who has a seat, ah importantly, and so is is seen as an important player in this.
00:09:30
Speaker
um So yeah, i Alberta always likes to you know ah say that it's very important on the national stage, ah even though sometimes the GDP numbers and where they come from, where the actual productive capacity of the country comes from, might belie a little bit of that swagger. um But ah it is a true fact that the membership of this province, because it is so significant, ah and the fact that the one sitting MP who's seeking the job comes from here is going to play big factor.
00:10:05
Speaker
Mm-hmm. Well, the... ah the The conflict between McPherson and Lewis, I think, can kind of serve as a stand in for ah conflict that's been simmering in the progressive left in Canada for at least the last 10 15 years.
00:10:24
Speaker
ah which to me seems to to be like something struggling to be born. um You've got this set of people who I think would identify their politics as eco-socialist,
00:10:38
Speaker
um ah you know very stridently left and stridently environmentalist. And they've been wondering where their home is for a long time.
00:10:49
Speaker
Which brings us to why I asked you to come on the show today, because I think that you were kind of front and center for ah part of this conflict several years ago when Abby Lewis last tried to run for the federal leadership on the back of the Leap Manifesto, but which became a major conflict here in Alberta for for a while.
00:11:13
Speaker
And folks, if you're not familiar with Shannon's work, but Shannon was previously the environment minister in the Knotley government, and so was right in the thick of all of this, and is still in the game these days. You're working now over at Meredith Boissin-Kuhl Policy Advisors, right?
00:11:34
Speaker
Meredith Boissin-Kuhl and Phillips, Jim. I'm a partner. Yeah.
00:11:41
Speaker
let's not Let's not write the women completely out of the consulting business, although who we are further and far ah further between than the men, for sure. but yeah Well, you're the only one there that I brought on the pod today. Well, yeah, given that they're liberals and Tories, but yeah.
00:11:58
Speaker
Okay, well, let's let's dial it back then and and go back to that convention. Would it be correct for me to say that this is where that kind of conflict between the Alberta NDP, or or maybe not so much a an active conflict, but just a feeling of bad blood between the NDP and Lewis ah first started to bubble up? Or was there something going on in the background? even No, there was nothing before. People didn't know about. No, not at all. I mean, i i
00:12:28
Speaker
ah although, you know, as a matter of color, i think it was in, oh, it would have been late 15 or early 16. I went to a Broadbent Institute conference and I sat on a panel um with McKenna, with Catherine McKenna.
00:12:45
Speaker
And ah I was the one who was taking all kinds of incoming fire And i cannot, and and you'll have to forgive me, I can't remember if it was, I think it was after we had announced the climate plan, right? So this is...
00:12:59
Speaker
the really the most ambitious ah public policy response to climate change from a province ah ah in the history of the country, with the possible exception of the coal phase-out in Ontario and in the McGuinty government.
00:13:14
Speaker
ah But even still, like once we achieved what we did, our absolute emissions reductions were were more... than the McGinty government's coal phase out. You can kind of parse the numbers different ways. Anyway, um the fact is, is that it was pretty ambitious public policy ah response to climate change in the context of WTI being 28 bucks a barrel. And ah the left was just, you know, yelling at me, like quite literally yelling at me.
00:13:42
Speaker
and And I was like, whatever, finished the panel. and um And Lewis was part of that. like I think either him or some f friends of his or whatever, like kind of asked some like questions and whatever. And and I know him. i have worked with him, in fact, in the past.
00:14:01
Speaker
And I just remember McKenna looking at me in her very Catherine McKenna way. And going, ah ah oh dude, are these your friends? They don't really seem like your friends.
00:14:14
Speaker
And um but that is and I was like, yeah, I don't know, man. Like, I don't know exactly what we're supposed to do here. um and Because even if I were to stand up and say, leave it in the ground and tank everyone's stock price, I'm not sure if that would be good enough.
00:14:29
Speaker
i ah like um I don't know if that would go far enough. And so, you know, you just have to keep governing. um And so, you know, that was kind of before ah Leap Manifesto of Memory Serves. And then this leap thing comes to Edmonton and It was kind of out of the blue, if we're all being honest, um in terms of its showing up on the floor of convention. and And I'm not sure if it was designed as a ah run for Ovi at the time up against Mulcair or what.
00:15:02
Speaker
It was unclear to me what the end game was. I mean, what it ended up doing was destabilizing Tom Mulcair's leadership to the point where he had to leave after that convention. If I'm recalling correctly, LEAP was around a bit before Lewis's run. Yeah, I mean, but it was around... And i think I think it had some traction in in the internal politics of the Greens for a bit. Okay, yeah.
00:15:24
Speaker
I mean, certainly it was bouncing around civil society, right? And that's great. um and ah But here it comes into the floor of a federal convention when it's being held in Edmonton,
00:15:39
Speaker
um when the right is starting to figure out how to unite themselves to get rid of that horrible lady government um that was making us do horrible things like cut child poverty in half and reduce ah pollution and invest in energy efficiency and ah recognize the ah existence of ah trans people in human rights legislation, all the other horrible things we do.
00:16:05
Speaker
did You know, this is untenable to people like Jason Kenney. And so they were starting to figure out how they were going to get rid of us. um And at that very moment, you know, the worst thing you can do in politics is divide your own base while ah ah ah consolidating your own. And that's exactly what the federal NDP did in that Edmonton convention.
00:16:28
Speaker
and ah And so, you know, um ah People don't like it when people in in a electoral politics say things they're that describe people as being unhelpful.
