Herald Column: Promises, Promises, Promises

My latest Calgary Herald column looks at the emerging and troubling trend of Premier Alison Redford backing down from her campaign promises:

Given the absurd lengths of the Progressive Conservative leadership race, not to mention the very high stakes, it is hardly surprising that campaign promises were in abundance.
After all, we wanted to know what these candidates would do as Premier, and they all had ample opportunity, day after day, to provide lengthy answers.
Of course, when it comes to campaigning politicians, nuance is often scarce. “This is what I will do” is a much better sell that “this is what I hope to do, if circumstances allow”.
Plus, it’s rare that politicians are punished for breaking promises — it’s almost as though we’ve come to expect it. So the message is then clear: promise whatever you think you need to promise, and sort it all out after you win.
That’s the position Alison Redford now finds herself in. Her many promises helped propel her to victory and she’s now faced with the prospect of keeping them.
She was very quick to keep one of them: finding $107-million dollars for the education system. Other promises face an uncertain future.
It’s no secret, for example, that Redford’s promise to hold a judicial inquiry into the intimidation of physicians and other failings within the health-care system was opposed by virtually all of the Tory caucus.
Standing alone on this issue might play well in a campaign, but it’s another matter entirely when having to now lead that same caucus. Consequently, Redford’s insistence that a judge be the one to lead a health care inquiry is suddenly negotiable.
The backtracking doesn’t end there, however.
For instance, on the question of protecting freedom of speech, Redford’s commitment was unequivocal: “ ... freedom of expression must be shielded and Section 3 of the Alberta Human Rights Act should be repealed.”
Yet, in her mandate letter to Justice Minister Verlyn Olson, the Minister has been instructed to “assess the appropriateness of amending or repealing Section 3 of the Alberta Human Rights Act”.
So a firm belief that Section 3 should be repealed is now an uncertainty about whether repealing Section 3 — or even amending it — is appropriate.
That’s not to say this promise has yet been broken. But if Olson reports back to Redford that repealing Section 3 is a bad idea, how will she respond? Why didn’t Olson’s mandate include simply following through on the promise in the first place: “Section 3 needs to go. Make it happen”?
On the question of fixed election dates, however, it’s clear that Redford has broken her promise. In fact, in this instance, it would seem as though she’s gone out of her way to do so.
Most other provinces have fixed election dates. Even here in Alberta, municipal elections occur every three years on the third Monday in October.
This is what Redford envisioned for Alberta. She emphasized the importance of changing the status quo by denouncing the “behind-the-scenes deal-making and manipulation that characterize the timing of an election”.
However, under the proposed Election Amendment Act, Albertans would go to the polls every four years, sometime between March 1 and May 31. The exact date would be determined by none other than the sitting government.
While the government is trying to spin this as a creative and flexible way of keeping the Premier’s promise, anything other than a fixed election date is not a fixed election date. Moreover, it’s hard to see what purpose this serves.
If “flexibility” is so important, the status quo offers that in spades. Government House Leader Dave Hancock claimed last week that this is the sort of flexibility that other provinces would like to have, yet oddly no other province has done so.
If the government is worried about winter weather, then don’t schedule an election in the winter. It’s pretty simple. Yet, in this instance, the government has turned what should be simple into a muddled mess.
If politicians don’t want to be held to account for the promises they make, then perhaps they ought to be more careful about what they promise. It is in no way unfair to call out this Premier for failing to live up to her own words.