Zain: This is Strategist episode 1889. My name is Zain Velji. With me as always, Stephen Carter, Shannon Phillips. Hello, friends. Wow,
Carter: Wow, we're getting into like years that I recognize. 1889. That's pretty
Carter: pretty great stuff. I'm pretty excited.
Zain: Well, Carter, these are large numbers. I
Carter: I was born in 1889. This is a great time for me. I'm living my best life.
Zain: This is a great
Zain: Are you living your best life? I mean, this is not the episode to ask you if you're living your best life. I'm living my best life,
Carter: not
Carter: life. I'm living my best life, baby. We're going to do the accountability episodes, aren't we? We're going to do them live. We're going to do live shows. Is that what we decided? Are we actually committing
Zain: We're going to do the accountability
Shannon: committing to this on
Carter: on the podcast?
Shannon: the podcast? Yeah. We have not had a meeting about this. Shannon,
Carter: Yeah. We
Zain: meeting about this. Shannon, that means nothing.
Zain: No,
Carter: No, I mean, yeah. I guess
Zain: yeah.
Shannon: yeah.
Shannon: I guess we can have the meeting right now.
Zain: guess we can have the meeting
Zain: Let's have the meeting. Should we do this live? I think we should do it live.
Shannon: Let's
Carter: Let's
Shannon: Let's
Carter: Let's
Carter: I
Shannon: I
Carter: I think we should do it live. I think we should do it live. The Stephen
Zain: do it live. The Stephen Carter accountability episode, maybe we'll bring a guest or two in. Yeah,
Carter: Yeah, I've been approached by a couple of potential guests already. Oh,
Zain: Oh, excellent. Oh, good. Do you think any of your candidates are free? I feel like a lot of them might be. My candidates are super busy.
Carter: Oh, excellent. Oh, good. Do
Carter: you think any
Carter: unable to make it.
Carter: Okay.
Zain: Okay. Okay.
Zain: Okay.
Carter: Okay. But I've been approached by someone who wants to be a special guest already that's fairly
Carter: fairly high profile. I'm pretty excited by it. Okay. Yeah.
Zain: Okay. Yeah.
Carter: It's not Corey.
Carter: Corey's
Zain: Corey's not high profile. Well, I mean,
Carter: Well, I mean, parliamentary
Carter: parliamentary secretary for forestry or something or natural resources. I don't remember. I wasn't paying attention. Shannon, do you want to do this live?
Shannon: Oh, sure. Sure, I'll do it. I mean, availability is always an issue. So, I mean, if it's Christmas Eve, I'm probably available. But other than that, we'll see how it goes. Shannon's not going to be there, Carter. We have to do it fairly soon. I'm going to try.
Zain: Shannon's not going to be there, Carter. We have to do it fairly soon. I'm going to try. Shannon, it is an accountability episode where we got to tell Stephen Carter that he's not as good as he thinks he is.
Carter: It's not true. That's not how it works. Okay. I have some
Shannon: I have some good faith questions for Carter. Yeah,
Carter: Yeah, exactly. They're
Zain: Yeah, exactly. They're going to have to wait. Good faith. Including the therapy session. Good faith, Zane.
Carter: Good faith.
Carter: therapy session. Good faith, Zane.
Carter: Good
Zain: Good faith.
Carter: faith.
Zain: faith.
Zain: Speaking of good faith, that's maybe the title of the episode, as well as, because we took a talk about good faith bargaining. Stephen Carter, it
Zain: has not been tabled yet, however,
Zain: however, when we record. And I should tell everyone we are recording at 3
Zain: .50 p.m. on Monday, the 27th of the
Zain: October 2025. But Bill 2 in Alberta. I was going to go across the board. I was going to go Doug Ford ads, Ronald Reagan. We were going to go all, but this has just happened. So we have to talk about it. Bill 2, legislation
Carter: this has just happened.
Zain: legislation is supposedly embargoed until tabled, but if accurate,
Zain: Daniel Smith is invoking the Notwithstanding Clause to force teachers back to work.
Zain: Shannon Phillips, can you help us understand what this is? And then I want to spend the time with the both of you to understand the scope and scale of what this is from a political perspective. And then I want to talk about the path forward here as we digest this news and understand it today on Monday, the 27th of October here in Alberta. Okay,
Shannon: well, basically,
Shannon: the government has to invoke the notwithstanding clause in
Shannon: in order to pass this legislation of get these people back to work,
Shannon: because it is unconstitutional. It is an unlawful piece of legislation and the government knows it. So
Shannon: you have the right within the Constitution that we passed in 1982, or patrioted, I guess, that provincial legislatures or the federal government do have the right to override certain sections of the charter. And those sections are our fundamental freedoms, our legal rights, and our equality rights. So they have the right to override those. And the idea being in the original of the, you know, when the Constitution came in, that that was kind of the way that they got the deal to
Shannon: to get 9 out of 10 provinces to agree to the
Shannon: the charter. It kind of froze out Quebec, pissed off Lévesque. But at the end of the day, that's how the deal got done in 1980. So
Shannon: we have this and it's sort of an escape
Shannon: escape hatch for any kind of conflicts between rights that might or between legislatures or between legislature and parliament that might arise. It's supposed to be used extremely judiciously.