00:16:43
Speaker
But this was extraordinary. Yeah, um a millstone. I remember Gil describing it as a millstone around people trying to do Alberta politics. Gil was super funny. Like he said things you in the Globe and Mail, like, you know, these downtown Toronto dilettantes coming to, you know, leave their ah garbage all over our lawn. maybe that was on the CBC. I just remember it being very colourful.
00:17:08
Speaker
ah at the time, Gil was really solid. and Yeah, colorful is one word for it. Maybe maybe be incendiary. Yeah, I mean, but also like what were his members ah telling him to do around that table, right? Like Gill is represent like people forget that, you know, unions so and houses of labor represent a certain perspective, right? Of unions are around the table.
00:17:30
Speaker
And like, you got to remember what kind of yes economic circumstance that this is walking into, right? ah Like when WTI is 28 bucks a barrel, you are looking at generational unemployment.
00:17:42
Speaker
Right. You are looking at the fact that, you know, we stabilized public sector jobs being those were the only jobs probably paying the bills in a lot of households. Right. As jobs were being shed out of the oil and gas sector and the commodity price crash.
00:17:58
Speaker
ah And, you know, so having a new Democrat government in place really did mitigate a lot of suffering. And a lot of kids ah remained having new shoes or ski pants to go to school with that would not have had them had both people lost their jobs because oil and gas was cratering.
00:18:19
Speaker
And it it recovered ah and price recovered over 2017. But in I mean, the the fiscal position of the government, the choices that we had to make ah and the choices that people were making as layoffs were sort of, you know, ripping through a lot of households were significant.
00:18:37
Speaker
Okay. um I remember even that impacting how I made decisions on the environment, right? um There was a caribou plan that apprentice government i'll just like segue off just to give people some color on like what it was like right because that this is part that people sometimes sure yes so i had a caribou plan that i inherited from uh because caribou listed in species at risk and and certainly uh uh you know close to having a critical habitat order because of the way that their habitat has been mismanaged especially up in northwest alberta
00:19:08
Speaker
for a long time and two herds in particular that were on the brink of being extirpated. So what happens is Prentice kind of cooked up this plan within Canna and the oil and gas guys to kind of basically screw the forestry guys out of ah out of out of sticks, out of eight you know out of allowable cut.
00:19:28
Speaker
And so I inherit this thing. And by early 16, I was like, I cannot do this. Even if I wanted to, um the only thing keeping the lights on in a lot of these parts of Northwest Alberta is the forestry industry and those forestry jobs, right, at this point.
00:19:45
Speaker
um And some of those communities were looking at 20% unemployment in oil gas.
Political Strategy and the Leap Manifesto
00:19:50
Speaker
So had to rewrite the whole Caribou Plan. And I mean, oh that's a whole like other awful conservation ah a policy area that still doesn't have a resolution a decade later.
00:20:01
Speaker
um or it does not to the parent, does not redound to the caribou's benefit. um But the point here is, is that like at every step of the way, we were confronted with this, you know, commodity downturn unemployment.
00:20:15
Speaker
And you can sit up in your faculty lounge all the live long day and stroke your chin about how we need transition and everything else. And meanwhile, when people hear transition, they hear transition to EI, right?
00:20:27
Speaker
Right. And that's the reality. So, um you know, unhelpful is one way to put it i ah when this shows up on the floor of the of the convention. But I mean, and then what happens is instead of figuring out how to mobilize delegates to kind of make it go away in a corner because it's not the time,
00:20:51
Speaker
ah at all um in the middle of Edmonton, in the middle of a commodity price crash, to be like talking about how more people should be at work ah and introducing like grand ideas and grand schemes when people's idea of a grand scheme is how am I going to pay the mortgage this month?
00:21:10
Speaker
How am I going to do make my truck payment? Right? um And ah essentially giving, you know, a really horrible, ah ah ah no holds bar opposition, a nice big nail bat to beat us with, right? To confirm everyone's suspicions about a new Democrat government that they weren't quite sure about anyway, um around whether we truly ah were of Alberta, understood the province, represented people and had their best interests at heart.
00:21:39
Speaker
And so you get these Toronto people showing up and, you know, folks from other places going like, hey, you know, i how about we, you know, ah transition your economy to the equivalent of the monorail?
00:21:52
Speaker
And it wasn't great. But instead of understanding that, going, okay, like we actually need to work with this government. You know, this is an historic ah achievement to achieve an NDP government in in Alberta. There's things that we can do.
00:22:11
Speaker
ah ah Together, there are ways that we can use their success to build the federal party, ah you know, in working class areas and, ah you know, actually ah build political power around ah things like energy efficiency, retrofits, energy.
00:22:31
Speaker
ah yeah indigenous, i like everything from off diesel to equity stakes in renewables, all these things that were part and parcel what we're absolutely what we were doing.
00:22:42
Speaker
Instead, what it set the federal ADP up as is diametrically opposed to us or like and and embarrassed of us, you know, and like we were some kind of like ah impure losers because we refused to stand up to a podium and crash the fucking stock market.
00:22:58
Speaker
It made no sense at all. So that's the last I kind of tracked V. You know, I noticed that he ran.
00:23:10
Speaker
on Sunshine Coast and didn't do terrifically well. I thought it was a weird riding choice. I noticed when he was nominated in Vancouver Centre, and I also thought that was a weird riding choice because if anybody in the Liberal Party of Canada was going to be a nuclear cockroach, if they were going to get wiped out, it was going to be Eddie Fry. Yeah.
