Thoughts on BC Politics and More

A former member of Premier Danielle Smith's government caucus says Elections Alberta has approved the name for a new political party, after the province banned a list of monikers it could use, including "conservative." Airdrie-Cochrane legislature member Peter Guthrie announced in a social media post on Thursday evening that the new party will be known as the Progressive Tory Party of Alberta. "That's right. There will be another conservative option on the ballot in the next election — one that's socially reliable, fiscally responsible and answers to all of you," Guthrie said in a video with the post ... CLICK HERE for the full story 

IMAGE CREDIT:   Discover Airdrie In this week’s episode of The Line Alberta podcast, Rob Breakenridge sits down for a conversation with Airdrie-Cochrane MLA Peter Guthrie, who just recently became leader of the Alberta Party. Guthrie, of course, started the year as a member of Danielle Smith’s cabinet, before stepping down over his concerns about how the government was handling the controversy around health care contracts and procurement. His calls for a public inquiry into the matter led to his expulsion from the UCP caucus. Since then, Guthrie has become a sharp critic of the Smith government and has been organizing to present Albertans with a more moderate - and federalist - conservative option. Efforts to revive the Alberta PC Party have been met with lawsuit threats from the UCP and ultimately legislative roadblocks in the form of Bill 14. In this episode, we discuss Guthrie’s own political journey and what future holds for the Alberta Party and its possible rebranding. We’ll ...

All the words of our magnificent English language have meanings, and those words and their meanings belong to all of us who speak and write in English. Which is to say I can declare myself to be a progressive conservative if I wish, and those of you who read this column are free to debate that proposition if you are so inclined.  So it is both unnerving and amusing – even in this age of financialization and marketization of everything – to learn that the United Conservative Party of Alberta is ready to go to court to stop a couple of former members who happen still to have seats in the Legislative Assembly from using those words to describe their political philosophy and their political party ... CLICK HERE for the full story

Two former United Conservative MLAs will join with the centrist Alberta Party and file to rename it the Progressive Conservatives, and they'll abandon initial plans to launch a new party under the old brand that ruled Alberta for 44 years ... ... Alberta Party president Lindsay Amantea proposed that the Independent MLAs join her existing party's fold, and together they could file a name change to "Progressive Conservative" with Elections Alberta. "We figured, well they have the infrastructure; we have the momentum and the people," said Guthrie, Smith's former infrastructure minister. "So we decided, this is something that could get us to official party [recognition] faster without getting caught up in these legal wranglings with the UCP that they like to play" ... CLICK HERE for the full story

So let's put the conclusion up front. How much confidence can you place in two MLAs who want to revivify a party that's dead and buried and more particularly, didn't exactly embody the virtues they want to highlight in their new creation, whatever it's called? Not so much. Worse, it represents the kind of principled conservatism that splits the vote and gets the NDP elected ... CLICK HERE for the full story 

Two former members of Alberta's governing United Conservative Party are resuscitating the province's once-dominant Progressive Conservative Party. Former infrastructure minister Peter Guthrie and legislature member Scott Sinclair were booted from caucus earlier this year for pushing back against the Premier Danielle Smith's government and now sit as Independents. Sinclair says the province's two-party system has become too divisive, and they want to galvanize support from Albertans who feel they don't have a political home ... CLICK HERE for the full story