Shannon: And in this case, I don't think that you could argue that it is because it's just cutting off collective bargaining. The
Carter: The
Carter: The reason why we know it's unconstitutional is
Shannon: is because there's been a couple of different Supreme Court decisions upholding the right to strike as part of your right to collective bargaining. Your right to collective bargaining is captured under one of your fundamental freedoms, which is the right to free association. association we
Zain: to collective bargaining.
Shannon: we are allowed to freely associate to have this podcast we can question uh whether the courts should uphold that but it's true we can talk to each other people can talk to carter even it's a it's a charter protected right but
Carter: protected right but
Carter: but
Shannon: but i we can also band together uh and bargain collectively in our workplaces and the courts have said that like you don't really have that right unless you have the right to withdraw labor right
Shannon: right it's kind of a fake right unless you have The right to take it to its logical end, which is, you know, we're not coming back to work until we have a better negotiated process for this collective agreement.
Carter: So those are the decisions that we
Shannon: we live under as a country. And there is one way to override them. And that's with use of the notwithstanding clause. And so that's what they've done. First time in Canadian history, Doug Ford threatened to do it with educational assistance a couple of years back, and then ultimately back down due to public pressure. The
Carter: The
Shannon: The idea is that we don't override those sections of the Constitution because there'll be so much public pressure and so much scrutiny. Hard
Shannon: to have scrutiny when you're rattling through the bill in one day.
Zain: Yeah.
Zain: Carter, help me understand this, if you can.
Zain: Is there a way to send teachers back to work without issuing or without invoking, I guess is the term, the preemptive use of the notwithstanding clause? I know that's a lot of words, but is there a way that the government could have done this without the clause? I'm
Carter: I'm so glad you asked me that, Zane, because Shannon explained it to me just before the podcast. Perfect. And now I'm able to jump right in like I am. She's built your vessel, and I now
Zain: because Shannon explained it
Zain: She's built your vessel, and I now want you to empty it on the show. Thank you.
Carter: now
Carter: want you to empty it
Shannon: it
Carter: it
Shannon: it on
Carter: on the show.
Shannon: show.
Carter: show.
Carter: Bottom line, and Shannon will correct me when I'm wrong, because ultimately, they needed the notwithstanding clause. If they don't put the notwithstanding clause in, then they run afoul of the courts, which have ruled on very similar type of ideas in British Columbia. Am I correct in that, Shannon? That's right. So I throw back to you, but ultimately, they have to go the route of the notwithstanding clause. They have to remove fundamental rights that are yours and mine that will not reply to teachers starting as soon as this act is passed. And I don't think that people really understand. I think that when you think of back to work legislation, you think, well, you know, the government can order someone back and that's fine. fine um but if you're having to invoke the notwithstanding clause then people start to wonder okay well what is it that we're giving up and i think that that's what
Carter: ultimately the public relations of this is going to be much different than the legal side and i'm going to stay away from the legal side too too much and throw to our resident pretend lawyer uh you know it's nice that we replaced cory our pretend oh my god this is
Shannon: i'm going to stay away from the legal
Zain: oh my god this is
Carter: is
Carter: is this is a step this is two steps in the wrong And I'm really excited about it.
Zain: Corey would have still been on spelling out the Notwithstanding Clause for us, talking about how somehow he was involved tangentially when at first, you know, he may have been in the womb or a very young child, but he was probably going to tell us about how he was involved in something. I remember when it came out
Carter: talking about
Carter: been in the womb
Carter: how he was involved in something. I remember when it came out in episode 42 of the podcast. He wasn't even born yet. Yeah, but
Carter: but Roy Romano was part
Shannon: Roy Romano was part of the the crafting of the notwithstanding clause. And I'm probably the only person on this podcast who has a picture with Roy Romano. So I'm going to claim the degrees of separation on this one.
Zain: one. Sure. Well, we're going to give it to you. That is one you can take. Well,
Zain: Well, I mean, you have a picture
Carter: you
Carter: you have a picture with Roy Romano you're allowed to talk about.
Carter: I
Zain: I
Carter: I
Zain: I need help. I need. It's true.
Zain: Jesus Christ.
Zain: What do you want to say, Carter? Nothing.
Carter: Nothing.
Zain: Okay.
Zain: Nope.
Carter: Nope.
Carter: Just saying. I
Zain: I was giving you space and time.
Carter: No, that's fine.
Zain: Okay. I'm not afraid of silence. I'm not afraid of it.
Carter: I'm not afraid of silence.
Zain: I'll let you fill the gaps however you wish, Carter. Okay,
Zain: you're good? Oh, yeah, I'm good. Let's move on. Shannon, question for you. Help me calibrate. I'm trying to understand how to calibrate in terms of how significant this is. I'm hearing unprecedented. I'm hearing significant. And I also want to tease the fact that there is a leaked memo that was provided to the broader media and political ecosystem a few months ago in regards to Daniel Smith using the notwithstanding clause on the trans legislation, the three trans bills. So this is not that, to be clear. That is still coming, this session. So there's a chance the notwithstanding clause makes a two-time appearance in the next, what, week?