00:23:29
Speaker
You know, just like knowing politics. And so and then he's popped up doing this. So now here we are. ah And so we have an Edmonton MP going up against him as kind of the two major candidates. So we'll see what Rob Ashton can do.
00:23:46
Speaker
And to Neil Johnson, I suppose. Oh, that's right. She has... I'm interested in that campaign. I'm a Campbell River boy myself. Yeah. I'm interested to see how she does. I did see it wip by that she made an announcement. I mean, I think it's going to be interesting to see how much these folks can raise a hundred grand.
00:24:04
Speaker
It's a different conversation, but, you know, there are these sort of, you know, time markets and little wickets they have to go through in terms of ah fundraising. And who knows? Maybe she'll be able to do it. and Maybe she won't. I don't know enough about her to be able to...
00:24:16
Speaker
make a prediction either way. Yeah, I'm not familiar with her either. Okay, let me um let me wind the clock back a little. you You mentioned many topics there that I want to dig into. So um let's see if I can remember all of them.
00:24:29
Speaker
Before I start too, just to provide a little context to the listeners, ah because I think my set is a is a little dubious of the Notley government's overall achievements. I think there was some frustration near the end over compromises.
00:24:48
Speaker
ah The climate leadership plan, though, was was, you're right to call it historic. It was a ah big step forward. I was quite proud to canvas that material myself when I was a young Minyan-type guy. A Lakata, a missions professor.
00:25:09
Speaker
went down, it was a relatively elegant policy. i i think I would agree with you that just keeping it in the ground was not saleable for you at the time.
00:25:20
Speaker
It's not saleable now either. like It's just not saleable. It's not how people live their lives, right? like yeah i think that I think there's a bit more of a question about it now. 10 years ago, Palestinian sovereignty was not saleable.
00:25:36
Speaker
for the federal NDP. And now it is the mainstream position. So yeah ah things things are drifting a bit and may change in the future.
00:25:47
Speaker
One question I have about LEAP is how much of LEAP was an actual threat and how much of it was more of a theatrical threat? Like how much of the problem with LEAP was just that Kenny could swing it at you and how much of the problem was what was actually in the document?
00:26:05
Speaker
Because i i don't recall I don't recall LEAP having a ton of specific language about keeping it in the ground and more of just a general, ah like we need to consider climate the number one problem kind of framing.
00:26:21
Speaker
I mean, you bring up a good point here, Jim, ah ah that a substance matters, so a lot less than how things go into contact with the opponent. ah And going into contact with the opponent is literally everything in politics. And ah so, you know, that's how you have to think strategically, because when you go into contact with the opponent, you're also going into contact with voters and ordinary people.
00:26:47
Speaker
And so again, to this point about, you know, sitting in our faculty lounge apart from people, ah rather than getting in among them, as my rugby coach used to say and encouraged me to do, go get in there among them, right? That is that is the nature of politics in electoral politics.
00:27:04
Speaker
If you want to do other things, go do other things. And that's fine. People should. ah To move overall public opinion, to move us culturally to your point about politics, ah ah Palestine, that's an absolutely well taken point.
00:27:18
Speaker
um you know And and like let's all be clear, that has come from civil society, right? So there's a role there. from From civil society and also I think from the gadflies and in the the party apparatus, of i think a like persisting i think that they have had a bit of an impact. I mean me i can think of quite a few folks who were- Here of like how, you know for example, like a recognition of the Palestinian state.
00:27:45
Speaker
you know, out of the liberal government, for example, like who knows, you like, we all know how complicated that is. But so the the point is, is that like, that would have been unthinkable a decade as well, ago as well. And a lot of that thinkability has now come from civil society, right? Like all around for all parties, I think.
00:28:02
Speaker
Yeah. And so, i you know, I but back to leap. I mean, you're right that a lot of it is just sort of bog standard.
00:28:13
Speaker
ah Let's mobilize public sector ah for towards an industrial policy. right? Like, I mean, when you when you go back and read it as a, set and is it a very well thought out public policy document? No, not really. It's a series of a ah aspirational statements with no regard for... It's it's a it's a manifesto. Yeah, being yeah exactly. a manifesto. um But, so and so, you know, fine, whatever. ah And what it articulates in it
00:28:44
Speaker
you know It's funny because like it's not it wasn't all that different than things that the Federal Party had said over the years, things that even Jack had said over the years. um ah But the point of politics is not just to write down your high-minded ideas, and it's not just to talk to your friends about them.
00:29:02
Speaker
It's to i make sure that you can talk to voters about them. And people sniff you know like when they say things like, oh, it's not saleable. I don't think we should sniff. I think we should go talk to people who live in cul-de-sacs and vinyl houses with vinyl siding, right? ah And it'll make you a lot less sniffy.
00:29:22
Speaker
ah But it also like grounds us in like the kinds of language, but also the pacing and the sequencing, right? Because that that's the thing that trips like voters up.
00:29:34
Speaker
ah in grand schemes. And like, I know this from being a veteran of the climate policy, right? And like, Jason Kenney's literal Bill 1 was to, you know, a repeal a lot of the stuff that was my life's work. So, you know, experience in public policy failing, and being too big, maybe, or ah not communicated well enough, and and and and being too many steps for people to follow, right? What are we doing here?
00:30:00
Speaker
Um, And i think that that incrementalism, again, sometimes we sniff at it. But number one, it's the nature of democracy.
00:30:12
Speaker
Number two, it's how people understand ah ah ah like sort of their what they're giving, getting out of the electoral process. Right. Like, and so, uh, in that sense, it was, it was, uh, uh, a bit, the, the head was too big to fit through the door. You know what I mean? Like it was, uh, uh, uh, there was not a permission structure for it, uh, uh, at the electoral level.
