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Kenney gave the anti-vaxxers everything they wanted and still lost
142 Plays2 years ago
Lorian Hardcastle, University of Calgary law professor with a specialization in health law and health policy, joins us to discuss Jason Kenney dropping the the COVID-19 health protections to appease an illegal anti-vax blockade at the American border.
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Transcript
Duncan's COVID Recovery
00:00:12
Speaker
Friends and enemies, welcome to The Progress Report. I am your host, Duncan Kinney, recording today here in Amiskwachee, Wisconsin, otherwise known as Edmonton, Alberta, here in Treaty 6 territory on the banks of the Kasiska-Sawanissippi, or the North Saskatchewan River. I am back after a couple of weeks off. I caught a very mild case of COVID, but while my case was very mild,
00:00:35
Speaker
And I didn't end up getting my partner or my kids sick. I did have to take the two weeks off because my kid couldn't actually go back to daycare because she was a close contact and she's under five. She's unvaccinated. So we got to watch a lot of Encanto and do a lot of family portraits and make a lot of art in Lego.
00:00:53
Speaker
for a couple of weeks. So not terrible in the kind of stretch of things of people who have caught COVID. How about, and that brings us, that's enough of the intro here.
Impact of COVID Restrictions Lift
00:01:04
Speaker
I was going to ask the guest if they've caught COVID yet, but I haven't even introduced them.
00:01:09
Speaker
Our guest for this podcast is a returning guest, Lorian Hardcastle, an associate professor at the University of Calgary who specializes in health law and health policy. We've obviously brought her here to discuss the decision by Jason Kenney to lift pretty much all of the COVID restrictions because a bunch of people blockaded the border and got really mad at him. But before we get to that, Lorian, how are you doing? Have you managed to not get COVID?
00:01:38
Speaker
I am good and I have managed to not get COVID, although I will say in large part due to my limited associations with people who go to school and my ability to work from home. I've been fortunate both in not catching it, but in having circumstances that are conducive to not catching it. Yeah. I don't see very many people either.
00:02:01
Speaker
Uh, I, my hypothesis where I got my case was either from my like daughter who's asymptomatic who goes to daycare or from like the grocery store because the only other person in my life who wasn't my family, uh, that like I was in a room without a mask on prior to getting sick was like, didn't get sick. And so it's like, I don't know. Like those are the only other two places. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Omicron is, is, uh, is pretty evasive and finds you, finds you where you are.
00:02:30
Speaker
Exactly. Thankfully, it was mild. I do have my double VAX and my booster, so it's like, if you haven't got your booster yet, go get your booster. It can only help if you are unlucky enough to get sick.
Kenney's Controversial Decision
00:02:42
Speaker
But yes, yesterday was the long, terrible shit show of Alberta Politics continues, and Jason Kenney, Jason Kopping, and Dina Hinshaw.
00:02:54
Speaker
stood in front of the people of Alberta and said, you know, all this COVID stuff, you know, we don't need it. It's like, it's good. It's run its course. We're safe now. There's no more COVID anymore. You know, you can now eat or you can now go to a restaurant. You can now go to a show or a hockey game. And in fact, the change they announced took place like immediately, like midnight the same day.
00:03:19
Speaker
which was wild to me. The other big changes was you can now eat or drink in your seat if you're at like an entertainment venue. So if you're, you know, eat nachos and drink your beer, if you're sitting in this, if you're watching the flames or Oilers game live, there are however, still restrictions on serving booze and dancing and drinking out late for some reason. Venues with capacity of over a thousand people are limited to 50% capacity and facilities with capacities between 500 and a thousand are restricted to 500.
00:03:46
Speaker
for whatever that gets you. And then starting next week, February 14th, no more masks in school and masks and no more masks for children in any setting, uh, age 12 and under. So why don't we start with those kind of those like first two blocks, Laurie, and what kind of jumped out at you from those initial kind of restrictions that were lifted? Well, I think that, uh, the, the school one in particular came very suddenly and
00:04:16
Speaker
We heard from school trustees and other stakeholders that they hadn't been consulted, hadn't been let know this was coming, and indeed are still receiving masks, have received shipments of masks in recent days. And so we're very caught off guard. I think with the restriction exemption program or the
00:04:35
Speaker
vaccine passport by another name. Again, people were puzzled by how rapidly that happened. And the mayors didn't know it was coming. The chambers of commerce didn't know it was coming. It was dropped on everybody very quickly. Yeah. I mean, two weeks ago, Jason Kenney was saying, oh yeah, we'll drop the vaccine passport end of March. And then a week ago, he was saying, oh yeah, we'll drop the vaccine passport at the end of February.
00:05:04
Speaker
And then late last week, like Friday, he was, oh yeah, we'll drop the vaccine passport like Monday. And very interestingly, Dr. Hinshaw was asked about the vaccine passport last week and talked about its significant benefits and didn't talk about those benefits in a way that like she didn't say we're getting diminishing returns on those benefits.
00:05:24
Speaker
She didn't say it's run its course, which is what we heard from the premier. So I'd be interested to know what she advised them and how that somehow morphed into what we got.
