Thread by @ahopeross

Lmaooo watching the Danielle Smith presser and she says that a “made in Alberta” carbon tax should have always been the goal.
Uhhh it was. @RachelNotley had it working quite well and then the UCP threw it away for the federal option. Hmm. Funny that.

I swore I wasn’t going to watch this tire fire but here are some more highlights:
- Kenney has yet to accept a meeting with Smith
- Smith is getting rid of Hinshaw, she’s currently still employed but will be replaced so we can treat Covid like the flu

Smith says she and Kenney had disagreements on two big policy issues that were what tripped him up as leader.

Covid and what else?

Smith says the “only hostility she sees is on Twitter” and everyone in the UCP is very keen to keep the party moving together. Campaigned on reforming health services, changing the human rights act for vaccine choice and the sovereignty act.

Q: Fewer than 2% of those who could vote in AB actually voted for you. How will the sovereignty act work then?

Smith says that Kenney tried to be friends with the feds and she’s not going to do that. She’s going to get tough with Ottawa. Says we have acted like subordinates.

Q: What’s in your priority list for seven months from now so Albertans can re-elect you?

Good Lord who asked that question?? We didn’t elect her in the first place.

Smith says she campaigned on health spending accounts, that kids are brought up to speed in education, sovereignty act, changing the human rights act, and restructuring AB health care.

Smith says the equalization referendum should have led to a constitutional change and that the feds have done nothing but attack Alberta ever since.

Q: How are you going to keep healthcare stable while you make changes?

Smith says that reinforcements are coming and we can’t continue understaffing hospitals. Says the problem was mostly created by AHS’s mandatory vaccination policy.

Lol wtf omg

Smith says Kenney gave AHS time and money to increase surge capacity and add beds but AHS didn’t do that before the Delta variant. They’re going to change the management.

#bestsummerever

Q: Where will you be getting these new healthcare workers?

Smith says there will not be a vaccine mandate and any healthcare worker across the world who doesn’t want to be vaccinated can come here.

Smith says they will be doing fast track recognition for international health care workers and getting nurses from Makami College (uh that’s a massage therapy school…?? Unless I misheard her?) She says we will also promise not to burn out healthcare workers.

Smith says that the working conditions created by AHS in the past two years have caused people to leave the system. She claims that a paramedic friend says there is a turnover of 5 years in EMS.

Smith says the healthcare changes will be made before the end of the year.

Hey @ABDanielleSmith you’re dumb as a bag of rocks btw.

Q: What’s your msg to COP27?

Smith says that the jurisdiction of natural resources are under the province and they need to talk to the province and not Canada. Says that AB is addressing the issue of carbon neutrality.

Smith says the German Chancellor should have been brought to Alberta not to Newfoundland. Says LNG will reduce emissions and we should have met with the Germans instead.

Q: You pledged to introduce 300 ICU beds immediately but people need to man them, how do you do that on short notice?

Smith says she is going to build a task force and that the # of ICU beds are taken up by people waiting for long term care.

Smith says that moving people that are too sick to go home are moved into long term care. Says there is 20-30% vacancy in long term care and that’s where the room will be created.

[AHR note: Thats fascinating to me as my friend’s dad who is battling cancer was forced from AB long term care to private long term care last year because there wasn’t enough room…. Unless… PRIVATE 🚨]

Smith says that if she was awaiting long term care placement she would rather be in her own home so we need to fund home care and home care renovations like ramps and bathrooms. Seniors should age in place.

[AHR note: Another friend’s husband is dying of cancer at home right now and he wants to die at home but my friend can’t keep up with the amount of laundry or carrying him everywhere, but sure, her husband should “age in place”]

Smith says they will also work at training current staff to meet surge capacity. Need to bring in more workers during flu season.
Lmao yeah I bet @CupeAB and the nurses union will love that.

Smith says that AB made a wreck of ambulance services. Says a central planning model can’t work.

[Well I agree there but I assume we very much disagree on the how]

Smith says her intention is to have a new healthcare governance structure within 90 days but she has a briefing this afternoon with AHS and will see how things work first.

Rick Bell question time, starts with a congratulations.
Smith has a very sour look on her face.

Q: Let’s say you pass the sovereignty act you won’t enforce federal law and the feds take you to the Supreme Court and you are ruled against - what then?
Smith laughs and says let’s let it play out since we won’t enforce their gun confiscation scheme.

Smith says that gun control is provincial and that we will probably win if the feds take us to court.

Smith says the courts don’t always get it right and if a court desision comes down we’ll have to take it back to legislation to modify the intent and see how we can work around it.

Smith says sometimes things take years to work around the court but we have had enough. AB has tried three times to find common ground so now we will defend our own citizens.

Q: I don’t think that’s the question I asked. A sovereignty act means that if you are ruled against federally it wouldn’t matter. A lot of people who voted for you because of this.