00:30:37
Speaker
And that's where I think we need to, you know, kind of distinguish what we're up to here. Uh, uh, and how it was, um received and also you know then like deployed against us.
00:30:52
Speaker
It also walked in ah to a political context where there was like a really concerted effort to make us look like we were from outside Alberta, even though Rachel Notley, I mean, there couldn't be ah hardly a more Albertan last name.
00:31:07
Speaker
right ah ah people like me and others are lifelong albertans um but there was a ah concerted effort to you know oh but they're not those ladies aren't really in charge they couldn't possibly be smart enough so let's turn our attention okay so let's turn our attention to you know their chiefs of staff the men who were actually in charge they came from somewhere else i'm sorry
00:31:40
Speaker
You're lucky and we don't have the cameras on. I would have made you. I let her sit in here and I shouldn't have. i i Because she clearly there was, you know, either the it's the house has come and go right now because so of the teacher's strike.
00:31:53
Speaker
There are just teenagers everywhere on every available surface. ah They're just they're just everywhere. They keep popping up. um But yeah, so there was this concerted effort to make us look like we were not of here. We were not from here.
00:32:06
Speaker
ah Yes, I recall. you know I recall one big attack along those lines involving the contractors who came out to do the the retrofits. Yeah, I mean, which is also like completely insane, right? Because it was a i i it was competitive process.
00:32:23
Speaker
And it wasn't even to do the retrofits. It was to manage the system. And it was it like, right? or It was... so you know, like kind of the tech management ah of the system. It wasn't the actual humans. ah Well, the phoniness of that line of attack, I think brings me to maybe my my first criticism of that argument, ah which is that if they didn't have leaped to wave at you, they would have just made something up.
00:32:51
Speaker
You know, our experience with the Kenny and now Smith UCP has been that they they do not swear a lot of fealty to the truth.
00:33:02
Speaker
And if they need something to shake a fist at, they will invent it. Yeah, that's true. I mean, it depends on like, you you don't need to hand them a a nail bat when, i ah you know, otherwise they'll like invent a foam finger, right? Like the, sometimes the the attacks land because they ah ah are a bit more believable. You don't need to hand them a believable one.
00:33:24
Speaker
um You're better off when they've got a ah bullshit one. Right. That's fair. And so, you know, um it like it was just, but also like on a personal level and let's just go there. Like, why not? Hey, um like I've known Avi for a really long time.
00:33:43
Speaker
He's had my cell phone number since like quite literally 2005, six, I don't know. six i don't know um And, uh, like he could have picked up the phone at any point and phone Alberta's literal minister of environment. And no matter what meeting I was in, with the exception of possibly cabinet itself, I would have picked up the phone.
00:34:06
Speaker
Uh, and, and like, let's talk this out. Let's figure out what you guys want to do with the party. Great. Uh, uh, let's figure out how we're going to, uh, you know, ah walk this through, uh, on the floor, uh, of convention so that, uh, uh, things come out properly, you know, and, uh, you actually, you know, you guys get what you want.
00:34:26
Speaker
Um, we get some momentum out of the convention. Yay. You know, high five. None of that ever happened, right? It's just fundamentally, like on a fundamental human level, super disrespectful.
00:34:38
Speaker
ah And like just like really, like i you know I think, dismissive of what we we're trying to do here in Alberta and ah our individual loyalty to our own values and principles, which are rooted in those same goals at the Leap Manifesto ah in terms of you know good employment and good public sector, ah ah you know public participation and and expansion of public ownership and all these, you know, good public infrastructure, these kinds of things, right. Which are shared values.
00:35:13
Speaker
um It was. That tracks. I was ah I was a party guy at that convention. And I recall a bit of that sentiment too, that that, that felt like the overall feeling among the Alberta crowd that someone was coming in from outside and just causing problems for us regardless of what was in the document that it it was just kind of an, it represented like an unwillingness to play ball or to to be cooperative.
00:35:41
Speaker
And so when you describe it as as more of like a personal animus, i I think that tracks with what I remember. yeah Do you think that if Avi gets the votes and and gets the leadership, do you think that he's going to have difficulty working with the the Alberta NDP establishment?
00:36:00
Speaker
I don't know what an establishment is, Jim. um i Well, I but i i mean, what I think i'm I'm using that as shorthand yeah for basically the old the old set for from your government, right?
00:36:13
Speaker
Oh, I think he will will have trouble working with old set, new set and every set in between. And when you look at how the membership thinks about ah ah these questions, they are deeply, and the people who are members of the party are are deeply prematic pragmatic people who, you know, ultimately want to win power.
00:36:32
Speaker
um ah Maybe even I, I, you know, with more, uh, um, ideological flexibility than even sometimes I'm comfortable with.
00:36:44
Speaker
Uh, it, we saw that through the leadership, right? There's 80,000. Well, there were 80,000. We certainly see that in, in BC right now. I don't like hearing about the, the BC NDP dev, like enforced treatment when we're talking about,
00:36:57
Speaker
Yeah. Flexible ideology. yeah I think maybe the listeners should be apprised that there is probably something to be disappointed about in every local, in every provincial party. There's something to be disappointed about in every... um i ah i liberal democratic institution and liberal democratic process.
00:37:19
Speaker
yeah Well, okay. this This gets me to another line of questioning that I want yeah sure i want to dive into before it before the idea falls out of my head. Yeah, go ahead. But sorry, I interrupted. If you want to finish that thought. No, no, go ahead.