00:05:35
Speaker
Yes. And while cases have plateaued, they haven't really significantly decreased. We're still seeing our 10 to 15 deaths a day from COVID. And really the only thing that changed in those two weeks from when Jason Kenney said, oh yeah, we'll end it at the end of March to, oh, we'll end it tomorrow, is a protest movement started up in Ottawa. And then there was like a sympathy protest movement that started up
00:05:59
Speaker
at the busiest international border between Alberta and the United States at the Kootes Sweetgrass Crossing, where a couple hundred people in trucks, I think it's down to a few dozen now, decided to block an international border and put pressure on the government by stopping commerce, stopping traffic on a major international highway and border crossing.
00:06:21
Speaker
You know, to bow at one of their demands, obviously, they had several demands. Hilariously, one of them was they wanted every UCP MLA to resign and sit as an independent, which would have been very funny.
00:06:36
Speaker
because it's like, well, then then Rachel not leaves the premier, but but OK, go off. But the one of their demands was the dropping of the vaccine passport program. And they fucking got it. You know, they they fucking Jason Kenny. Listen, you block an international highway gets Jason Kenny's attention. Yeah. And I think I mean, I think that that in and of itself is concerning. I think there are certainly there were political factors at play. I think that's important. I think the
00:07:04
Speaker
forthcoming leadership review is influential on his decisions. But I think it's unfortunate because it sends the message that, you know, that kind of protest which involved some concerning physical interactions, you know, the version in Ottawa involved some white supremacist messaging. I mean, I don't think we want the message out there to be that that is the kind of protest that influences policymakers.
00:07:32
Speaker
Well, we're going to get into that later on. Trust me, I have my opinions on both on tactics and on outcomes and on the people who are doing them and what they're asking. But there are still, there were other parts of that announcement that I haven't even gone over with. So starting at the end of February, starting on March 1st.
00:07:49
Speaker
First, any remaining provincial school requirements, including cohorting, will be removed. Screening prior to youth activities will no longer be required. All capacity limits will be lifted. Limits on social gatherings will be removed, which weren't really being enforced anyways. Provincial mask mandate will be removed at the end of the month, and mandatory work from home will be removed. I assume that's for provincial workers. It wasn't really clear in the announcement.
00:08:13
Speaker
But, uh, yes, so that's all coming as well. And then there was kind of like future announcements that were like dependent on, you know, hospitalizations going down. But Lori, this all seems incredibly dangerous and irresponsible considering the stress on the healthcare system that we were currently seeing.
Expert Concerns Over Policy Shift
00:08:34
Speaker
No. Yeah, it is concerning. The vaccine passports were an important tool to bolster vaccination rates and to
00:08:43
Speaker
prevent a lot of commingling between unvaccinated and unvaccinated and others. Of course, masking has been a significant component of the public health effort right since the beginning. And of course, when you talk about the odds and ends that will be removed in the future, one of those is the requirement to isolate when you're sick. And so I think those are some just basic public health measures that soon we won't have the benefit of.
00:09:12
Speaker
Yeah, like this government is making policy choices that will kill more people, like that will extend the length and and the length of this fifth wave and the damage that it does to both their health care system and people's lives and bodies. Right. That's right. And this is a government that we've heard a lot about lives and livelihoods from and some of the restrictions. I don't think we can deny that some of the restrictions around business closures and whatnot.
00:09:34
Speaker
have impacted livelihoods. But the requirement, for example, that we no longer mask, I just don't see what benefit that's that we're really gaining in terms of freedom or economic benefits. It's such a simple thing we can do to try to stay safe. I want to see children's smiles, Lorian, and it's frankly, it's hurting my freedom that I can't see the smiles of children.
00:10:00
Speaker
Well, and we did hear from the premier that he does think that masks are oppressive to children and that they interfere with their freedom. But I think that we've heard from actual experts in the area, child psychologists, pediatricians, that in fact children are more resilient when it comes to wearing masks than we give them credit for.
00:10:23
Speaker
Yeah, I have a four year old. I mean, they don't have to wear a mask in daycare. But like when we go to the grocery store or we go to like the pool or whatever, like you give them as they put on a mask like who fucking cares? It's not a fucking deal. You know, I still see my kids smile when we're like home together, you know.
00:10:40
Speaker
One of the more absurdist parts of this whole kabuki theater about Jason Kenney lifting these restrictions and not saying that it was due to his rural caucus and his base and this leadership review was this bullshit about kids.
00:10:56
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And kids, I think to the extent that kids are complaining about wearing masks, that they're just reflecting the attitudes of their parents. If the parents are positive about wearing masks and are not complaining about wearing masks, the kids will mirror that, especially the little ones.
00:11:13
Speaker
Oh yeah. And I think it's also worth pointing out the day that Kenny announced the lifting of all these restrictions. You know, Alberta set a new record for COVID hospitalizations. You know, 1,623 people in hospital just yesterday were recording this late afternoon on Thursday. You know, 129 people in ICU, 13 deaths. The stats just came out before we started recording, Lori and
00:11:35
Speaker
The hospitalizations are essentially flat minus eight to 1615, but an increase of plus six in the ICU numbers up to 136 and another 10 deaths today. So it's not like we are through this fifth wave in any, by any stretch of the imagination.
