Braid: Smith proposes new rules for UCP members fleeing leaders

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Premier Danielle Smith has gone further than any other Canadian leader to regulate transgender treatment and surgery. He practically forbids any talk of sex in class.

On Wednesday, some students took to the streets to protest. This is not a look the Prime Minister likes.

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Why is he suddenly so determined to regulate what's going on, including the mythical under-18 transgender surgeries?

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It is, of course, about his United Conservative Party.

On the first weekend of November, UCP members will vote on a simple question: Do you approve of leader Daniel Smith, yes or no?

UCP has already booked the Westerner Park Event Center in Red Deer.

It will be the party's only vote for Smith's leadership until the next election in 2027.

Former Prime Minister Jason Kenney was forced out by the UCP he had so lovingly created. The memories – and the reminders – are still fresh.

Smith's government majority is much smaller than Kenney's. He may look stronger by the day, but his party is still a sandbox that can crumble under any leader's feet.

This political reality explains Smith's invasive provisions. So is Take Back Alberta frontman David Parker's fleeting expression of delight.

Smith's people deny any association with TBA. According to them, all this was done for the benefit of the family and children.

But every veteran conservative strategist I've talked to says it's clear—Smith is playing to the angriest element in his party.

To placate those people, Smith goes above and beyond what his members demanded at the annual general meeting last November at the BMO Center in Calgary.

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Members passed a policy proposal asking the government to “strengthen the doctor-patient relationship” by “protecting Alberta's physicians from unwarranted third-party interference.”

The rules “must not compel physicians to prescribe treatment or prohibit them from prescribing treatment.

“Doctors' rights should be protected so they can always do what's in the best interests of their patients.”

These UCP members were outraged by vaccine mandates and bans on “off-label drugs” to treat COVID-19. They didn't think about LGBTQ+ and transgender teenagers.

But doctors are now complaining that the new rules for counseling and treatment of transgender children violate the party-endorsed principle.

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The whole point of the principle is that it applies in all cases. It just turns out to be situational.

At the same convention, school libraries were heavily attacked as repositories of “racism, bigotry, violence, sexual and physical violence, and overtly sexual content through cartoons.”

Members protested the transfer of “male-born” prisoners to a women's prison.

The convention was a hotbed of social conservative concern.

Interestingly, neither resolution mentions transgender treatment, surgery, age restrictions, or regulations of any kind for youth or adults.

Members want a clear statement of parental rights to approve children's names and name changes.

But they had nothing to say about the most controversial elements of Smith's current plan.

Again, Kenny, this is the prime minister's warning.

When angered by the Covid restrictions, he called on the angriest elements in his party.

He said they were not part of the UCP base. “These are not Alberta Conservatives, they are not mainstream Albertans,” Kenney said. “These are the voices of extremism and hatred.”

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As the leadership vote approached, Kenney's campaigners polled members. The result showed at least 65 percent support, enough for him to stay.

Their personal appeals and calls assured Kenny strong support from the membership.

But when the votes were counted on May 17, 2022, he won only 51.4 percent. Kenny announced his resignation.

“I think the Kenney supporters thought he won and didn't vote,” said one campaign veteran, “but the angriest people voted.”

Smith got the message.

Don Braid's column appears regularly in the Herald

X: @DonBraid

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