Alberta Premier Smith Faces Crucial Leadership Vote at Party Convention

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and her cabinet take questions from the audience at the Alberta UCP 2024 annual general meeting at Westerner Park in Red Deer, Alta., on Nov. 1, 2024. Omid Ghoreishi/The Epoch Times

RED DEER, Alta.—Alberta Premier and UCP Leader Danielle Smith will face an important leadership vote on Nov. 2 as her party holds its annual general meeting.

Around 6,000 members have registered to attend this year’s two-day event in Red Deer, which started on Nov. 1. Party organizers say the number of attendees is a record not only for the UCP, but for any party in the country holding a convention of this kind.

“Nobody has held a paid political convention this big,” says Dave Prisco, a spokesperson for the party.

The bigger turnout this year could be related to the leadership vote, as some groups who want to see Smith gone have mobilized supporters to get a larger representation, while many have also registered to counter those votes.

“I think that there’s a lot of excitement here in support of Premier Smith,” Mike Ellis, deputy premier and minister of public safety and emergency services, told The Epoch Times.

“Premier Smith is in the category of a leader who listens to the membership and does what is right for the people of Alberta. And the other thing too is this is a premier and a leader that’s going to stand up for Albertans.”

Among those posing opposition to her leadership are former Smith ally and Take Back Alberta founder David Parker, and 1905 Committee organizer Nadine Wellwood.

“Excited to see the fruit of my labour. The largest AGM [annual general meeting] for a political party in Canadian History,” Parker wrote on Nov. 1.

“We have created a movement that forces accountability.”

At last year’s event, when there was no leadership vote, 3,700 delegates came to take part in inner-party votes on policy and governance resolutions and board member elections.

Leadership Review

Under UCP rules, leaders are required to have their tenure confirmed by the membership once in a three-year period. The party had a leadership race in 2022 and went to an election in 2023, so the leadership review is happening at this year’s AGM.

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith and two of her cabinet members at the Alberta UCP 2024 annual general meeting at Westerner Park in Red Deer, Alta., on Nov. 1, 2024. Omid Ghoreishi/The Epoch Times

The rules specify that getting less than 50 percent of the vote would automatically trigger a leadership election. However, former leader and Premier Jason Kenney resigned in 2022 after getting 51.4 percent of the vote, saying it’s “not adequate support to continue on as leader.”

Smith hasn’t specified a threshold she wants to meet to stay on as leader, but has said she wishes to improve on the 53.8 percent support she received in the 2022 leadership election.

Tenure

Smith won the 2022 leadership race while campaigning against COVID-19 restrictions that were one of the main reasons for the ouster of Kenney by the membership.

Shortly after becoming leader and premier in October 2022, she brought in her promised Sovereignty Act which she said would be used to stand up to any jurisdictional infringement attempts by the federal government, and pushed back on Ottawa’s gun control legislation and other initiatives such as a net-zero electricity grid.

She led her party to a majority election win in 2023 against the NDP, with the voting mostly divided along urban-rural lines.

Just ahead of the leadership review, Smith’s government on Oct. 28 tabled legislation to amend the province’s Bill of Rights to, among others, add language regarding the right to refuse vaccination and reinforce property and gun rights.

In addition, her government on Oct. 31 went ahead with tabling legislation to prohibit gender transition for minors, require parental consent for students to change pronouns at schools, and establish women-only sports divisions.

“I support her because no one’s perfect, but she is doing the best she can. I think she’s doing a good job,” Brenda Ans, director of the Red Deer UCP Constituency Association, said in an interview.

Ans says she supports Smith because of the work she’s done to oppose COVID-19 mandates, her treatment-focused approach to drug addiction and homelessness and opposition to government-supplied drugs for injection sites, and for her support of parental rights.

“If we don’t have her, then who do they want? There’s nobody else.”

Wellwood, whose 1905 organization advocates for more selective skills-based immigration and a flat tax, has criticized the Smith government’s management of provincial finances, and is asking for the size of government to be reduced. Wellwood was disqualified by the UCP from seeking a candidacy nomination in 2022.

“Had Danielle Smith been a true conservative, she would have reduced the size of government, reduced the budget, [and] this would not be a problem,” she said on Oct. 30 in reaction to news that Smith said her projected budget surplus could be at risk if oil prices don’t rebound.

Annual General Meeting

The first day of the convention saw Smith take the stage as host, prodding her ministers to tell the attendees what their portfolios entail and taking questions from the audience.

Party members also reviewed and voted on governance resolutions.

The leadership vote and review of policy resolutions will take place on Nov. 2.

Policy resolutions serve as a representation of the wish of the party grassroots, and are not binding for cabinet to adopt.

Nevertheless, some of the items voted in by members in last year’s convention did make their way into the legislature, including restrictions on the gender transition of minors and ensuring female-only sports divisions.

Among the policies being considered this year are ensuring merit-based hiring in the public service, giving the province more control over immigration, and taking more action to strengthen parental rights.