00:11:52
Speaker
No, and we hear a lot from this government on the difference between people in the hospital because of COVID or people with COVID. And I think that we're just exaggerating and fixating on that because the fact of the matter is, if you're there with other conditions and you have COVID, that can complicate and lengthen your recovery, even if it's not your primary reason for being there.
00:12:16
Speaker
Yeah, there's no such thing as incidental fucking COVID. When you have COVID, you have COVID. And if you're in a hospital and you have COVID, it is a fucking deal. All of the people who treat you have to be fully PPE'd up. You are possibly getting other people in that hospital sick. It is a complicating factor when it comes to the other things you are getting treated for, working in concert, perhaps making it harder for you to live or to have a functional, healthy life in the future. The whole incidental thing is pretty frustrating to hear because it doesn't matter.
00:12:45
Speaker
If you're in the hospital with COVID, you're in the hospital with COVID. Yeah, absolutely. And it's part of this bigger problem where we hear language from the premier constantly that minimizes the impact of COVID and overstates the impact of what I'll call public health protections. We heard from him yesterday in the press conference, he must have used the phrase damaging restrictions two dozen times.
00:13:12
Speaker
Oh yeah, it was a key message. It was a key message. It was underlined and read and like circled, like say this word over and over and over. Yeah. Definitely. And so, I mean, let's get to the press conference and let's kind of like parse the weird and nonsensical justifications that Kenny kind of trotted out.
00:13:33
Speaker
for this decision, what were your favorite and or most nonsensical justification that Jason Kenney came up with to introduce this lifting of all these COVID restrictions now? Well, I think that just this characterizing them as a whole, as damaging restrictions, is just not accurate. I think there are certain restrictions you could say have economic impacts. There are others that have other kinds of impacts. But to just label them all as damaging, I think it's just ridiculous.
00:14:01
Speaker
For the masks, for example, I keep coming back to that, but it's such a minimal intrusion on what you can and can't do. So we heard him talk about that and how damaging this has all been to children.
00:14:15
Speaker
And while the restrictions have had an effect on children, children are also unvaccinated. Some of them can't be vaccinated, some of them. And schools have put them at a lot of risk. And we've seen pediatric hospitalizations. Those numbers are concerning. So I think his remarks to me just lacked any sort of balance.
00:14:38
Speaker
The other thing I think stood out to me from his remarks were, and we heard the same thing actually in Saskatchewan's press conference yesterday, was a lot of rhetoric around being kind to the unvaccinated and being nice to people and respecting individual choices. And while of course people should be respectful of one another, you don't get to minimize the legitimate frustration that people feel who have been trapped at home
00:15:08
Speaker
in many cases because of the unvaccinated or who are on healthcare waiting lists in large part because of the unvaccinated. And to just minimize the feelings of those people isn't fair either. Yeah, you brought up something I was going to bring up, which is one of my most least favorite parts is Kenny constantly bringing up how divisive these public health restrictions are or these public health measures are in order to stop the spread of a deadly disease. And it's like, bro.
00:15:37
Speaker
Like you are literally one of the people, one of the most prominent people causing this so-called division. Like you have fundraised off it. You have derided and mocked people who wanted to bring in public health measures and then were forced to bring them in because like the situation got so bad that like your healthcare system was about to collapse and really is still in a state of collapse.
00:16:01
Speaker
Like, him decrying how divisive this all is, is fucking crocodile tears. You did that, bro. Like, that's you. And you fanned the flames of the truckers, you fanned the flames of anti-maskers, you fanned the flames of anti-vaxxers. You know, like all this, like, oh, we got rid of mandatory vaccinations. Like, bro, like, there hasn't been mandatory vaccinations in Alberta in like 98 years.
00:16:26
Speaker
That was a particularly infuriating part of Kenny's justification for all of this is the divisive nature of these public health restrictions. Get the fuck out of here. Yeah, no, he's been one of the biggest causes of that division all along and has really emboldened
00:16:46
Speaker
Those who have pushed back against restrictions by constantly talking about freedom and liberty and of course those are important concepts but those those concepts are not unlimited and and those concepts have to be balanced against caring about other people and doing the right thing for your community and we just don't hear as much of that that from him or for example when when the premier gets airtime on vaccines and
00:17:13
Speaker
He often wastes half of the time talking about Health Canada being slow and Trudeau. Nobody needs to hear that. You don't need to politicize everything. If your mouth is open and the word vaccine is coming out, the only things that you should be saying are safe, effective. Here's where you can get it. We don't need to hear about Trudeau.
00:17:34
Speaker
Yeah. And the rhetoric around freedom and all that shit is incredibly infuriating too, right? I feel like George Costanza and fucking Seinfeld, we're living in a society here. Your freedom does not extend to the freedom to crush our hospitals and our healthcare systems. Your freedom is not extended to coughing in my mouth. And also, I mean, the short term sacrifice in freedom has
00:18:03
Speaker
longer-term payoffs in terms of freedom. Some of the countries that have locked down quite stringently were then able to enjoy a greater degree of openness in a much sooner time.
