WHAT UCP STANDS FOR IS OFFENSIVE

Premier Kenney distances government from 'offensive' essay

Dave Breakenridge -Edmonton Journal  


Premier Jason Kenney is attempting to distance himself and his government from a provincial essay contest that produced a racist, sexist third-place winner.

Jason Kenney speaks at an event at Spruce Meadows in Calgary on Wednesday, May 18, 2022.

On his weekly radio show, Kenney admitted the third-place essay, which argued women are “not exactly” equal to men and should be encouraged to have babies to avoid “cultural suicide,” was offensive, but added he doesn’t know “what happened here.”

“There was clearly a breakdown in how they assessed the essays,” Kenney said.

“This is not the government. People in the legislature have different associations and they do different projects. This is one they screwed up. They’ve admitted that, they’ve apologized and committed to ensure that it doesn’t happen again.”

The Her Vision Inspires contest invited women aged 17 to 25 to submit essays in February describing their ideas for the province and what they would do if they were a member of the legislative assembly.

The third-place winner, attributed to S. Silver, contained a passage that states: “While it is sadly popular nowadays to think that the world would be better off without humans, or that Albertan children are unnecessary as we can import foreigners to replace ourselves, this is a sickly mentality that amounts to a drive for cultural suicide.”

The contest was organzied and judged by MLAs Jackie Armstrong-Homeniuk , now the associate minister for the status of women, in her capacity as Alberta’s representative to the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians Association, an organization Kenney says he had never heard of before last week.

Camrose MLA Jackie Lovely, the parliamentary secretary for the status of women, was the only other judge.

Kenney said on his radio show that he doesn’t know what the judging process was, and is “waiting for a report on that.”

Lovely and Armstrong-Homeniuk, who have both admitted the essay shouldn’t have been chosen, have faced calls for their resignation.

The office of assembly Speaker Nathan Cooper has said neither he nor the legislative assembly office had anything to do with running the contest or picking winners.

One entrant in the contest, Emelia Kazakawich, has said that while she doesn’t feel the ministers should resign , calling that idea “unproductive,” there needs to be a change in behaviour from those in government.