When leadership matters: Former cabinet minister James Moore on why we should applaud Danielle Smith

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith speaks about the impact of coastal First Nations and B.C. Premier Eby not being brought into the MOU discussion earlier.

James Moore is a former federal cabinet minister under prime minister Stephen Harper, and a columnist for CTVNews.ca.

Across Canada, at all times, we are an appropriately judgmental people when it comes to holding our political leaders accountable. This is particularly true when we think our leaders have failed us, disappointed us or misled us.

Whether it is a municipal politician caught in a scandal, a provincial cabinet minister who makes a terrible decision, an opposition backbencher who loses his temper in a parliamentary exchange, or a prime minister who flat out betrays a campaign commitment from just a few months ago and thinks the public won’t notice. And this is how it should be.

The anger, judgement and condemnation against politicians are typically fast, furious and often unforgiving. With the quick thumbs of angry taxpayers blazing away on smart phones and out onto social media platforms, the disdain of the latest politician who disappoints or angers us is seemingly constant.

What we ought to do more often is the inverse. When a leader rises to an occasion that is thirsting for reason, selflessness or courage, we ought to recognize that leadership when we see it and hopefully signal a future democratic reward system for others who are contemplating similar acts of good judgment.

I’ll do my part to walk my talk here and offer my appreciation and admiration for Alberta Premier Danielle Smith for her leadership and for her half of the partnership of the “Canada-Alberta Memorandum of Understanding” that she signed with Prime Minister Mark Carney last week.

In broad strokes, the deal is objectively good for Alberta’s future and represents a principled compromise with Prime Minister Carney towards establish lasting clarity on how we might build a pipeline in Canada, and much more.

Of course, the way forward is enormously complex and fraught with challenges from those who will always say no to the energy sector. But for most moderate and open-minded Canadians who want Canada to diversify our economy away from Donald Trump’s America, and who are open to the responsible development of our resources, this was a significant week of progress.

From modernizing the emissions cap on the oilsands to unlock large scale investments in production, to pursuing nuclear power production to satisfy skyrocketing energy demands on the horizon, to mandating Indigenous co-ownership and equity participation in projects, to shelving absurd electricity and emissions restrictions to open the door to AI data centre agreements, and more. These compromises and reforms are vast in scope and deep in substance.

• Praise, discontent, resignations follow Carney-Smith agreement on future pipeline

The benefits of some of the changes will be felt far beyond Alberta as well. This success could trigger more wins elsewhere for Canada. Newfoundland and Labrador’s new premier, Tony Wakeham, declared last week that his province is “in the oil business and we need Ottawa at the table as a real partner.” The policy unlock of the “Canada-Alberta Memorandum of Understanding” could well broaden Canada’s economic opportunities both to the east and to the west in ways that were utterly unimaginable under former prime minister Justin Trudeau.

I am not naïve. I recognize the steep hill that is ahead for project development, tanker policy, B.C. coastal access, deep Indigenous opposition, the complexity of route design, the regulatory burden that exists, the roadblocks that are real and the shifting economics of resource development in the energy sector. No one should be fooled into thinking the road ahead is easy. And, for Prime Minister Carney, the politics of the accord with Alberta is fraught with political complications for him that will challenge his hold on borrowed progressive voters who supported him in the last campaign.

However, with all that having been said, I want to come back to Alberta Premier Danielle Smith. She didn’t have to do this. She didn’t have to make a deal with Prime Minister Carney. She could have stood aggressively against any imposition of a $130 per tonne carbon tax, she could have demanded faster timelines for regulatory changes, she could have picked an endless series of fights if she wanted to.

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She could have dug in and sparred with a Liberal government and pinned all of Alberta’s simmering anger at the four-term, 10-plus year-old Liberal government and wedged her way to re-election. She could easily have said of Prime Minister Carney: ‘A Liberal is a Liberal, Trudeau and Carney, same is same, nothing will improve for Alberta under any Liberal government and I’m here for the fight.’

The next Alberta election isn’t scheduled until the fall of 2027, so she could have chewed up much of next year picking fights instead of making progress. She chose not to. She chose better. She chose to advance Alberta’s interests, and Canadians beyond Alberta need to recognize this moment.

It is true to say that Prime Minister Carney’s popularity in Alberta compared to Justin Trudeau helps make things easier for Premier Smith to find alignment on the policy challenges ahead of us. It is certainly fair to say that Prime Minister Carney is taking significant risks of his own that he will have to politically mitigate in the months ahead. But Danielle Smith’s moment of political leadership is undeniable. And when she stood before United Conservative Party delegates in Edmonton on the weekend you could see why.

It has been observed that, at times, managing the factions of Alberta’s conservative movement within a single political party is often more challenging than governing the province itself. The passions are real, the principles are deeply held, and expectations for results for your world view are high when the party holds a majority government, which is the case with Premier Smith. Not all factions are always reasonable and when it comes to confederation and the deeply held perspective that Alberta’s needs have not only been mishandled but deliberately sabotaged for ideological fetish or crude regional politics, tempers can run hot.

When Premier Smith heard booing at her party convention after she said: “I hope people today feel a lot more confident that Canada works than they did a couple of days ago,” she didn’t flinch. In her keynote address she spoke about her deal to pragmatically move towards successfully advancing Alberta energy projects forward, we saw a moment of fearless leadership.

Alberta separatists in the room tried to embarrass her and belittle her achievements for the province she loves a few times over the weekend, but they failed. She didn’t waiver or buckle in her confidence. It was an important moment. Both the Memorandum of Understanding and the steely defence of Alberta within a united Canada in the face of those who would rather be angry and loud than constructive and reasonable was a breath of fresh air for us to witness.

As quick as we are all too often to complain about political leaders when they let us down, we should pause in moments like this and raise a glass to toast Danielle Smith for reminding us that leadership means taking risks, being responsible in delivering good policy and good government, and being fearless and tireless in the defense of your actions when you know you are on the right side of history.

Bravo, Premier Smith. Job well done.

More from James Moore:

• Imagine if this fragile Parliament shrinks down to a 1-seat margin
• Carney’s pipeline hesitation reveals limits of his ‘nation-building’ vision
• Carney’s ambitious ‘major projects’ is what Canada needs, but come with big risks