It’s been a rough few months for the Progressive Conservatives, Alberta’s ruling party. In June, the government was caught illegally spying on its own citizens. In September, a government-appointed panel found Albertans don’t receive their fair share from oil and gas royalties, and haven’t been “for quite some time.” And in October, Alberta’s auditor general revealed that Alberta Energy cost Albertans billions by refusing to raise royalties even though it knew it could have done so without hurting industry profitability. “The Conservatives have been in so long that there’s a few leaks in the dyke,” says former Liberal leader Nick Taylor. “And just like the little Dutch boy, they just don’t have enough fingers.”
In the midst of all these troubles, the Conservatives became the longest-governing party in the province’s history, beating the previous Social Credit record of over 36 years. Most agree that if ever there was a time for the Liberals to unseat the Tory dynasty, it’s now. But despite the Conservatives’ season of fumbles, polls show opposition parties are still treading water. A recent Leger Marketing poll put the Liberals at less than 15 per cent popular support — even though, in the same poll, the Conservatives were only at 33 per cent. The number of undecided Alberta voters is high.
Even Preston Manning, son of Social Credit premier Ernest Manning, has publicly speculated that Premier Ed Stelmach’s Conservatives could face disaster in the next election. “Stelmach is in trouble,” says David Taras, a political analyst at the University of Calgary. “This government has made very big mistakes. It’s become kind of a firehouse government where they’re constantly putting out fires — and the critique the Liberals have mounted is quite devastating.” But will it translate into a Liberal victory in the next election? “I don’t know,” says Taras. “It’s very difficult for a government to be defeated in prosperous times.”
COMPETENCE AND CHARISMA
At six-foot-two, Kevin Taft towered over the diminutive Ralph Klein in the legislature. Armed with a BA in political science, a master’s degree in community development and a business PhD, he also stood tall over Klein intellectually. When Klein’s autopilot government stubbornly tried to ram through its Third Way plan to privatize health care — even as most Albertans opposed it — Taft and the Liberals put forward a comprehensive plan to improve the province’s health system without privatization. (Klein’s response is well-known: when presented with the policy in the legislature, he called the document “crap” and tossed it over his shoulder, hitting a legislative page.)
Similarly, Taft is arguably more intellectually astute than Stelmach. “In terms of presence, articulateness, sophistication of thought — he’s miles ahead,” says Taras. (On CTV earlier this month, Manning questioned whether Stelmach has “the competence to deal with… big-picture issues” like energy security and the environment.) As Stelmach comes under fire for his leadership style, the Liberals see an opportunity — one they never had when Klein was in power. “For whatever reason, Ralph had a great deal of personal appeal and managed to get away with a lot,” says Liberal House leader and Edmonton MLA Laurie Blakeman. “Premier Stelmach is a very different person. A nice man, but he doesn’t seem to be able to gather the team under him in the same way.”
While Klein won elections by having his MLAs advertise “Ralph’s Team” on their campaign material, Albertans likely won’t hear about “Ed’s Team” anytime soon. “All kinds of Conservative MLAs who won on Ralph’s coattails are now having to win on their own,” says Taft. “And you know what? I think a lot of them don’t know how to do that.”
Taylor says Taft’s moderate approach to politics could convince longtime Klein loyalists that it’s OK to vote for a different party in the next election. “He’s not too radical,” says Taylor, who was Liberal leader from 1974 to 1988. “I think that if you’re a Conservative, you can either stay home, or you can vote for Kevin without feeling that you’ve really wrecked things.” But getting Conservatives — especially Conservatives in rural Alberta — to make that transition to voting Liberal isn’t easy, and the Liberals know it. “I liken it to the experience of car ownership,” says Calgary Liberal MLA Dave Taylor. “What the poll results are showing right now is that the voters have decided that Brand PC is a lemon. They just haven’t started seriously shopping around for a replacement yet because it isn’t election time.”