00:18:18
Speaker
The other thing that really came to light over the course of this, these past two weeks is the political rebellion internally within the UCP and what's being done by Kenny to manage it via these, you know, public health policy decisions. Uh, you know, he still has to set the date for the, the Fort McMurray by-election where Brian Jean is going to be the UCP candidate and where he has said out loud, his only goal is to get rid of Kenny as leader. He is facing a leadership review, uh, April 9th.
00:18:45
Speaker
His rural caucus is essentially baying for blood, and essentially, based on outcomes here, is running the party now. Again, public health policy decisions that will mean more people will die are being done so Jason Kenney can save his own political skin, and it's worth saying that over and over again, because it is completely craven and cowardly and just a complete lack of leadership shown on, again, the public health policy decision that will
00:19:15
Speaker
kill probably hundreds of more people by the time it's done. Yeah. The politicization of these issues throughout the pandemic has been such a source of frustration. He has constantly tried to walk the middle line and try and appease the members of his caucus who are opposed to restrictions, but then also appease those who
00:19:37
Speaker
maybe some of the MLAs in urban areas where their residents are more supportive of restrictions. And by trying to worry about the politics, he's really failed at the public health piece. Yeah. So was there anything that jumped out at you from the press conference? I mean, I know the one I'm originally, I'm going to jump to right off the hop, but is there anything that jumped out at you that you want to pull out from the press conference?
Confusion from Abrupt Changes
00:20:03
Speaker
Well, one thing that I think is interesting, and this is maybe something we'll come back to, is just the issue around, well, where does that leave everybody else? I think this decision came very suddenly to businesses, schools, post-secondaries, to municipalities. And one of the things that he got asked about, which was interesting, was around what about private businesses? Can they still have rules? Can cities still have rules?
00:20:30
Speaker
And he seems to, his suggestion seems to be that they plan to be resistant in terms of municipalities having rules, but that he's receptive to individual businesses having vaccine restrictions or perhaps masking restrictions. And so we're sort of in a place where he has his press conference in the evening and I'm sure everybody else was scrambling all day today to figure out where that leaves them.
00:20:58
Speaker
Yeah, let's get into that because there has been a reaction from municipalities and businesses and business associations, business groups. Right before we started recording, Calgary City Council voted on bringing in their kind of own vaccine passport program. That looks like it was voted down. However, they do look like they are going to be writing a strongly worded letter to the province, politely asking for the recommendations that were made by Dina Hinshaw that were used to make this decision.
00:21:26
Speaker
Edmonton has taken a slightly different tack. Edmonton has gone to administration, voted unanimously to go to administration and say, hey, draw up a vaccine passport program for us to consider, likely on Friday. We've seen the Alberta Hospitality Association and the Chamber of Commerce and Calgary, friend of the show, Deborah Yedlin, notably, kind of going public saying, while we support the blah, blah, blah, this is a little too much, too soon, too fast kind of thing.
00:21:53
Speaker
Uh, you know, the reaction from, you know, other levels of government from school boards, from business associations, like there doesn't, there doesn't, and even then, and even the Coots blockades are still blocking in the world. Like there doesn't seem to be anyone that's happy with what happened.
00:22:09
Speaker
Yeah, and I think the problem is Jason Kenney does not live in a UCP vacuum. His decisions affect other groups. They affect other people, other decision makers. And to not have consulted them on this, to not have got input, to not give anyone the heads up, and this comes into effect immediately, everybody was scrambling.
00:22:29
Speaker
I know that my employer sent an email after all of this saying, well, we have our own vaccine system that's separate from that of the province. It's not part of the restriction exemption program. So I guess for now that applies, but stay tuned. And I'm sure lots of people received stay tuned emails from their employers or from organizations that they work with because the government really just didn't consult anyone on this.
00:22:58
Speaker
Yeah. Like, like, I mean, you made the point earlier about, you know, school boards were still getting shipments of masks and, and it's the same day or the same week that, um, you know, Jason Kenny is saying, Oh yeah, by the way, you don't need to wear a mask. And pretty soon, like a one hand doesn't know what the other hand's doing here. And, and this is clearly evident when Kenny starts talking about mask mandates, you know, there's a clip here that I'm going to play where it's like, Oh yeah, here's Jason Kenny in 2020, uh, before he was forced to bring in mask mandates.
00:23:24
Speaker
saying, oh yes, we're not bringing in a mask mandate because municipalities can bring in mask mandates. But then you'll hear him say the exact opposite. Here's the clip. Debbie Babbage says, why not make masks mandatory across the province? It seems ridiculous to not do it at least for a while until things calm down just a bit. Thanks, Debbie. Good question.
00:23:48
Speaker
Municipalities representing about 90% of the population have already brought in various kinds of mask mandates based on their own local conditions. We respect their authority to do so. All right, Suvanto, excuse me, says, Mr. Kenny, when you repeal the mandates, could you add a provision to stop local municipalities from implementing their own mask or vaccine mandates?
00:24:13
Speaker
Very good question, Luke. Right now, based on the current powers of the Municipal Government Act,
00:24:22
Speaker
the legal advice we have is that municipalities do have that authority. They have a very wide ranging bylaw, general kind of generic bylaw authority under the Municipal Government Act. But we will certainly take a look at that because I don't think that the city governments, alderman councilors, excuse me, have any, this is not their normal field of responsibility.
