PEAS IN A POD
Tank: Sask. premier's Moe-jo may depart with Alberta's KenneyPhil Tank, Saskatoon StarPhoenix
© Provided by Star Phoenix
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney, left, appears with Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe in July of 2019 in Saskatoon, Sask.
We know Alberta will get a new premier, but Saskatchewan might get a new leader, too.
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney announced this month that he will quit as leader of Alberta’s United Conservative Party, but some wonder whether he also announced his resignation as Saskatchewan’s de facto leader.
Many see Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe as so much a reflection of Kenney in terms of policy and strategy that you can’t help but wonder whether Moe is feeling a little lost.
What will he do without his mentor/role model/chief strategist? Who will Moe copycat now? Kenney’s successor?
Sometimes, the similarity between Kenney and Moe seemed eerie, particularly in their reckless responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.
One of Kenney’s most-referenced blunders was declaring the “best summer ever” in June 2021 prior to the lifting of pandemic restrictions and a predictable surge in cases.
Moe followed two days after Kenney with a similar toast to a “great Saskatchewan summer” and ditching restrictions.
As with Alberta, Saskatchewan suffered through one of the worst stretches in Canada during the pandemic last fall, with Moe only reluctantly opting to impose restrictions, including a vaccine mandate, after Kenney had.
Moe takes an almost identical approach on federal-provincial relations to Kenney, relying on western victimization and bashing of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the carbon tax. Call Moe a carbon copy.
Yet Kenney was consumed by the conflict within his own party and challenges to his leadership from the right wing inside his party. Moe appears to have emerged relatively unscathed.
Five years ago, you could hardly have predicted that outcome.
Kenney arrived from a career in federal politics as a conquering conservative hero to unite the right and defeat the NDP in Alberta. That worked until division by the very forces Kenney tried to unite consumed him.
Kenney won the UCP leadership in 2017 with 60 per cent of the vote on the first ballot, an outcome almost unheard of for a contested leadership.
Moe, a few months after Kenney was elected UCP leader, trailed in the Saskatchewan leadership race until the fourth ballot, when he topped 30 per cent for the first time. Moe edged bureaucrat Alanna Koch on the fifth ballot.
If you had to forecast based on their leadership wins who would be leaving in less than five years due to internal division, you probably would have predicted Moe.
But the forces that doomed Kenney in Alberta also exist in Saskatchewan, except perhaps the serious threat the NDP poses to any right-wing party.
Rachel Notley’s Alberta NDP is competitive, while the Saskatchewan edition is not seen as a viable alternative to form government.
On the right flank, however, the Saskatchewan Party faces the same threats.
There could soon be three registered right-wing parties aiming to syphon support, with True North Saskatchewan and the Saskatchewan United Party trying to get the signatures needed to join the Buffalo Party.
So many parties with Saskatchewan in their names might mean a bigger ballot is needed.
Yet Moe has mostly given people opposed to vaccine mandates everything they wanted, starting with leading Canada in ending pandemic mandates despite the threat to public safety. More than 400 people have died of COVID-19 this year.
None of that proved enough for some in Saskatchewan. And if you try too hard to accommodate the right-wingers, you alienate the moderates, the so-called middle that is crucial to election wins, which the Saskatchewan Party has courted so successfully.
We see this dynamic playing out in the federal Conservative race with Pierre Poilievre’s divisive right-wing bid opposing pandemic mandates, supporting anti-mandate protesters and pandering to conspiracy theorists.
Poilievre’s campaign website claims the support of 21 Saskatchewan Party MLAs, including cabinet ministers Dustin Duncan and Christine Tell. That compares to six MLAs from all the other provinces.
Moe’s critics fail to give him credit for his political shrewdness, but no leader trying to hold together a centre-right coalition can avoid certain realities.
A tent can only hold so many before it bursts.
Phil Tank is the digital opinion editor at the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
ptank@postmedia.com
twitter.com/thinktankSK
We know Alberta will get a new premier, but Saskatchewan might get a new leader, too.
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney announced this month that he will quit as leader of Alberta’s United Conservative Party, but some wonder whether he also announced his resignation as Saskatchewan’s de facto leader.
Many see Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe as so much a reflection of Kenney in terms of policy and strategy that you can’t help but wonder whether Moe is feeling a little lost.
What will he do without his mentor/role model/chief strategist? Who will Moe copycat now? Kenney’s successor?
Sometimes, the similarity between Kenney and Moe seemed eerie, particularly in their reckless responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.
One of Kenney’s most-referenced blunders was declaring the “best summer ever” in June 2021 prior to the lifting of pandemic restrictions and a predictable surge in cases.
Moe followed two days after Kenney with a similar toast to a “great Saskatchewan summer” and ditching restrictions.
As with Alberta, Saskatchewan suffered through one of the worst stretches in Canada during the pandemic last fall, with Moe only reluctantly opting to impose restrictions, including a vaccine mandate, after Kenney had.
Moe takes an almost identical approach on federal-provincial relations to Kenney, relying on western victimization and bashing of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the carbon tax. Call Moe a carbon copy.
Yet Kenney was consumed by the conflict within his own party and challenges to his leadership from the right wing inside his party. Moe appears to have emerged relatively unscathed.
Five years ago, you could hardly have predicted that outcome.
Kenney arrived from a career in federal politics as a conquering conservative hero to unite the right and defeat the NDP in Alberta. That worked until division by the very forces Kenney tried to unite consumed him.
Kenney won the UCP leadership in 2017 with 60 per cent of the vote on the first ballot, an outcome almost unheard of for a contested leadership.
Moe, a few months after Kenney was elected UCP leader, trailed in the Saskatchewan leadership race until the fourth ballot, when he topped 30 per cent for the first time. Moe edged bureaucrat Alanna Koch on the fifth ballot.
If you had to forecast based on their leadership wins who would be leaving in less than five years due to internal division, you probably would have predicted Moe.
But the forces that doomed Kenney in Alberta also exist in Saskatchewan, except perhaps the serious threat the NDP poses to any right-wing party.
Rachel Notley’s Alberta NDP is competitive, while the Saskatchewan edition is not seen as a viable alternative to form government.
On the right flank, however, the Saskatchewan Party faces the same threats.
There could soon be three registered right-wing parties aiming to syphon support, with True North Saskatchewan and the Saskatchewan United Party trying to get the signatures needed to join the Buffalo Party.
So many parties with Saskatchewan in their names might mean a bigger ballot is needed.
Yet Moe has mostly given people opposed to vaccine mandates everything they wanted, starting with leading Canada in ending pandemic mandates despite the threat to public safety. More than 400 people have died of COVID-19 this year.
None of that proved enough for some in Saskatchewan. And if you try too hard to accommodate the right-wingers, you alienate the moderates, the so-called middle that is crucial to election wins, which the Saskatchewan Party has courted so successfully.
We see this dynamic playing out in the federal Conservative race with Pierre Poilievre’s divisive right-wing bid opposing pandemic mandates, supporting anti-mandate protesters and pandering to conspiracy theorists.
Poilievre’s campaign website claims the support of 21 Saskatchewan Party MLAs, including cabinet ministers Dustin Duncan and Christine Tell. That compares to six MLAs from all the other provinces.
Moe’s critics fail to give him credit for his political shrewdness, but no leader trying to hold together a centre-right coalition can avoid certain realities.
A tent can only hold so many before it bursts.
Phil Tank is the digital opinion editor at the Saskatoon StarPhoenix.
ptank@postmedia.com
twitter.com/thinktankSK
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