Shannon: Let's move on. Shannon,
Carter: session.
Zain: Yep.
Zain: Help me calibrate. I kind of have the answer internally, but help me give words to how I should be feeling about this in terms of the unprecedented nature of what we might be seeing here.
Shannon: Oh,
Carter: Oh, this is a five-alarm
Shannon: -alarm
Carter: -alarm fire.
Shannon: fire. Yeah,
Carter: I mean, but
Shannon: mean,
Carter: the
Carter: the more you use something, the less people are going to be worried about it, right? It becomes normalized. And I would expect to see, notwithstanding, notwithstanding, notwithstanding, I mean, I was joking with Haxson before you guys came because you guys are so tardy, that, you know, why wouldn't you just throw it into every piece of legislation at this point, right? Because the Alberta government is suffering exactly zero consequence from doing the notwithstanding clause. Every other government... Are you
Zain: you sure? I mean, it's happened seconds ago, but I'm like, what makes you so confident that that's the path we're going here? Zero sort of accountability or zero sort of political blowback here? We're getting into the politics of it, so talk
Carter: We're getting into
Carter: talk to me about it, Carter. We had zero blowback on the trans issues. I don't anticipate that we're going to see any blowback on the teacher issues because, you know what, to the end of the day, and Daniel Smith is not wrong about this. This is what is extremely frustrating. At the end of the day, Alberta parents do want their kids back in school. What
Carter: are they prepared to put up with in order to get their kids back at school? Are they prepared to put up with the notwithstanding clause? Well, they were willing to put up with the anti-trans stuff. Are they prepared to put up with this notwithstanding clause being forced upon teachers? And I think that because it's not them,
Carter: and because it benefits them, they're
Carter: going to say, fine, it's fine, it's fine. As long as my kid gets to go back to school, I don't care what the tools were that enabled that. That's what my expectation is. Do
Zain: what my expectation
Zain: Do you agree with this? I mean, we've seen recent polling, and of course, we know polling can fluctuate, and that public opinion is squarely on the side of the teachers here. Now, time is, you know, there's erosion as it relates to people's patience, especially parents, as it relates to having their kids back in school. So I take Carter's point. I don't take it to the extent that he delivers it, which is that this will actually equate zero consequences for the government. But what's your take here?
Shannon: There's a question of politics here. And
Shannon: And it's not just a question of politics coming from the opposition, although they're doing everything they can.
Shannon: It is also a question for broader civil society, and the broader labor movement. And it really depends on what the response is, and how swift it is, how decisive it is, how it stretches across the economy, and how it reaches into people's lives to Carter's point. And we have yet to see that. But we won't see it until, you know, they're moving through the stages of the bill, which is happening as we speak. And once it passes, I think we will see the labor movement take some significant steps. But it will – it's a question of how actors use their power in the system. Power sloshes around a system. And it's not fixed at any one time. So, yeah.
Carter: how
Zain: how swift
Shannon: Yeah, so she agrees with
Carter: so she agrees with me.
Zain: Well, I agree with both of you in the sense that I think this is – the action is seismic. Yeah. I'm going to use that word. And it potentially is doubly seismic. Although, Carter, you make an interesting point around the political sort of absorption of it being potentially less the more it's used. But unprecedented seismic. Okay, that has just happened, if not is happening while we are recording right now. As I mentioned earlier, these are leaked reports of the Notwithstanding Clause being invoked. You guys may know better than I, but Bill 2 has not been tabled just yet. However,
Zain: we're assuming that that is being fact. I agree with Shannon as well that I think this is now about the response. whether you were expecting it today or not whether you thought this was going to be you know done slightly differently whether this happens again next week on the trans right stuff let's talk about the most strategic optimal
Zain: response carter and i do want to include the groups that shannon has mentioned let's talk about the new democrats let's talk about labor and then let's give the third bucket to civil society which i think can include the broader populace non-profit groups those that are tangentially related, unrelated to this, just people, people who are active, mobile, partisan, nonpartisan. I'll put that in the third civil society bucket. And I'm not sure that's how you would define them. That's how I would too. Okay. Let's start with the new Democrats, Carter. And let's start with what they need to do as it relates to in the legislature and then outside of the legislature, because they'll have a process here, I imagine, and both of you can tag team on this. I imagine it won't be a successful process, But they'll have things that they do. What do they need to do inside the legislature here? And what do they need to do outside? And then let's go to union labor, union slash labor, and then let's go to civil society. Well,
Shannon: define them. That's how I
Carter: Well, I mean, ultimately, inside the legislature, they need to raise their voices and fail.
Carter: Because ultimately, they will fail in the legislature. So failing isn't necessarily bad. Failing is part of this. But when you fail, you must be able to point your finger at someone else and say that it's their fault. Right? I failed, but it's ultimately Danielle Smith's fault. This is bad. This is going to hurt people. This is a bad direction to go in. So that's what I'm anticipating from the from inside. What I don't want them to do is is to think
Zain: Right? I
Carter: think that the whole world lives inside the legislature. I don't want them to start thinking the solution to this is filibustering the rest of the legislation or to, you know, to to to to try and hold things up or
Carter: or make it more difficult for the government to do other things. Can
Zain: Can I can I interrupt you there? Yeah,
Zain: Yeah,
Carter: Yeah,
Zain: Yeah, they won't be able to. Well, I'm
Carter: Yeah, they won't be able to.