00:24:49
Speaker
They don't have access to the same data that we do.
00:24:57
Speaker
If the province moves ahead safely to broadly lift our public health measures, but we have municipal politicians improvising their own local policies, I think that would be a matter of great concern. So we'll consider your suggestion and take a look at that, but we wouldn't be able to amend the Municipal Government Act in any event until the legislature resumes sitting effectively in late February, early March.
00:25:26
Speaker
He'll say one thing, say the other. He's completely craving and he'll bend to whatever he wants to get done at the time, he'll say. Yeah, and it's a concern to me that in, I guess, second wave and then in fourth wave when this government was nowhere to be found, others had to fill the gap. You had municipalities putting in mask bylaws, second wave.
00:25:50
Speaker
During the government's period of being MIA, you had school boards putting in place requirements in anticipation of the school year, universities. You had private businesses start to require vaccines of their employees. Municipalities started to put rules in place. And so everybody else has been doing that work all along. And it's a real about face for him to say that now he's thinking about amending the law
00:26:16
Speaker
to bar municipal governments from doing this. And similarly, we had a letter from Minister Lagrange saying that schools are not allowed to have mask rules or vaccine rules. Her letter, in terms of its legal status, it's not clear that it's specific enough and clear enough to constitute a ministerial directive, but she certainly could make a ministerial directive.
00:26:42
Speaker
The only group that Kenny seems to want to let make their own decisions is he said that individual businesses could still continue to require proof of vaccine and presumably masks.
00:26:54
Speaker
Yeah. And of course, during this press conference, Jason Kenney also famously brought up picking up that thread about divisiveness. He was comparing people who didn't have the vaccine to the stigma that those people face to the stigma that people faced when people had AIDS and HIV during the height of the AIDS HIV crisis.
00:27:20
Speaker
which is an incredible fucking thing to say for Jason Kenney for obvious reasons. Like Jason Kenney bragged in the late nineties about, you know, being part of a successful ballot initiative. And you know what? I have, I have the clip here. I'm just going to fucking play the clip. Yeah. I became president of the pro life group in my
00:27:40
Speaker
campus and helped to lead an ultimately successful initiative petition which led to a referendum which overturned the first gay spousal law in North America in 1989 in San Francisco. So I fought a lot of battles there. But it's never okay to treat people like that, to stigmatize people in that way. In a way it kind of reminds me of the
00:28:08
Speaker
Attitudes that circulated in North America in the mid-1980s about people with HIV AIDS. That there's this notion that they had to be kind of distanced for health reasons. Listen, this is a terribly divisive attitude. So yes, we encourage people to get vaccinated, but treating people who have made a different decision
00:28:38
Speaker
as though they are unwelcome as members of our society is not acceptable.
00:28:52
Speaker
You know, what can you even say? No, it's just it's just it's just vile. And it's completely different. You know, those who who were contracted a terrifying, highly stigmatizing disease versus people who have made choices not to get vaccinated.
00:29:10
Speaker
It's a, it's a vile comparison. And while he did later apologize for it, it was only after taking a lot of heat. And, you know, frankly, if that's what comes out of your mouth and that's the comparison you want to make, the fact that you're later sorry, because people got upset is irrelevant. Like that, that is indicative of your true thoughts. That's, that's what came out of your mouth in the moment. And it's, it's just vile that he, he thinks about those two things as the same way that,
00:29:37
Speaker
People who had this terrifying disease versus people who are pissed off that they can't go to eat at Eastside Mario's because they're not vaccinated Yeah, like the divisive attitudes around AIDS like probably like you were one of the people who were like
00:29:56
Speaker
stigmatizing people who had AIDS. You were actively campaigning to stop same sex couples from being able to see their partners in hospitals when they died of AIDS. That was you. You were the one causing those divisive attitudes. It's shocking, even for him.
00:30:12
Speaker
He was a frontline fucking soldier on the culture war there. You have to wonder what the fuck is going through his mind sometimes. All right, I think now is the time to segue to... There's no good segue, but now is the time to just segue to the conversation about...