00:37:32
Speaker
Okay. um So if we... if we um Looking from ah from Lewis over to McPherson.
Challenges in NDP Leadership Race
00:37:41
Speaker
So McPherson recently and announced, and there was a ah bit of coverage around her presentation at the announcement.
00:37:49
Speaker
And the detail that seems to have stuck in most people's craw at this point was a comment about ah purity tests. Did you catch McPherson's announcement? are you do you know Yeah, I watched her announcement. Really, what she was saying is that we need to you know open up the party beyond this. you know my She called it a purity test. I call it a faculty lounge um where we sit ah in judgment of others, in haughty judgment of others and so you know whether they're good enough for us. and you know, and, and so I thought it was good because it's, it has happened in the left, right? It absolutely has that this is a, just a fact that like, oh, well, you're, you're not quite checking every single box for me and making me feel good at every ah turn. So, you know, I have to reject the whole thing wholesale.
00:38:41
Speaker
well and It certainly has happened in the party in my experience. But when I think back, when I when i remember the thing that was purity tested over when I was ah I mean, I, ah you know, I still include the party in my list of monthly subscriptions along with all my podcasts, and I will probably cast a vote in the leadership, but I haven't really been engaged. haven't gone to any deliberations in a long time.
00:39:05
Speaker
have But the one purity test issue that I remember since I got involved with the NDP was Palestine. and And you you basically were were not allowed to talk about it. You were heavily discouraged from talking about it.
00:39:19
Speaker
And outside of Palestine, I don't really remember a lot of purity tests being run on anyone. there There was, in all other regards, quite a lot of, as you say, ideological flexibility.
00:39:32
Speaker
Like what purity tests are actually being run here? Well, I think what she was talking about is basically the, uh, the, the, a like what she was doing was a, it was a pretty like sort of veiled drive by on Avi that like, we weren't like, you know, she was standing there in front of a bunch of Edmonton, uh, New Democrats,
00:39:50
Speaker
ah whose last day interaction with this person was probably on the floor, ah ah not necessarily talking to him, but certainly watching him talk to others on the floor of the Edmonton Convention almost a decade ago.
00:40:03
Speaker
um And so what she was doing there was basically saying, look, like all kinds of working people, ah working class people and labor unions and others, ah you know, belong in my tent.
00:40:16
Speaker
Um, you know, you belong here, even like if you are trades person and, uh, you know, work in the oil sands or oil and gas more broadly or what have you.
00:40:27
Speaker
Um, and, and so that's what she was saying. I didn't really understand the the reaction to it and I didn't really follow it either, but, um, yeah. um like I just didn't understand why people got upset about it. But ah ah look, i i you know she was she was drawing a contrast line with Lewis without explicitly doing so yet because at your launch speech,
00:40:49
Speaker
is not really the time to target your opponent. ah Right. You want to talk about yourself. Yeah. And so, you know, I'm sure that'll come later ah in some way, shape or form, or as she gets out and talks to membership, maybe they, you know, it'll depend on what they want to hear ah more about her, more about her opponent. Like it really will depend. Right.
00:41:10
Speaker
Well, I can speculate a bit as to the cause of the reaction. Part of it, I i think, is that outside of the very the very engaged party member set who remember Avi coming and being a big inconvenience to them, ah most people don't have this this personal beef with him. the you know People who are not constituency volunteers, people who are not going to convention, people who are not really, really keyed into the party process, ah they don't remember Abby Lewis as being a problem or or a gadfly.
00:41:47
Speaker
you know They didn't have to didn't have to grapple with any of that. So they don't really get the reference, so to speak. Yeah, I think you're right. Rick Ferguson is trying to refer. And so when they hear this talk about purity tests, they instead here Someone talking about compromise, compromise, compromise, compromise on on principle, compromise on ethical positions.
00:42:12
Speaker
And the pragmatism argument, I don't think lands with them because the last time they heard it ah was right before the Alberta NDP ate shit and we lost government.
00:42:26
Speaker
um Yeah, ah maybe. i I think you're right. that But I mean, at some point, Heather's going to be drawing a contrast between, um you know, where, like, so the membership is rooted in the provinces, right? ah And um in the West, anyway, and where there's the most membership, that is to say, in Alberta, and in British Columbia,
00:42:54
Speaker
um You know, there's a ah ah certain ah view coming from the base of the party. And part of that is so ah we are a provincial party and we exist to govern.
00:43:06
Speaker
um And i think that to the extent that people are going to be thinking about those people who are primarily provincial members are going to be thinking about what they want in a federal leader.
00:43:17
Speaker
They want that same thing. ah They want to be broadly, ah they want to appeal broadly so that they can win. um And we've seen ah since, I would say, the 2015 election, that proposition ah diminish over and over and over again to the the point of out the, ah you know, the cratering that we saw earlier this year terms of the party's support.
00:43:46
Speaker
an inability to have any anchors to hold them from, from the, you know, from the collapse that they ended up in. So I think people are going to be looking for, you know, ah they're not going to be I don't think they're going to be voting on like any kind of policy at all. They're going to be voting on winnability and vibes.
00:44:04
Speaker
Right. And that might redound to Avi's benefit. Right. It might. Because in life yeah the nice people might think that a bolder ah bolder program might be more saleable.
00:44:15
Speaker
You know, people might be asking the question of, well, we haven't tried being bold. Why don't we try being really Yeah, I mean, i would say that Jagmeet and some of his propositions were reasonably bold. But I mean, the packaging... ah ah you know, so far was pretty good on obvious parties, filmmakers, so I should hope it is.