Carter: Well, I'm not talking about just this piece of legislation. No,
Shannon: I'm not talking
Shannon: No,
Carter: No, I know. But if they
Carter: think that the legislature is the place to do this, it's a mistake. They need to get their asses out of the legislature and into people's living rooms and into places where
Carter: they can talk to people. One of the things I have learned on this campaign that we're just done is that no one is paying attention to anything. There
Shannon: is that
Carter: is no news anymore. There's no social media anymore. more there is only social networks and those social networks are concerned about so many things that if they don't start to talk about this massively in a hurry they're not going to they're not going to catch a wave people will not know the good news is
Shannon: know the good news is that this is national news
Carter: and for good watching the news the
Shannon: for good watching the
Carter: the news
Shannon: news
Carter: everyone's watching every
Shannon: everyone's watching every
Shannon: every once in a while stories break through and this is one of those uh situations for the for the opposition so
Carter: for the
Zain: the
Shannon: so uh i mean what they they need to be doing right now like literally right now as we record this and the legislation is being introduced uh is use every single opportunity they have for the leader to stand and look like a fighter every
Zain: record
Zain: this
Zain: and the legislation
Zain: every single
Shannon: single one even if he is you know reading out an emergency motion moving an emergency motion in order to slow down the the gears get that clipped get it pushed out He had a really great first question period. I thought so too, yeah. Really good. So clipped out. And I know they're doing that, but like today needs to be something of a war room style approach to every single time the leader stands up that he looks like a fighter. And to Carter's point, everybody knows that the fix is in and the point is the fight. Right. Primary audience, obviously, being teachers and people who are, you know, directly affected by this. But just all Albertans.
Zain: I thought so too, yeah. Really
Carter: Albertans. This is an opportunity for him to introduce himself. Now,
Shannon: Now, secondly, what the the New Democrats obviously need to do is use every moment that they have within time allocation. Although the bad guys will to, again, make sure that the leader is up. Right. Because when he gets to speak to a bill, it's for longer than the others. So get him up as many times as you can so that you get as much good content as you have of him standing in the legislature with people sitting around him, nodding and pushing that content out over the course of this evening, because that will serve you in traditional media coverage. It'll serve you like in this 24 hours. Right.
Shannon: And like then you move after this, after they ram it through. But right now you have great examples of the leader saying smart things that most people agree with, that we know that most public opinion agrees with. so use every single you don't get these opportunities of people speaking directly to camera uh uninterrupted um you know for and being able to splice together two and a half three minutes you don't get that all the time uh
Shannon: uh this is a good opportunity for that and for lots of different pieces of content carter
Zain: carter do you disagree because you you said don't filibuster don't don't delay this thing if if shannon's saying fight i'm gonna i'm gonna sign a word two you're saying fold and get out of the the legislature get
Carter: get out of the legislature you're going to lose get out of lose fast would be my would be my recommendation the government's already doing that for you you're only getting
Shannon: my recommendation the government's already doing that for you you're only getting an hour per stage right so you're going to be done by nine o'clock tonight so but at every stage you need to think about every stage of debate every hour or between you know suggested we even truncate that you're suggesting truncate that
Carter: stage
Carter: right so you're going to be done by nine
Carter: you know suggested we even truncate that you're suggesting truncate that well i'm not saying truncate it just lose fast and then when you're done but but don't think I don't think that the world rests on the feedback that you're going to get in the legislature. People don't want to see Nahid Linchi standing up strong in the legislature. People want to see Nahid Linchi in their communities standing up for teachers. But to be clear though, you mean
Zain: that well
Shannon: fast and
Shannon: don't want to see Nahid
Zain: up
Zain: But to be clear though, you mean exclusively not in the legislature? Not in the – I want to make sure I honestly interpret what you're saying. I
Carter: I just don't, I just want everybody to be, I feel like the NDP have fallen into the trap all too often of saying that everything exists in the legislature. If something happens in the legislature, then people pay attention to it. And I would argue that just because it happens in the legislature does not mean that people are paying attention to it. This is not going to be a legislature-focused
Carter: -focused exercise. It is going to be a focused exercise with people learning about it from their social networks. I want people, when they go back to school on Wednesday, Thursday, whatever it is, when they're gathered in the playground to pick up their kids, I want them saying how shitty it is that this has happened, not how lucky they are that the government has put these kids back to school. That's
Zain: That's your goal. That's the sort of key messaging that you want proliferated on the streets. I've got a question for each of you, and then you can dabble in each other's questions. But for you, Shannon, is there a way for the NDP to extend this beyond, as we estimate, 9 p.m. tonight? Is there an equivalent of an American-style filibuster, speeches all night? Do any of those mechanisms exist as our resident former MLA? What do you know of and how do you interpret
Carter: proliferated
Zain: interpret this? No,
Shannon: they can't, because what they did is they put on the order paper that the government, whenever they want, can limit debate at
Shannon: at every stage to one hour.