00:30:29
Speaker
the tactics used by the Koots blockaders. And, you know, you had a thread, you know, a line of thought here where it is bad for the government to bow to the demands of these people who are illegally blockading the border. Why don't you kind of like walk me through your argument there? Yeah, so the concern that I have is that, you know, if these are the kinds of tactics that were rewarding, were rewarding people who have
00:30:59
Speaker
Disrupted society like this who have caused others on the border or people who living in downtown, Ottawa great hardship and of course have had some affiliation with Terrifying organizations white supremacist groups. I just think that if we reward those people and let those people think they got their way we're only emboldening them to continue to
00:31:27
Speaker
stage these protests, have these demands. I mean, I'm a proponent of free speech, but I'm not a proponent of the tactics employed by these people and how tolerant law enforcement has been of this. And I don't want them to think that their demands were bowed into and that this behavior was rewarded. All right. So before I get into my piece on this, I want to acknowledge that I don't obviously share the goals or the aims of the ideology of the people doing the Kootz blockade. And I also want to acknowledge that like,
00:31:56
Speaker
they're pushing on an open door here, right? Like the government of Alberta, Jason Kenney, the Royal Caucus, the UCP itself, want to really do want to get rid of COVID restrictions because they don't like them. And I also want to acknowledge that when a bunch of reactionary white people show up and do illegal shit, the rule of law is applied asymmetrically to those people, as it would be if a black or indigenous or anti-capitalist movements showed up and did the exact same thing. With all that being said,
00:32:27
Speaker
Uh, effective and effective protest movement is one that disrupts the business of the day and blockading a border has proven itself clearly to be an effective protest tactic. We saw the wetsuit and solidarity protests, uh, rail blockades. Those were also very effective tactics because they did disrupt the business of the day that the economy of Canada is dependent on our vast rail network moving freight around. You know, Alberta, I mean, the Coots
00:32:53
Speaker
One was kind of localized to one single error, but that's a very kind of that's a choke point That's a very important node for certain sectors of our economy and I think it's important for the left to not necessarily give up the idea of like civil disobedience that disrupts the economy that disrupts the business as a tactic simply because People who we don't like people who we object to are employing that same tactic
00:33:20
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think that is fair. I think that civil disobedience is one thing. But I think some of the things that I saw out of Ottawa I think went beyond disrupting the business of the day and became downright harassing. There were incidents of violence. And so I think that there has to be a line. And I think that in certain ways, some of this protesting
00:33:47
Speaker
went beyond what I would consider an acceptable line. Very much so. And there was an attempted mass murder by arson in Ottawa. I'm not suggesting that those are acceptable tactics, but there is a certain elegant and simplistic
00:34:06
Speaker
tactic at play here, which is like if you fucking want something, go blockade a railway, go blockade international crossing, go blockade a port. That will actually cause shit to happen. The shit that happened like might be you might there might be violent repression of you by the state. And frankly, if you're black or indigenous or anti capitalist, it's very likely. But that type of direct action, that type of civil disobedience is has far more of an effect than
00:34:35
Speaker
a planned protest down the street that the police know about or a protest outside of a legislature. You know what I mean? Yeah, absolutely. I think, of course, we've seen that. This protest has the attention that it's received and the response from policy makers has been far greater than, for example,
00:34:56
Speaker
the protests that we saw when the government opened for summer. And there were weeks and weeks and weeks of very peaceful protests. So absolutely, it's effective. And absolutely, free speech is important. But there is that somewhere in there. There is that balance. And I've just been stewing at home. When I saw this happening, I was stuck at home with my four-year-old looking at what was going on with the convoy, what was going on
Protest Tactics and Effectiveness
00:35:22
Speaker
with Koots. And I was like, look, I don't like these guys.
00:35:25
Speaker
that they're being successful because obviously it's bad. I do want public health policy that keeps us safe, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater when it comes to this type of direct action. Again, I don't have another good segue to this, but I was
00:35:42
Speaker
able to somehow get through on a COVID presser with Dr. Hinshaw. Sometimes I can get through to Dr. Hinshaw. I've never been able to get through to Jason Kenney or anything with a health minister or a premier at it. But I did get a chance to ask Dr. Hinshaw a question at a press conference last week. And it essentially was, given the many failures of this government and you as the chief medical officer of health to stop the spread of COVID,
00:36:08
Speaker
you know, would she resign if the vaccine passport was dropped for obvious political reasons? And, you know, she didn't answer the question. She was kind of like, oh, you know, I'm sorry. I'm sorry about the mistakes I made, blah, blah, blah. But then the vaccine passport and all these public health policy things happened. And there's Dr. Hinshot, the press conference, and she did not resign. Given that she seems to have willingly abdicated her responsibilities to protect the people of Alberta from this pandemic, should she resign?
00:36:38
Speaker
Well, I think that at this point, we're getting rid of restrictions. And if she had wanted to resign and to have that resignation be meaningful and send a message to Albertans, the time for that would have been open for summer. We saw the trajectory that that set us on. And we saw the poor evidence that was relied on to make that decision or the non-evidence that was relied on
00:37:07
Speaker
to make that decision. And so to me, that would have been the time to take a stand. And even other medical officers of health were critical of that policy. Sometimes they didn't directly pin the criticisms on her. But we heard from the former chief medical officer of health. We heard from many doctors. And so to me, that would have been the most, the time that she could have resigned that would have had the most impact, maybe saved lives would have been that open for summer.
00:37:37
Speaker
Um, you know, we'll see what happens here, but, but I certainly wasn't surprised. She didn't resign. Um, I wasn't, I wasn't surprised either, but I mean, you know, better late than never, obviously you can always correct your mistakes and you bring up an interesting point, you know, a year from now.