Conservative discontent in Alberta was evident in June, when the party lost Ralph Klein’s Calgary-Elbow seat in a byelection. Less than 16 per cent of eligible voters picked Liberal candidate Craig Cheffins. (Voter turnout was less than 35 per cent.) However, that small bit of voter support was enough for Cheffins to win the riding. “In Elbow, the numbers did not go up,” says Taras. “It’s just the Conservatives stayed home. If that repeats itself, I think that will be quite powerful. There will be a lot of seats that fall to the Liberals.”
Also key to the Liberals is the influx of newcomers to the province — people who, unlike many native Albertans, imagine and vote for a change of government more than once a lifetime. “There’s a lot for whom voting Liberal didn’t bring the end of life as we know it,” says Taras with a laugh. “They probably have voted Liberal in their home provinces and weren’t struck by lightning instantly.”
Ken Chapman, a Conservative party member and Edmonton public policy analyst, says Albertans could see new leaders in all three major parties within a year and a half if none of the parties make gains in the next election. “If Stelmach loses popular vote or loses seats… the knives are going to be out for him,” says Chapman. “If he does that and Taft doesn’t fill the void and start showing that he can really pick up those seats, the knives will be out for him.”
A ROYAL SCREW-UP?
Like the Conservatives, the Liberal party has also faced criticism in recent months. After the royalty review panel put out its report in September showing Albertans were being ripped off, the Liberals were mostly silent on how Stelmach’s government should respond. The energy industry, with its hyperbolic predictions of economic catastrophe, was able to frame the royalty discussion. Finally, two days before the government announced its decision, Taft announced the Liberals’ position: royalties should increase by at least 20 per cent. In other words, the Liberals supported the review panel’s suggestions — and it took the party over a month to come out and say so.
“Many people felt that the response was too little too late — and too weak,” says Brian Edy, a Calgary lawyer who ran for the Liberals in 2001. Taft was short on specifics in his announcement, which left many disappointed after such a long delay. “I think we have to encourage this party to articulate their positions and get out in front on many issues — particularly the oil royalties,” says Edy. “To the extent it hasn’t been done, I think the entire party suffers.”
Taft, however, says the Liberal response was a sound one. “Throughout the period between the release of the report and us making our position public, we had made it clear repeatedly that we supported raising royalties,” says Taft. But so did all the parties, with the exception of the right-wing Alberta Alliance and Wildrose Party. To many, both inside and outside the party, the Liberals missed a prime opportunity to take the lead on the biggest issue of the day. “(Albertans) need to be reassured that the sorts of policies provided aren’t just simply radical responses or not thought out,” says Edy.
Chapman says the Conservatives’ handling of the royalty situation shows the party is still fit to govern. “You can argue whether or not they did a good job in terms of accepting the recommendations,” says Chapman. However, he says Stelmach’s decision to call the review, make it public and encourage debate signalled a shift in the Conservative party. “That would never happen under Klein,” says Chapman. “There would have been no review. It would have been done behind closed doors, and we would have been told it was good for us.”
DEMOCRACY DERAILED
Blunders like the royalty delay clearly don’t help the Liberals. Yet when I ask Taft if the party is to blame for its poor ranking in the polls, he disagrees. “I don’t think that’s a legitimate explanation,” he says. “I really think there are structural distortions in the governing processes of Alberta that work to keep the governing party in power.” Earlier this year, Taft released a book, Democracy Derailed, about these “structural distortions.”
As an example, Taft tells me about press conferences at the legislature. Reporters from out of town can phone in and listen to government ministers make their official announcements. They can also listen to the Q & A with reporters afterwards. But when Taft takes the podium — which he does after most ministerial announcements — the lines are cut off so reporters can’t hear the Liberals’ response. “There’s a thousand tricks like that,” says Taft. “And frankly, it’s a danger to democracy. It’s a kind of corruption that is a threat to good government.” (Taft was also barred from the government’s technical briefing on the royalty changes last month. Media and industry were invited, but Taft wasn’t allowed in.)