Shannon: So that, too, is fairly unprecedented, although nobody has taken to the streets, to Carter's point, in righteous
Carter: So
Shannon: righteous indignation about government's use of time allocation and bill debate. it uh
Shannon: uh but this government's become uh
Shannon: uh has gotten awfully used to it it never used to really happen you know Klein I think used it on bill 11 uh and a couple of other bills uh back in the day and and it it was not something that was generally done uh starting with after um the first session for Kenny they started using it all the time because they didn't understand the rules as well as we did uh
Shannon: uh and in their first session they had to sit through us giving long uh
Zain: they had to
Shannon: uh we made them sit for you know 30 hours or something around bill hate that
Shannon: that was the gsa thing and taking away of i made that up so i just put it was really nice and um um taking away people's right to uh uh banked overtime and and oh and the kids minimum wage the under uh under 18 minimum
Carter: it was really nice and
Carter: under 18 minimum wage um
Shannon: um so we we've forced them to eat shit on that for a day and a half they didn't like it so now they just bring in time allocation all the time. So, no, it turns out it matters who you elect and they can use their majority for all kinds of ridiculous undemocratic purposes.
Zain: So, to be clear, Nahid Nenshu will have clippable moments tonight, but he will not have an extended overnight sort of thing as we have seen in other cases or as we've seen late nights sort of. This will not be one of those moments, at least from how we see the confines of this are protected. Carter, Carter, my question for you is
Zain: that Nahid Nenshi was not in the legislature up until, well, today when he is in the legislature. Is this one of those moments that when you look at it,
Shannon: is in
Zain: would you have wanted Nahid Nenshi out of the legislature today, given your strategy, your particular strategy, which is about lose fast? Would you have wanted him outside somewhere doing something else? Or is it actually the most advantageous thing that Nahid Nenshi is indeed on day one in in the legislature, day one for him, I should say, in the legislature today as the official leader of the opposition. When
Carter: When he's outside the legislature talking about this, he needs to be in a position to say, I was there. I watched her do it. She did a bad thing, right?
Zain: right?
Carter: She
Zain: She was- So even bearing witness today is helpful for him to be in there. Bearing
Carter: there. Bearing witness. But keep in mind, this is not going to boil down to procedure, right?
Carter: right? And this is my fear, right? And this may be where Shannon and I differ. Maybe we're not. But bottom line, my fear is that people are, you know, we're going to try and make this a process problem and people are instead going to say my kids are back in school problem right like my kids are in school ergo it is good um for
Carter: you know and the ndp are fighting to keep my kids out of school so i am not happy with that right the ndp need to be able to thread the needle where they're able to say that the process and the not you know the notwithstanding clause are trampling on on our on albertan's human rights and
Carter: and but at the same At the same time, we want kids back in school, but we want kids back in school under the right circumstances. And this is the wrong circumstances. You just have to be very careful because I think that the large, a large majority of people, while they do support the teachers, will support having their kids back in school. them shannon
Shannon: and but
Zain: shannon
Zain: let's talk about the ndp outside strategy carter's talked about it network effect get out into networks he actually even said he's planted a flag on a goal that whenever they're back wednesday thursday that it should be about you know look what that fucking government did not i'm so glad my kids are back okay i want to get you your comment on that i
Zain: i also want to get your comment on does the ndp's focus here stick solidly a hundred let's just use let's just give of it ratio 100% in the teacher's bucket? Or
Zain: do they devote any of that energy resource time allocation to the notwithstanding clause, overreach of rights bucket, which is much larger, much broader might have different access points for people that might not be in
Zain: in the teacher camp, so to speak. So I'm kind of curious to get your take on both. Do you agree with Carter sort of planting the flag of in the next couple of days, it needs to be about, you know, people in the parking lot blaming government? And then are you deviating any resources to the notwithstanding understanding unprecedented nature bucket of messaging no
Shannon: the media well on the latter question the media will do that for you they will go around saying unprecedented a million different times you don't need to you need to focus on what are the kids going back to they're
Shannon: they're going back to the status quo and the status quo sucked and is the status quo is the reason why parents were on to on the teacher's side in a to use an overwrought word unprecedented way in a albertans taking a pro pro-labor sort of public opinion orientation. So I
Carter: I think
Shannon: think
Carter: think
Shannon: think you don't
Shannon: don't need to be explaining the Constitution. It's boring. Carter told me that, and he's right. There's no question that people don't like the classroom composition, the class sizes, all
Shannon: all of those things. Parents are keenly aware of them. So continuing to talk about that. And, you know, the government took steps so they They would never have to be accountable for that. They would never have to fix it. And none of that's going to change unless you boot these guys out.
Shannon: That's got to be the way that this is communicated. As for the NDP, I mean, obviously, they have this session and, in fact, this couple of days to
Shannon: to be looking like they're fighting the
Shannon: the UCP in there. And that is fine. That is their job. That's what we pay them for is to sit in the big green chairs on the green carpet. it.
Shannon: And, you know, stand up, sit down at the appropriate time and cast votes. That's what they got elected to do. So that's what they will do. There are opportunities, is all I'm saying, to, you know, effectively communicate to the public that you are a fighter. I give you Pierre Polyever, if you doubt me, it's not an ideological thing. He used the house to great effect. You can use the house, right?
