USELESS CALGARY PARTY
Braid: UCP leadership run could spell end of Calgary dominanceDon Braid, Calgary Herald -
Calgary dominates, if not in hockey at this moment, certainly in provincial politics.
© Provided by Calgary Herald
The Calgary skyline was photographed on Thursday, January 27, 2022.
The city is wildly overrepresented in the UCP cabinet, partly through electoral fate (Edmonton holds only a single UCP riding) but also because of Premier Jason Kenney’s choices.
As a result, resentment among UCP members in the countryside and small cities could be a key factor in the leadership election to replace the premier.
Northern annoyance was certainly in play when Ed Stelmach won the PC leadership in 2006, following 13 years of Calgary premier Ralph Klein.
In final balloting, Stelmach, from Vegreville, was the only northerner up against Calgarians Ted Morton and Jim Dinning.
The northern vote wasn’t everything but it tipped the scales in Stelmach’s surprising third-count victory.
And here we are again, with a regional balance so lopsided it has alienated UCP members not just in the north, but across much of southern Alberta outside Calgary.
This could give an advantage to out-of-town leadership candidates, especially Brian Jean (Fort McMurray) and Finance Minister Travis Toews (Grande Prairie) if he decides to run.
Similarly, the disparity might cause trouble for Calgarians who enter the race, perhaps including ministers Rajan Sawhney and Rebecca Schulz.
The city is home to 12 full ministers. The rest of the province has only eight.
The city is wildly overrepresented in the UCP cabinet, partly through electoral fate (Edmonton holds only a single UCP riding) but also because of Premier Jason Kenney’s choices.
As a result, resentment among UCP members in the countryside and small cities could be a key factor in the leadership election to replace the premier.
Northern annoyance was certainly in play when Ed Stelmach won the PC leadership in 2006, following 13 years of Calgary premier Ralph Klein.
In final balloting, Stelmach, from Vegreville, was the only northerner up against Calgarians Ted Morton and Jim Dinning.
The northern vote wasn’t everything but it tipped the scales in Stelmach’s surprising third-count victory.
And here we are again, with a regional balance so lopsided it has alienated UCP members not just in the north, but across much of southern Alberta outside Calgary.
This could give an advantage to out-of-town leadership candidates, especially Brian Jean (Fort McMurray) and Finance Minister Travis Toews (Grande Prairie) if he decides to run.
Similarly, the disparity might cause trouble for Calgarians who enter the race, perhaps including ministers Rajan Sawhney and Rebecca Schulz.
The city is home to 12 full ministers. The rest of the province has only eight.
The count is just as skewed among the associate ministers who oversee chunks of larger portfolios.
Calgary UCP members hold four of these associate posts. The rest of the province has one.
The final score of full and associate ministers is:
Calgary 16;
Rest of Alberta, 9.
A Calgary UCP MLA has a 57 per cent chance of getting into Kenney’s inner cabinet circle.
An out-of-towner has a 23 per cent chance.
This is a recipe for regional trouble on a grand scale. We’ve already seen it explode time and again in rural ridings.
MLAs from these areas did not see their views represented or even understood by a cabinet so top-heavy with ministers from a big city.
“Rural Albertans are feeling frustrated, that they’re not being heard, and this (the Calgary factor) is definitely something that surfaces,” says Airdrie-Cochrane MLA Peter Guthrie.
“It’s not something that is pointed to all the time, but it does come up.”
© Jim Wells
Calgary UCP members hold four of these associate posts. The rest of the province has one.
The final score of full and associate ministers is:
Calgary 16;
Rest of Alberta, 9.
A Calgary UCP MLA has a 57 per cent chance of getting into Kenney’s inner cabinet circle.
An out-of-towner has a 23 per cent chance.
This is a recipe for regional trouble on a grand scale. We’ve already seen it explode time and again in rural ridings.
MLAs from these areas did not see their views represented or even understood by a cabinet so top-heavy with ministers from a big city.
“Rural Albertans are feeling frustrated, that they’re not being heard, and this (the Calgary factor) is definitely something that surfaces,” says Airdrie-Cochrane MLA Peter Guthrie.
“It’s not something that is pointed to all the time, but it does come up.”
© Jim Wells
Following a 51.4 per cent approval rating from the leadership review, Jason Kenney said on Wednesday, May 18, 2022, he will be stepping down as leader of the United Conservative Party.
Kenney himself obviously cares about rural Alberta. One of his proudest achievements was an $815-million irrigation project in the southeast , with participation from Ottawa and area farmers.
He campaigned across rural areas for both the leadership and election campaigns. He seems to like nothing more than events in small centres.
But it’s one thing for a premier to make friends with people outside his home base, and quite another to let them into the heart of government.
Kenney’s failure to do so is almost inexplicable. The rest of the province surely had many MLAs who could have done as well or better than the Calgary ministers.
But Kenney seemed quite unconcerned by the Calgary factor that has worried conservative premiers all the way back to the PC founder, Peter Lougheed.
When Lougheed retired in 1985 after 14 years as premier, he worried that another Calgarian would provoke resentment. That’s why he favoured Edmontonian Don Getty.
Getty served for seven years. But after he left in 1992, Calgary dominance resumed with Klein, Alison Redford, Jim Prentice and now Kenney.
Lougheed took office in 1971, 51 years ago. Calgary conservative premiers have run the Alberta show for 38 of those years.
Those premiers, aware of sensitivities, usually took care to balance cabinet posts among the two big cities and the rest of the province.
Kenney didn’t have much to work with in Edmonton — only Kaycee Madu got elected in 2019. But that was even more reason to pick more ministers from rural and small-city Alberta.
About 60 per cent of UCP members live outside Calgary and Edmonton. Many more will join up during the leadership race.
They’re very likely to want one of their own this time around. Who could blame them?
Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald.
Kenney himself obviously cares about rural Alberta. One of his proudest achievements was an $815-million irrigation project in the southeast , with participation from Ottawa and area farmers.
He campaigned across rural areas for both the leadership and election campaigns. He seems to like nothing more than events in small centres.
But it’s one thing for a premier to make friends with people outside his home base, and quite another to let them into the heart of government.
Kenney’s failure to do so is almost inexplicable. The rest of the province surely had many MLAs who could have done as well or better than the Calgary ministers.
But Kenney seemed quite unconcerned by the Calgary factor that has worried conservative premiers all the way back to the PC founder, Peter Lougheed.
When Lougheed retired in 1985 after 14 years as premier, he worried that another Calgarian would provoke resentment. That’s why he favoured Edmontonian Don Getty.
Getty served for seven years. But after he left in 1992, Calgary dominance resumed with Klein, Alison Redford, Jim Prentice and now Kenney.
Lougheed took office in 1971, 51 years ago. Calgary conservative premiers have run the Alberta show for 38 of those years.
Those premiers, aware of sensitivities, usually took care to balance cabinet posts among the two big cities and the rest of the province.
Kenney didn’t have much to work with in Edmonton — only Kaycee Madu got elected in 2019. But that was even more reason to pick more ministers from rural and small-city Alberta.
About 60 per cent of UCP members live outside Calgary and Edmonton. Many more will join up during the leadership race.
They’re very likely to want one of their own this time around. Who could blame them?
Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald.
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