Premier Danielle Smith is going further than any other Canadian leader in regulating transgender treatment and surgery. She will virtually outlaw any mention of sex in the classroom.
Some students took to the streets on Wednesday to protest. That’s not a look a premier generally wants.
Why on earth is she suddenly so determined to regulate things that aren’t even happening, including mythical transgender surgeries under age 18?
It’s about her United Conservative Party, of course.
On the first weekend in November, UCP members will vote on a simple question: Do you approve of Leader Danielle Smith, yes or no?
The UCP has already booked Westerner Park event centre in Red Deer.
That will be the only party vote on Smith’s leadership before the next election in 2027.
Former premier Jason Kenney was forced out by the UCP he so lovingly created. The memories — and the warnings — are still fresh.
Smith has a much smaller government majority than Kenney did. She may look strong from day to day, but her party is still a house of sand that can collapse under any leader’s feet.
This political reality explains Smith’s invasive rules. So does the instant expression of delight from David Parker, leader of Take Back Alberta.
Smith’s people hotly deny a connection with TBA. They say it’s all done with the good of families and children in mind.
But every veteran conservative strategist I’ve spoken to says it’s perfectly obvious — Smith is playing to the angriest element in her party.
To placate those people, Smith is going even further than her members demanded at last November’s annual general meeting held at Calgary’s BMO Centre.
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The members passed a policy proposal asking government to “enshrine the doctor-patient relationship” by “protecting Alberta physicians from undue third-party interference.”
Rules should “neither compel physicians to prescribe treatments nor prohibit them from prescribing treatments.
“Physicians must have their rights protected so that they are always able to do what they know is in the best interests of their patients.”
Those UCP members were angry about vaccine mandates and prohibition of “off-label medications” for treating COVID-19. They weren’t thinking of LGBTQ+ and transgender teens.
But now, doctors complain that the new rules about consulting and treating transgender children violate the very principle endorsed by the party.
The whole point of a principle is that it applies in all cases. This one turns out to be purely situational.
At that same convention, school libraries came under bitter attack as cesspools of “racism, bigotry, violence, sexual and physical abuse, and explicit sexual content via cartoon pornography.”
The members railed against inmates who were “male at conception” being transferred to women’s prison.
The convention was a hothouse of social conservative anxiety.
Oddly, though, not one resolution mentioned youth or adult transgender treatment, surgery, age restrictions or rules of any kind.
Members did want a clear declaration of parents’ rights to approve change of children’s pronouns and names.
But they had nothing to say about the most controversial elements of Smith’s current plan.
Once again, Kenney is the cautionary tale for this premier.
As anger rose over COVID restrictions, he called out the angriest elements of his party.
He said they weren’t part of the UCP base. “Those are not Alberta conservatives, those are not mainstream Albertans,” Kenney said. “Those are voices of extremism and hatred.”
As the leadership vote approached, Kenney’s campaigners surveyed members. The result showed at least 65 per cent support, more than enough for him to stay.
Their personal pleas and calls also convinced them that Kenney had strong backing from the membership.
But when the votes were counted on May 17, 2022, he only got 51.4 per cent. Kenney announced that he would resign.
“I believe to this day that pro-Kenney members thought he had it won and didn’t vote,” said one scarred veteran of that campaign, “but the angriest people all voted.”
Smith got the message.
Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald
X: @DonBraid
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