Zain: can
Carter: can use
Zain: the house,
Carter: house, right?
Shannon: right? People who run around saying, oh, the house doesn't matter, the house doesn't matter it does matter or it can uh and so i don't think i i hear a lot of political practitioners often say that stuff and i just go like okay yeah pierre polly ever totally sucked uh and he absolutely did not you know um essentially run himself into a a 20-point lead until he wasn't uh but he used the house for a lot of that but he also used videos
Carter: but he also used videos for all for a lot. Well, that's the thing. He also used the ability to communicate outside the house. A hundred percent. He
Shannon: lot. Well, that's the thing. He also used the ability to
Shannon: outside the
Shannon: A hundred percent. He used it all. He did it all in every opportunity.
Carter: He did
Zain: did it all in
Carter: in
Zain: So this is interesting. I agree with both of you. I'm going to merge these points. How did the NDP showcase
Zain: undeniable dedication, enthusiasm, work ethic on this file outside of the house? It's done tonight at nine.
Zain: And I'm speaking both strategically and tactically here. So go wherever you'd like. But how do they show that level of dedication that turns oppositions into governments or gives oppositions like this one a chance to be government? Because there is obviously a political basis here in terms of their reality. Carter, any ideas that you may have in terms of how they showcase that dedication? And we've seen things in the past. Let me throw things out right in the in the United States. They've done live streams of the Democratic sort of establishment, you know, staying up all night and, you know, you know, doing midnight sort of things. I think the NDP has even done versions of that here. But I'm kind of trying to get into how do they tap into that level of dedication, enthusiasm, commitment, like we are the ones leading this parade sort of thing.
Carter: Well, number one, the number one thing is to make sure that there is no competing communications issues. This is one of the things that we've taken the NDP to task for on a number of times. They have a singular
Carter: singular point of contact. This is another thing that Pierre Pelletier does very, very well, is he has a singular point of singular vision. And he's going to go after that one point until that one talking point is done. And this talking point is the teacher's strike. It has to be the single thing that they're talking about from now until such time as it's resolved in some sort of equitable fashion or until such time as they've lost. And they could very well lose the battle here. But right now, they're not losing the battle. General population thinks that this may be the wrong thing. They have to come out and show people why it's the wrong thing. And they have to have their singular talking point. This is what it's about. every single mla i don't care if you're the the the critic for whatever um you're a critic for health care uh i mean i'm seeing headlines today about health care interesting interesting the health care system may shut down oh that's fascinating it's
Zain: And they have to
Carter: it's a later thing it's not a now thing the now thing is that we are focused on the teacher strike we are focused on bringing that out singular focus shannon
Zain: shannon any any any final thoughts here because then i want to go to unions and i I want to split that in two. I want to talk about the union, ATA, and I want to talk about the union and labor movement. So any final thoughts on the NDP inside or outside strategy?
Shannon: No, I mean, I think watching the caucus materials, they've all been doing exactly what they need to be doing. They've all been on message. They've been attending things.
Shannon: things. They've been talking to teachers. They've been highlighting their
Shannon: their constituency work. They've been highlighting constituency teachers. That's their rock and roll duty. They've all been doing it.
Shannon: The only note I'd give is just give me more. Give me more different types of content. Let me see maybe some paid content. I think now is the time for that sort of thing.
Zain: Let's talk about the ATA. Can we start there? So any teacher that does take the labor action, including work to rule during the time, could be fined up to $500 a day, with the organizations facing a half a million dollar a day fines if they do so. Carter, can
Zain: I start with you on this? Sure, sure. Is
Zain: the only choice here for the ATA to call their bluff or do they have to send teachers back to work? I think they have to send
Carter: I think they have to send teachers back to work. I think that there's a consequence to not. There's other things that can be done, work-to-rule structure. There can be time in classroom. There can be all kinds of different things that they choose to do. They can slow things down. They don't have to approach
Carter: approach the workday. I would imagine school sports are going to be off the table. I
Carter: I would imagine a number of clubs are going to be off the table. This is not going to be the scholastic experience that children have come to expect. To
Zain: To be clear, though, Carter, this says any labor actions, including work to rule, will be issued at $500.5 million. Got
Carter: be
Carter: to try that.
Carter: That's going to be pretty tricky,
Zain: That's going to be pretty
Carter: even defining what a work to rule looks like.
Zain: I agree. I think
Carter: I think you've got to take that type of thing. You can't continue the strike. the
Carter: strike is a half million dollars a day plus 500 per teacher or whatever the numbers are that they're creating pulling out of their asses here the the provincial government yes
Zain: yes um
Carter: yes
Carter: um i
Carter: don't think you can continue the strike as is i do think that we can see uh
Carter: uh the
Carter: the ata
Carter: ata call on their their
Carter: ideological you know the other unions which i know is coming in a separate question yeah so i'll leave that for now, but I think you have to go back to work. I don't see any model whereby not going back to work is in
Shannon: yeah so i'll
Carter: in the
Carter: the best interest of teachers.