00:44:31
Speaker
Right. And so i it may be that like people are not even really, ah they're not thinking in policy terms. I don't think they certainly weren't in the Alberta NDP leadership. They weren't in the race to replace Mulcair and they weren't,
00:44:51
Speaker
really in the it replaced race to replace Slayton that Mulcair won. It also was not a policy discussion. um It was a can-you-win discussion.
00:45:03
Speaker
And in fact, jack when Jack won, it was not a policy discussion up against Bill Blakey. It was a can-you-win. um So, you know, the membership, ah ah you know, people think of the New Democrats as more like worried about policy.
00:45:20
Speaker
ah And, you know, certainly they can get themselves twisted around the axle on the floor of a convention. um But ah in terms of leadership races, the the ah ah data in my adult lifetime anyway, shows that they are much more worried a boat about political marketability and ability to grow the party. Yeah.
00:45:42
Speaker
and be more broadly appealing. So, but, you know, a that could go either way between McPherson and Lewis is what I'm saying. um Right now, I would give it advantage McPherson simply because she comes out of a place with ah a province with a great big membership list.
00:46:02
Speaker
um Yeah. And with that has a proven track record of looking for winnability, broad public, broad appeal, that kind of stuff.
00:46:13
Speaker
I've got a more of a high level question I want to ask before we before we head into the conclusion, which is, do you think that there is a place in Canadian politics right now for a party that does pass all of the purity tests, for a party that that does give this set, my set, I guess I would say, everything that we want, a party that does not compromise on climate, that does not compromise on ah matters of anti-imperialism, anti-colonialism, things like Palestine, a party that does not compromise on police brutality or indigenous sovereignty, a but a party that passes all the tests.
00:46:52
Speaker
Because, I mean, i would personally like a little purity. yeah i would like someone to pass all the tests. Well, let's i mean, a political party isn't just a place where, you know, people just randomly get to go to the floor of the House of Commons.
00:47:08
Speaker
ah Oh, that damn dog. ah It is a place where you have to elect individuals in individual geographies. So think of it through that way.
00:47:19
Speaker
ah You can poll it that way. Are there i jurisdictions, right, of 100,000 people or so, because that's what seats are, ah that will, where a majority or at least a plurality of people will mark a ballot for such a program?
00:47:36
Speaker
That's what you have to ask yourself, right? Because that's that's what that's what electoral politics is. Somebody has to elect you. um So where are those places? Are they in the downtowns of our major cities? They kind of used to be, but those downtowns have become awfully expensive now, haven't they?
00:47:52
Speaker
Are they in some of the um still cities, but you know not the major cities? ah Well, places like Guelph, Guelph. there Some other ah southwest ah you know southern Ontario places where that might be the case were one or two.
00:48:06
Speaker
ah Certainly on the island of Montreal, there's so probably a seat or two ah where you could you could, you know, with really targeted resources and like quite a bit of money, right? Because you'd have to overcome all the other, the legacy parties, all of that. You you might have a good plurality to be able to fight it out and win it out, right?
00:48:26
Speaker
But even a place like Victoria. ah So you had two, you know, pretty long time New Democrat seats there in Esquimalt and in Victoria proper. They went liberal in the ah last election, even though they're pretty reliably federal NDP seats, right?
00:48:40
Speaker
And then you've got Elizabeth May's seat just down the road in Saanich. um But, like, go canvassing in Saanich. I did in the last BC Provincial, and it's not exactly, oh it's it's you know. It's not a leftist paradise around Victoria. i yeah I lived out there for for a while.
00:48:59
Speaker
That's some less ah less environmentalist and more conservationist yeah kind of event, if that makes sense. So, you know, if you can look across the country and and find me a collection of seats to get to party status with that, then, you know, like, let's go, let's fucking right? i ah um let's Let's put it together and raise some money and and off to the races.
00:49:21
Speaker
I am not seeing 12 seats. I'm not seeing Like, find them for me oh where you could ah do that. Now, you could have individuals that say hold many or all of ah those views who are, um you know, ah oh you know who have a ah record of service in politics ah at the more local level.
00:49:54
Speaker
Where, you know, under a more broad based banner, you might be able to get those individuals elected. And certainly the NDP has a long history of that, too. Right. Look at people like Sven Robinson, libby Libby Davies, Jenny Kwan.
00:50:09
Speaker
um But these are in specific areas, that is to say in the lower mainland. Janice Erwood, I think, is ah another great example. Yeah, yeah. In a smaller riding. But even if you were to broaden out Janice beyond Highlands Norwood, um I mean, there's some seats, but like she she butts up against seats that are much closer than hers is.
00:50:31
Speaker
Right. So if you were to double the size of her seat, you could elect her because she is everywhere. all the time. And as social media, ah ah bless her, doesn't drive her crazy like it drives me crazy, because I can't, I can't do it and She does. She's got a superpower. um But,
00:50:50
Speaker
ah ah you know, like, pretty soon, you're getting into territory where, ah you know, that kind of of ah politics doesn't, I mean, people can hold those views, right? And push them within caucus, but whether they are front and center all the time in all of your your public utterances and social media presence and all that is is a ah a question of whether at some point, you know, we would have diminishing returns. But certainly the NDP does that.
00:51:20
Speaker
um does have those people Well, if I could butt in for a moment, i I think that the constituency may not be found so much in a place as in a time.
Influence of Civil Society and Political Ambitions
00:51:31
Speaker
And by that, I i mean that I think a lot of these, and a lot of the conditions, a lot of these situations are shifting and people's opinions are shifting with them.