00:37:53
Speaker
are we going to look back at open for summer or are we going to look back at this turning point as which one is going to be worse? Yeah. Well, then I think it's interesting because which one is worse from a public health perspective might not be the same answer as which one was worse from a
00:38:11
Speaker
as sort of a social perspective, because I think open for summer, it seemed to me that there was a lot more pushback. There were protests. The public approval of that was quite low. People then were scared of Delta and wanted restrictions brought back, and Delta proves very deadly. In this case, Omicron is very different. But I also think public opinion is quite different now. People have really taken on board the message that
00:38:41
Speaker
Omicron is mild will probably be fine. There's a lot of people who genuinely believe that. It's not health professionals necessarily, but a lot of people in society have really taken that on board and seem much more receptive to these changes than maybe they were to changes earlier. Yeah.
00:39:02
Speaker
And finally, I think we're not obligated to, but we should end it off with something that's a little more hopeful. It's easy to be enraged or exhausted or tired about how this government doesn't care whether we live or die, is happy to make public health policy decisions based on the whims of
00:39:23
Speaker
politics and an unreasonable and frankly, awful group of people who don't care about the safety of others. But Dave Cornway did have a post about what we can do, and I'm cribbing from that. I'm cribbing from a few other people. And the frame here is important. Kenny keeps talking about
00:39:45
Speaker
you know, living with COVID. And he kind of seems to be talking about going back to a time where COVID never existed. And that's not happening, right? Like COVID is going to be with us. It's unlikely to be completely extirpated. But we also can't ignore the past two years.
Calls for Government Transparency
00:40:03
Speaker
And we should learn from what we have seen and observed from over that time, which Jason Kenney doesn't seem very interested in either. So I'll just run through these. And if you feel like jumping in on any of these, Laurie, please, please do. So, you know, audits, there have been a few of these audits that have been done by the auditor general into the government of Alberta's response.
00:40:26
Speaker
into the COVID-19 pandemic. They have not been made public. UCP members at committee have blocked this from becoming public. Make those public. Come on. There's also, I am of the opinion that there's been a bit of profiteering and that a lot of money has slashed around the health system here with regards to this pandemic. I think we do need to find out where some of the money went.
00:40:51
Speaker
I think you're right. I think the transparency is huge, and both of those to me are transparency issues. The government has spent vast amounts of money on COVID. Don't get me confused with the freedom fighter type, because I think freedoms need to be balanced, but the government has limited freedoms, spent tons of money, lives have been lost, and part of accountability is transparency.
00:41:21
Speaker
that being upfront about, yeah, where the money's gone, what auditor generals have recommended. I think the government is ethically and morally obliged to have an independent commission of inquiry review their pandemic response. So yes, to me, accountability and transparency are huge. And we'll also help inform our response to public health disasters in the future.
00:41:44
Speaker
Yeah, and that's the next one is follows on from the audits, which is what released the audits continue to do these audits on what the government's spending on COVID. But in that same vein, a public inquiry, a real one, with a real judge and a real budget that can actually look into this government's response to the pandemic, the outbreaks of Cargill and meat packing plants, long-term care centers, the oil sands.
00:42:09
Speaker
how decisions were arrived at, how did open to for summer happen? Where was Jason Kenney? Who was making decisions? These are things you can get at with a public inquiry. And that would actually be a proper use of what a public inquiry can do. Not the public inquiry we saw on alleged foreign funded environmentalists.
00:42:32
Speaker
No, and not a non-independent public inquiry for pay one. So for example, the government did a look into the first wave and they paid KPMG to do that report. That is not what I think what either of us mean by public inquiry. I think you're right. It needs to be a judge with a significant amount of independence from the government to properly do that.
00:42:58
Speaker
Yeah, like under the public inquiries act, like give it a budget of like 10 to $20 million, like say come back in two years and like figure it all out. Like what went wrong? Uh, the next one is obvious, is obvious, but it still needs to be said vaccinations, you know, for all of Kenny's talk about how vaccinations are the BL and end all. They sure really aren't trying to.
00:43:19
Speaker
vaccinate people who are under 12. The numbers on boosters are bad. The numbers on vaccinations under 12 are bad. That's still just work that needs to be done. Please, let's vaccinate the people who aren't vaccinated yet. You're actually going to have to spend time and effort and money to get that done.
00:43:40
Speaker
uh, cleaning the air. Um, essentially you need to invest in better ventilation in public spaces, uh, workplaces, you know, schools, you know, that would be a public space, but like, this has been proven, you know, you've got engineers and scientists and doctors saying like, we can stop the spread of certain amounts of COVID. Like we can stop X percentage if we just invest in this.
00:44:05
Speaker
Well, and not just COVID, right? There are many respiratory illnesses that circulate. There's the flu, there's whatever future bug fights its way to Alberta. Those investments pay off significantly. And I don't know that we've seen a lot of economic analyses on them, but I can't imagine that they're not wise investments given their ability to prevent not only COVID, but other things.
00:44:33
Speaker
Yeah, and it's like stimulus spending, get some HVAC texts and tradespeople working. This one is obvious, but I'll always say it, get a union and or get involved in your union. I think something that's been very clear from this pandemic is that working class Albertans need better and stronger workplace health and safety protections. And those aren't things that employers are ever going to just improve on their own. It's something that you actually have to come together with your fellow workers and demand.