Zain: Shannon, this is poor hosting on my part. Can you help, I should have gone to you first with helping us define work to rule. Can you help us understand what work to rule is in its broadest sense? I know Carter's talking about this application here. What is work to rule? And then the same question to you,
Zain: does the ATA call call the bluff of the government or do they have to encourage teachers to go back uh
Shannon: so we're to rule in this context like uh essentially well in all contexts it means only what's uh the actual what's laid down in the collective agreement that you will do right so the kids and i were talking about this and they were rattling off all the things their teachers do would this be in would this be out and my answer to them was i don't know it i don't know because i don't know what's in their their uh collective agreement right because the kids were like oh does that mean putting to grades in power school so that you can read them does it mean sending out the weekly you know email and this quiz is coming up i don't know but those are examples of things in addition to any of the you know lunchtime supervision like some of those other things like all kinds of stuff all kinds of stuff um yeah clubs sports but but even before you get to clubs and sports uh there's You know, just other things that teachers do, like sending me a weekly email that may or may not be happening anymore, really that do affect kids' learning experience. There's no question about it. There's a reason why teachers do these things, because they help kids learn. And parental experience
Carter: right so the kids
Carter: this be in would this be out
Carter: of things in
Carter: things like all kinds of stuff all
Carter: There's no question
Carter: And parental experience within the education system.
Carter: The parents are as much participants as the students in some regards, right? Right. So parental experience is going to fundamentally
Shannon: The
Carter: fundamentally change, in my opinion, at this stage. Whether that's work to rule or not, I'll let the courts decide. But if I was working with the ATA right now, I'd be saying we're going to be doing the
Carter: the relationship between teachers and parents is foundationally going to shift.
Zain: What do you think the ATA should do, Shannon? Should they encourage teachers to go back or call the bluff? Stay home. Don't go back. We're all out. How
Shannon: much money you got? Yeah.
Shannon: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, this is where actually
Zain: mean, this is where actually like the ATA financials might be worthy of digging into. And so I'm saying only quasi facetiously because we've talked about the Chen and you and I about their advertising and that and that pipeline and what this money is for. In some cases, there
Zain: is money. There is millions in the bank. So I'm going to just throw that out there from what we understand and what we know. Not
Carter: Not so much that the teachers got strike pay.
Shannon: so much that the teachers got
Zain: Not so much money that teachers got strike pay. But the question is, what is their move here? This whole sort of frame is response.
Carter: Not so
Zain: Going back is the move
Zain: that's been mandated to you.
Zain: But at the same time, do they also have to, and I'm kind of adding a secondary question on here, Shannon. If
Zain: they give in, is it kind of over for every other union here in some ways? Which kind of leads into the bleeding question of the other unions. So in some ways, their decision is not just for them. It's
Zain: obviously for their kids and for their students, but it's also for the movement in some ways. are they wearing that burden or can they take
Zain: that off their shoulders and say we're looking after ourselves here how do you think about this if you're in the in the movement right now it
Shannon: certainly is and it's not just for alberta dug ford back down and now uh folks are saying oh you can just do this well that will uh open up a whole permission structure for labor relations in uh every province in the country that doesn't that feels inconvenienced about bargaining um
Carter: down and
Zain: and
Carter: and now uh
Shannon: um so there's that uh
Shannon: for sure i mean but talk about rock in a hard place we're talking millions and millions of dollars a day and potential jail time.
Carter: for sure
Shannon: Now, is there money? Probably. They've got a building, so they've got money.
Zain: so they've
Shannon: And, you know, they've always been a well-resourced organization. But wasting millions, tens of millions of dollars on fines, just to make a point, that's a pretty tough one, when there might be other options for them. They can, They can, you know, litigate on what is work to rule and what's not and make things pretty uncomfortable. They can work with other unions.
Shannon: unions.
Shannon: unions. They do have
Shannon: have some ability to, you know, mobilize and make
Shannon: the shoes pinch for the government. But those are fairly far off now. So the choices are not great choices. And it's designed when government interferes in free and fair collective bargaining to redound to the benefit of the employer.
Shannon: That is why we don't allow it. Because in order to have workers on the same, anywhere near the same playing field as employers, you have to make sure that there's not somebody behind the employer with a hammer. Carter,
Zain: broader labor movement, the term general strike has been thrown around. Yeah,
Carter: it's not going to be a general strike. Explain to me
Zain: to be a general strike. Explain to me what a general strike is in this case. I don't know if we necessarily need to go further beyond then suggesting that this would be all public sector folks taking on strike positions. The idea is that everybody would be – everybody who has a contract with
Carter: on strike positions. The idea is that everybody would be – everybody who has a contract with the provincial government would be walking out in solidarity. I don't believe that that would generate positive outcome for the unions. And I think that it would be deemed illegal relatively quickly. It might work for a day, but it's not going to work for a week. So, you know, the problem that Shannon has described with the hammers on one side and not on the other, that certainly is, I think, part of the problem in this particular case. Could there
Zain: be a outcome, Carter, where it's not just money that's being wasted, but on the back end, when you have other unions in potential strike position, if
Zain: you get it together and
Zain: you all wage public campaigns, that you come out of this like
Zain: better, not
Zain: just trying to like, you know, you come out of this actually better. Correct
Carter: just trying
Carter: Correct me if I'm wrong. I mean, this was kind of, I think people were thinking that the nurses and the teachers could be facing the same labor action at the same time. Right. And one other
Zain: me if I'm wrong. I
Zain: Right. And one other one, I think paramedics may have been thrown into there, but don't quote me on that. I'm just going to go with nurses
Carter: don't quote me on that. I'm just going to go with nurses and teachers because those are the two that I can recall off the top of my head. You
Zain: teachers because
Carter: You know, and when the nurses signed, I think it was a big victory for the government. Because imagine a situation where the nurses and the teachers were on strike simultaneously. simultaneously. Your healthcare and education systems are shut down. Now, in
Zain: Your healthcare
Carter: in
Carter: a wildcat general strike, this
Carter: could be, you
Carter: know, could be catastrophic for the government. I just don't see how that happens in
Carter: in this province. I think what we would see is smaller actions that happen from time to time. And those smaller actions happening from time to time will be noticeable,
Carter: But not so not so broad that the
Carter: government to labor relations boards needs to bring down significant hammers.