00:51:40
Speaker
And I suspect that we will get there I'm not sure how soon or how late that will be, but you know the planet continues to get hotter and hotter. We continue to get more and more smoke every wildfire season. We don't have summers anymore. We just have wildfires. And you know that's going to change people's minds over time.
00:52:02
Speaker
ah There are fewer and fewer jobs per dollar in oil and gas. you know the The economic pressures have just pushed them to automate. and so that It's going to become less enticing as a source of jobs. Voters are going to be less and less interested in it.
00:52:20
Speaker
Certainly on issues like Palestine, we've we've seen things change very rapidly. There is a certain quota of dead children that people just refuse to see any more of. That's right.
00:52:33
Speaker
So i think the time for a quote unquote pure party may come. I'm not sure how soon we're going to get there. Well, I mean, one of the things too, that I think sometimes we forget about is that oftentimes, you know, people who are pushing those arguments are organizing in their communities, ah leading in civil society even are coming.
00:52:57
Speaker
They, they, they oftentimes will go into politics, but not at the federal level where it's so damn hard to get elected, right? Or even the provincial level where it's really damn hard to get elected outside of Edmonton. Like, I'm sorry, right? I mean, there's a couple of seats in Calgary, like my friend Kathleen Gamley's seat, where, as she always says, like, I could be a couch on the ballot and get elected, right? In her seat. But like, you know, i go out like one or two concentric circles from from Calgary Mountain View, and it becomes really hard to get elected, right?
00:53:27
Speaker
But meanwhile, There's all kinds of local politics going on and there's all kinds of ah ah municipal school board, that kind of stuff. And you can make a name for yourself i in being you know embedded in and coming out of either labor or civil society ah politics of various kinds and move into ah having built up trust in a community so that people will elect you.
00:53:54
Speaker
um And then you can push some of that from from within your caucus and in your party, right? ah But it doesn't come from party down, and i don't think.
00:54:06
Speaker
I think it comes from from a civil society up. And oftentimes the people who hold those views and who push them, either within a parliament, a legislature, a public discourse, are are coming out of those movements and get elected because they have other elements of trust that don't ah that are that the come back to, you know, I like their character. I may not always agree with them, but i i know they stand for something. That kind of a vibe is what gets you control.
00:54:36
Speaker
It makes you successful if you are going to be successful. provincially or federally, because that it is a, it takes money and a lot of votes. Right. So, um and that's where like the federal party, yes, should be articulating many of these ah ideas on the floor of the house of commons, in my view, less so in their, ah ah in their platform, because people aren't interested in platforms anymore. It should be more of an iterative, ah less moment in time. Here is my manifesto. Here is my, you know, like they do in the UK where and they used to be,
00:55:07
Speaker
ah ah available in the you you know in the Tesco. You could go to the grocery store and get the political party manifesto during the election time. um But ah less of that, you know here's a a platform as a brick, as ah as a but more as an iterative process that is coming up from the people into the House of Commons, right?
00:55:27
Speaker
and in using the the the electeds as kind of the the the megaphone for that in a way that is um sort of rolling with time as you describe it.
00:55:39
Speaker
think that's all fine. ah But um to kind of start with a set of... you know, really rigid ideas. I mean, good luck, but um I would start with one or two things that are going to materially affect people's lives in the here and now and get elected on them because that's what you have time to stay is say in a leaflet. That's what you have time to say on a doorstep.
00:56:03
Speaker
ah That's what you have time to say ah when you get up in front of a group of parents at a parent meeting. Yeah. or at teachers at a school meeting, you know, all these places where where ah the politician interfaces with with ah public and civic life.
00:56:20
Speaker
Well, guess the question of how you successfully do what Avi is trying to do is still unsolved. A lot of people have taken very similar swings at this.
00:56:32
Speaker
I'm thinking also of Dimitri Lascaris over in the Greens, tried something very similar and and it felt very flat. But it's obvious that there is a lot of demand out there for this. And eventually some eventually somebody is going to figure it out.
00:56:48
Speaker
Yeah. and I think the trouble is something that I find place, right? Rooting it in a geography. And this is the piece that Avi Lewis has not figured out. He runs around on ah ah ah power and politics and CTV and whatever, you know, comparing himself to Jack Layton, who didn't have a seat when he ran for leader. But I mean, Jack Layton had been a city councillor in Toronto, which is an economy bigger than, you know, a lot of our provinces um for 20 years.
00:57:12
Speaker
years Right. Prior to. And so ah getting yourself elected to something and understanding that part of of politics is not beneath anybody. um You know, and now he could have done that. He could have, you know, in B.C., there's all kinds of ways to to plug in and go get yourself on parks board or all kinds of places.
00:57:31
Speaker
But chose not to. Well, when I look back to that messy convention and leap and all of the conflict and bad blood that went on back then, i do remember one inspiring thing about that same week, which was that despite all of the disagreement over the manifesto and on whether the party should be militant or not on these issues and all of this anger over Avi coming in from outside and causing problems, we were all united
00:58:04
Speaker
in our dislike of Tom Mulcair. And today, i think in this leadership race, we have a somewhat similar situation. You know, the the the question of whether the front runner is going to be McPherson or Lewis or now Ashton or Johnston is still unsolved. And there's a lot of disagreement there.
00:58:24
Speaker
But I think we can all come together and agree that our pick, our man, is not the guy who kicked off his campaign by going on a Nazi podcast, Abe Zinkler. Oh, did he really?