00:45:02
Speaker
Um, and one of the ways to do that is through a union. Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, one can look, for example, at, uh, the long-term care sector where, um, you know, there, there are facilities that are, that are unionized, but there's a whole lot of, uh, healthcare aides, personal support workers who are not only, um, non unionized, but are in very precarious working situations and are not in a position to influence their, their employers. So, so absolutely.
00:45:33
Speaker
And you're glad you brought up long-term care. Let's just nationalize it. The profit motive should be nowhere near the system of how we take care of our elders as they get older and need more help. Yeah. And we've always had evidence that the for-profit facilities perform more poorly on certain quality metrics, but we now have evidence showing that in terms of COVID,
00:45:58
Speaker
They did, there's a study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal showing that in Ontario, those for-profit facilities did more poorly in terms of protecting their residents from COVID, unsurprisingly.
00:46:11
Speaker
You were more likely to die if you lived in a for-profit, long-term care facility. That's just fact. Sick days, the government has resisted bringing in sick days because bosses don't want it, but we absolutely, positively fucking need paid sick days. If you don't want highly contagious virus to spread.
00:46:32
Speaker
people need to be able to stay home and not be afraid that they're not going to be able to make rent, pay their mortgage, or be fired. It's as simple as that. I would hope that the greater receptiveness to working from home helps with that as well, that you may have people who are not
00:46:53
Speaker
You know incapacitated. They're not in bed coughing all day And and but could work from their home and so employers need to be receptive For that as well because I think we have a lot of people who even though they have sick days Will call in sick in the day that they're truly unable to work
00:47:10
Speaker
but then they'll show up for the next three days when they may still be infectious. Well, now that we've seen that working from home can be effective, we can have that same person stay home for a full work week, still be somewhat productive, but not bring their bug to the office.
Collective Responsibility in COVID Response
00:47:25
Speaker
Yeah, paid sick days, just do it tomorrow. This is a broader problem, not necessarily a like Alberta problem, but still needs to be done, which is vaccinate the global South and grant those trips waivers so that vaccines can be manufactured anywhere by any facility that has the ability to manufacture them. This is just like, if we don't want more variants to pop up, we just have to get everyone vaccinated. This is just simply like a global equity issue.
00:47:54
Speaker
Yeah, we don't need to be in a position where we're getting six shots and health care workers in sub-Saharan Africa haven't had one shot. That is appalling.
00:48:03
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's also clear we need publicly owned production and distribution of personal protective equipment and things like rapid antigen tests. And this wave, this fifth wave could have been drastically mitigated if we had widespread access to respirators and they just weren't available. You can only do that with the power of the state and a publicly owned.
00:48:31
Speaker
a system where you say, I don't care about the profit motive at this time. I'm just going to produce a shitload of respirator masks so that we can keep people safe. And finally, you know, this one's a bit of a cheesy one, but it is true is that we do need to take care of each other. The government isn't clearly isn't going to look out for us. They don't care if we live or die. So it's up to us. And that's both scary and comforting.
00:49:00
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I don't think that it's cheesy at all. If we think of it as in terms of sort of, you know, the government has said they're not going to do anything, but that doesn't stop us from making wise choices. It doesn't stop us from asking our employer to stay home if we're sick. You know, if we have the availability of sick days, it doesn't stop us from having our kids and ourselves wear masks in the grocery store. It doesn't stop us from not going to a massive gathering or
00:49:29
Speaker
or even collectively, right? Groups of employees pushing an employer to have better protections or people lobbying their municipality depending which way the winds blow on the municipal question or people lobbying their school boards. So people do have power and people do have influence and both themselves and collectively and can do things to mitigate their own risks.
00:49:57
Speaker
Yeah. As much as Jason Kenney and the rich and powerful want to hyper individualize COVID and the pandemic and society and the economy, it isn't. We can't approach it that way or we're cooked. We do have to come together and figure this out. We shouldn't have to rely on personal responsibility. The government should be the ones acting, but the fact that they're not going to act shouldn't defeat us. There are still things we can all do. Yeah.
00:50:23
Speaker
Well, it's been lovely talking with you, Lauren. I really appreciate you taking the time. How can people find you on the internet and follow the work that you do?
00:50:32
Speaker
So probably the best place is on Twitter and I'm at L-O-R-I-A-N underscore H. Hardcastle is too long for Twitter. Although I recently had a Twitter impersonation account pop up so I guess you know you've made it big when that happens. But yeah, Laurian underscore H or of course I have a webpage at the University of Calgary.
00:50:58
Speaker
Yes, follow Lauren on Twitter and if you're inclined to read health law, health policy stuff, she does great work in that field as well. Folks, if you like this podcast, there's something you can do to help us out. And it's really simple. You put in your credit card, you become a recurring donor, and we'd really appreciate it. We have a couple of big bills that actually come up every year right around this time. And if you could kick in 5, 10, 15, $20 a month, we would be very grateful.
00:51:27
Speaker
Also, if you have any notes, thoughts, comments, things you think I need to hear, I am very easy to reach. I am on Twitter, also and always, at Duncan Kinney. And you can reach me by email at DuncanKatprogressalberta.ca. Thank you to Jim Story for editing this podcast. Thank you to Cosmic Family Communist for our amazing theme. Thank you for listening and goodbye.