Legislature press conferences aside, it’s a challenge for the Liberals to get prominent media coverage. During the past year, Britney Spears’s name appeared in the Calgary Herald more than Taft’s. “In Alberta, your printed big-daily press is very highly Conservative,” says Taylor. “And your weeklies through the small towns, as a general rule, are Conservative too.” Mainstream news organizations are quick to publish front-page stories on government announcements, but slow to give much attention to opposition parties. “Let’s not forget — they have 150 people in the Public Affairs Bureau whose job from morning until night is to make sure we don’t get in the paper and the government does,” says Blakeman. “Considering that we have next to zippo in resources compared to what they have, we have done an extraordinary job in digging up the true scandals.”
UNITING THE LEFT?
If the Liberals were the only alternative to the Conservative dynasty, they’d likely unseat the Tories without that much effort. However, the opposition is severely fragmented. The recent Leger poll put the NDP at eight per cent popular support, and the Green Party at 5.5 per cent. “Stelmach is lucky in that the opposition is splintering,” says Taras. “He’s laughing. That’s his ace in the hole.”
The divisions between the opposition parties run deep. In recent months, the NDP has aggressively attacked the Liberals on an almost daily basis. It started in September, when the Liberals put out a call for political contributions. (The party is about $500,000 in debt — down from $1 million, when Taft took over as leader.) Within hours, the NDP put out a press release denouncing the Liberals as “political panhandlers seeking handouts from big business.” Ever since, it’s been common for the NDP to complain about the “Liberals and Conservatives.” “In many ways, they’re more vicious to us than the Conservatives are,” says Blakeman. (Over the course of a month, Fast Forward put in numerous requests with the NDP to interview leader Brian Mason for this story. The interview was never arranged, despite repeated phone calls and e-mails.)
Though it’s hard to imagine now, some Liberals have considered the possibility of a Liberal-NDP merger. “I think history tells us we’d be fools to rule it out,” says Blakeman. “And it’s fairly recent history, too…. I watched what happened federally and went, ‘OK, if it can happen there, it can happen anywhere.’” Calgary MLA David Swann says he’s also considered the possibility, and raised it in conversation with his colleagues. “If we don’t make substantial gains in this next election, I think we need to start talking very substantively about forming a stronger opposition,” he says. However, Swann says “it’s a pretty hard sell” — particularly in Edmonton, where the NDP has its four seats.
When I ask Taft if a merger is on the radar at all, his response is immediate: “No.” Mason has described the Liberals’ policy of accepting donations from oil and gas companies as “unconscionable and unforgivable.” “How do you work with somebody like that?” says Taft. “The New Democrats can be as sanctimonious as they want. At the end of the day, they’re politically irrelevant.”
For over 36 years, both the Liberals and the NDP have struggled to be politically relevant, and to meaningfully connect with voters. At election time, they’ve consistently come up short. “This is a bloody long time to be in opposition,” says Blakeman, who has been an MLA since 1997. “(Taft) is the fourth leader that I’ve served under, and he’s the only one I’ve seen who’s most likely to succeed.”
But will he be able to pull off a victory next spring, when the next election will likely be held? “That decision is with the voters,” says Taft. “I do know that for the first time in 15 years, politics in Alberta are actually unpredictable.”
Correction, November 15, 2007: In this story, we said Alberta NDP leader Brian Mason has “described the Liberals’ policy of accepting donations from oil and gas companies as ‘unconscionable and unforgivable.’” This statement is incorrect. In fact, Mason’s quote was taken from an October NDP press release about oil and gas royalties. In the release, Mason criticized the Conservatives and Liberals — who, he pointed out, both receive substantial corporate donations — for taking weak stances on oil and gas royalties. He called their positions “unconscionable and unforgivable.” Fast Forward regrets the incorrect use of the quote.