00:58:36
Speaker
Wow. He went on Jackson Hinkle. Okay, I don't know who that is. I'm sorry, I'm i just so out of the loop. I saw his um policy platform and ah certainly the agriculture pieces seemed, you know, pretty Maoist.
00:58:52
Speaker
and its orientation. um But I didn't know that. ae And I mean, yeah, is that guy going to raise $100,000? Probably not. And get the you know get the signatures and all that, because the signatures are a tough thing to do too. You got to be all over the country, right? so ah So I mean, I noticed that the right really paid a lot of attention to Eve because they love it, right? They really, really want so bad to caricature us right and exeter yeah but they want they because they have so many gooks and nazis and lunatics and and extremists and and and uh you know just it like in their in their midst and in their sort of in their online world and they know it uh they want to they want us to have some too right and they want to be able to both sides it and all that and so i noticed that like
00:59:44
Speaker
You know, he yeah at the right wingers are are paying attention to Eve Engler. I don't think anybody on the left is. I mean, it's a little frustrating as ah as more of a militant leftist guy myself. Eve is supposed to be a standard bearer for us, but he just puts his foot in his mouth all the time.
01:00:02
Speaker
yeah speaking to, you know, causing problems for people or having poor political instincts. Well, you know what, Jim, here's the thing about leadership races and municipal
Closing Remarks and Call to Action
01:00:13
Speaker
campaigns. I'm seeing this all over Lethbridge right now and elsewhere is that there's a lot of men in this world who think that they have a God given right to ah not just be in politics, but be the leader when they have absolutely no qualification or experience and no demonstrated record of success.
01:00:28
Speaker
ah That is an iron law of politics that anytime you have a race, you're going to have a man or men's wandering into the room going, absolutely, I'm kind of i'm i'm quite convinced that I am ah qualified for this or any other job in politics.
01:00:44
Speaker
um That is what men do, Jim. Well, I'll tell you, Shannon, i'm I'm glad that they did it because if those guys all wised up and did the job that they were supposed to be doing, the job that they were made for, I would have a a lot more competition for podcast listeners.
01:01:00
Speaker
Okay, well, Shannon, you're probably having a really chaotic week trying to manage your household during the strike. I've eaten up a lot of your time. I want to thank you for coming on the pod today to explain all of this.
01:01:12
Speaker
ah I know a lot of our listeners, they disagree with, with you on a lot them. a lot of our listeners are, are quite a bit more militant, but, uh, as I, as I said, they, um, they weren't there at that convention. They don't, they don't really have the, um, uh, the perspective there to really understand why there is this bad blood between Avi and the Alberta NDP.
01:01:36
Speaker
Uh, so I hope that, uh, hearing the story from you has helped, uh, um, illuminate a bit of the points that help people understand a bit why these two sets are having so much difficulty ah getting along.
01:01:51
Speaker
and ah And so, yeah, I think this was good information for them. ah Folks, if if you want to hear more from Shannon, um she also does appear frequently on a podcast herself, The Strategists, alongside saying St. Velgie.
01:02:07
Speaker
You will, i'm I'm afraid, have to put up with a little bit of Stephen Carter and a little bit Corey Hogan here and there for it. But I listened to it. I think it's fine. I really enjoyed the last episode about the teacher strike. So, yeah.
01:02:18
Speaker
Give it a listen. Is there anything else that you wanted to bring people's attention to before we wrap up, Shannon? No, not really. I do hope that people, especially if they're in the Edmonton area, do go out and ah do their civic duty in the municipal. I think it's a really close campaign.
01:02:36
Speaker
ah And there's, you know, at least one decent progressive alternative for mayor. And I know there's like some pretty, like really good humans on the ballot. ah and in the various council races as well, then these things are going to be close. And, uh, uh, you know, we had a pretty good outcome, I feel like in Edmonton in 2021, and it would be good, uh, uh, to keep that, uh, that moving forward. I, and I mean, obviously if you're outside of Edmonton or Calgary, um,
01:03:08
Speaker
You know, it's funny that there are there are progressive pockets everywhere at the municipal level. ah And please go and find those people and support them. Write write them a little check if you can, ah because it's super hard to raise money municipally, especially if you're a woman candidate and or school board.
01:03:25
Speaker
and just pay attention ah to it. And- It's super hard to raise money unless you're in that party process. that Yeah, that's amazing. The cartels are i mean i wild.
01:03:36
Speaker
ah Yeah, I definitely want to impose that on listen to, please don't sit out this muni election. Please, please take a look at things because there is a lot of money being thrown at trying to buy councils and school boards here. School board is almost like outside of, I don't really know what's going on Edmonton and Calgary, but I know outside of the two major centres, school board is actually in some ways more important because that's where the far right is really trying to ah ah flex their muscles. And um even if you're
01:04:07
Speaker
sort of voting for some incumbents that are sort of middle of the road standard bearers, that may make a big difference up against some like pretty wacky people.
01:04:18
Speaker
so I don't have a great recommendation for people outside of the Edmonton Corps, unfortunately, but listeners, if you are looking for some so more information and some endorsements, I would recommend that you browse over to the support our students website for school board endorsements and for muni endorsements uh troy pavlek actually i think has has the great list this time around so look up troy pavlek and the district labor councils will uh often they did in lethbridge here anyway they do an endorsement uh thing um and some uh you know and then yeah like you're right uh influencers will like uh of various kinds oftentimes we'll we'll put things out too i just think it's really important this time on school board
01:05:04
Speaker
I agree. agree. Okay. Well, thanks a lot. Thanks for your time. And I hope we have you on again soon. Thank you. Take care.