Smith says she doesn’t think so, Rick.

Smith says there have been things claimed about what she ran on. She adopted the free alberta strategy but says she knows constitutionally there are things we couldn’t do in there.

Smith says the sovereignty act is a good one but now they need to figure out how to make it pass muster. It’s not the original idea but it does work under the constitution.

Smith says we are a combo system between the UK and the US. In the US the Supreme Court has the final say but in the UK parliamentarians have the final say. We have a hybrid allowing a conversation.

Smith says the Supreme Court ruled on carbon tax so she will find another issue to bring it back to court. Need to find another pathway to achieve her end goal. Canada is complex.

Hoooboy. She is….. hooooboy. I’m sorry for calling her dumb earlier, that was ableist of me, I know. But she is a perfect Trumpian storm of ignorant and confident. Two more questions left.

Q: What are your expectations for the byelection? Rural police force opinion? Property tax?

Smith says the byelection will be Nov 8th. Results will need to be validated. Earliest she could be in the leg would be Nov 29th.

Smith says that the UCP did a good job getting 5 years of funding for Halo but that Halo needs to be funded like STARS.

[I worked for STARS btw, it’s not nearly as well funded as you’d be led to believe at all]

Smith says rural policing is a priority. Rural province police will replace or augment the RCMP. Will create the AB provincial police very quickly. Says rural crime comes from feeding drug addiction and will train AB police on mental health and addiction calls.

Smith says the Hwy 3 upgrade is important as well. She notes that Medicine Hat is facing a serious addiction issue and needs an appropriate long term treatment centre.

Smith says her chief of staff is Marshall Smith who was featured on a recent documentary called Vancouver is Dying. Smith says her and other Smith will go against “socialist” harm reduction beliefs that have only made the problems of addiction worse.

Q: Can you touch on unpaid taxes for oil companies, and will you run in Brooks-MedBat again for re-election?

Smith says her intention is to continue on if she is elected.

Smoth says that oil companies don’t like that their mill rate varies by jurisdictions & that’s why they’re not in tax compliance.

Smith adds that she also thinks that a royalty credit program should be paired with well site cleanup. $30B liability with well cleanup. Need to look at the worst wells from the 1960s before focusing on new ones as the oil companies don’t have access to capital.

Smith says that there was a billion dollar site rehabilitation program provided by the feds but sadly Alberta didn’t end up spending it due to internal inefficiencies. She wants to reward companies who are in compliance with their tax bill with additional tax credits.

Lololol imagine not paying your taxes and the government being like “if you pay them we’ll give you a bigger tax break or you can just keep not paying them at all and that’s cool too! 😃”
Ahahahaha

Smith says that one rural community told her that they are missing out on about $7.4M in taxes from oil and gas companies and that's a lot of money.

Q: How do you see vaccine choice as equal to race, gender and sexuality in the human rights act as those things are not about choices?

Smith says that community that faced the most restrictions were those who made the choice to not be vaccinated.

Smith continues, saying she has never experienced a situation in her lifetime where a person was fired from their job or not allowed to watch their kids play hockey or not visit a loved one in long term care or not allowed to get on a plane.
[BRACE FOR IT...]

Danielle Smith says that the unvaccinated have been the most discriminated against group she has ever witnessed in her lifetime.

Ps. Danielle Smith was born in 1971

Smith says that she doesn't want to take away the discrimination faced by another groups but this has been an extraordinary time, and she finds un-vaccinated discrimination unacceptable. We are not going to create a segregated society based on a medical choice.

Smith says there was a lot of hope that the vaccine would provide "sterilizing immunity" and as a result everybody was working to get to a high level of vax but Covid mutates and we need to treat it like influenza.

Smith continues saying that about 1/3 of the population decides every year to get vaccinated against the flu. Smith says that in vaccination is self protection in this case because you have to make your own choice on your own status and pre-existing medical conditions.

Smith says we have to stop victimizing certain people because they made a different medical choice. She adds that's going to be a little challenging for some people holding a different view but this discrimination is unacceptable and she will change the human rights act.

Q: What will the teeth of the sovereignty act be in the Supreme Court still has the final say?

Smith says how the feds respond to AB not following the new gun control legislation will help us determine what the next steps are. She hopes there will be very few disagreements.

Smith says she isn't legislating federally, she isn't opening military bases, managing passport offices (although some people think she'd do a better job of it she adds), or managing airports - she respects that, they need to respect 92 & 92A of the constitution.

Smith says Quebec is treated very differently that Alberta and Alberta deserves to be treated as a senior partner in confederation. Have some common causes will Sask and Manitoba. The country was never supposed to be controlled by Ottawa.

And that's it, that's all.

Please don't ever let me watch her again.
I.... 🤢 .... miss..... 🤢 ...... Jason.......... 🤢 Kenney