Zain: Shannon,
Zain: the small actions that Carter mentioned seem logical. They seem like they're incremental steps. Are we out of the era of small incremental steps in this? And I don't mean to insult Carter strategy here. But in some ways, there is a case that one could make that
Zain: if the teachers go back, that we enter a very dark period of what bargaining rights means in Alberta, period. In
Shannon: In Canada. And
Zain: Canada. And you extended the frame. And I apologize. I agree with you. To the entire country. So we look back then, five years later, ten years later, and be like, fuck, I wish we hadn't done those incremental things. things, that those incremental things didn't actually stand up to anything, that it didn't create the shock in the system that we needed to. And
Zain: I am disagreeing with Carter's sort of approach here, but I'm not trying to push it on you. But I am trying to get your sense of it into sense of a general strike. Your thoughts on it?
Shannon: Well, I mean, if you think that it's going to cost millions and millions of dollars and invoke potential jail time for the
Shannon: the ATA with a bunch of affected members and the majority of their membership behind them, and you still think I don't think that's too difficult. Try it on a bunch of members who have just gotten a collective agreement or are in active bargaining. That is to say the HSAA. Because UNA settled that HSAA is still in bargaining. Thanks for the info. Yep.
Zain: That is
Zain: Because UNA
Zain: Thanks for the info. Yep.
Shannon: place. So,
Shannon: So,
Carter: So,
Shannon: So,
Carter: So, I mean,
Shannon: talk
Carter: talk of general strike
Shannon: strike feels like it's, to me, it's felt like it's been thrown around a little bit without understanding what bargaining is and what unions are there to do and how the labor code works.
Shannon: There may be some province-wide actions taken, maybe even that might incur fines for some of the unions. That may happen. But is it going to be long and sustained? The penalties for doing so are severe.
Shannon: And the reason for those penalties is that we are supposed – the tradeoff for workers is they're supposed to have bargaining and good faith on the other side, again, with
Carter: again, with
Shannon: with
Shannon: with balancing the teeter-totter in labor relations. And
Shannon: And so I
Shannon: I don't
Shannon: don't hold out a huge amount of hope. I think they're going to have to do public mobilization. That
Shannon: leaves us with public mobilization.
Zain: leaves us
Zain: What does public mobilization need to look like? Like, I had the opportunity to see that 30,000 teachers all wearing red outside of the Day of the Throne speech, which was a sight to behold. Carter,
Zain: are you saying more of that? Are you saying bigger than that? Are you saying more diverse than that? What does public mobilization in
Zain: this moment with these potential downstream impacts, not just to the labor movement, but we haven't talked much about the notwithstanding clause and what it means to rights overall,
Zain: let alone what it means to trans rights. in a number of days with it potentially being invoked again.
Zain: What does public mobilization need to look like here? What does allyship need to look like here?
Carter: I don't think it can just be we protest in front of the legislature. We go to McDougal. I don't think it can just be that. I think it needs to be 50 teachers standing outside the elementary school at pick-up and drop-off times talking to parents. I think it needs to be one-to-one communications applications, where the individual teachers are given talking points that they are going to be delivering to the general population. Yes, we are back to work. No, we are not happy. The
Shannon: I don't
Carter: The conditions here are not satisfactory for your child. That
Carter: That has to be expressed directly to the parent so that the parent understands it, so that they're not just talking about how great it is that their kids are back to school on Tuesday or Wednesday or whatever day. I think that that's what, when we're talking about public mobilization, we are actually talking about parental mobilization. Don't worry too much about the public. The public will follow the parents. The parents are the most influential generation, right? Because they move up, down, sideways. You know, Shannon's far more influential than I am because she's got kids and social networks in school, right? And that social network that revolves around school is probably one of the strongest social networks that exists. And the teachers need to activate it. What I would say, the
Shannon: Wednesday or whatever
Zain: Don't
Carter: very first thing we're going to do is that no one goes into the school until such time as the first buzzer rings. And they're standing out talking to parents as they're doing drop-offs and pickups. That
Carter: would be the first thing I would say. That's our first mobilization. And we do the exact same thing the last buzzer of the day goes. teachers walk with the students and they go straight outside and they wait for the parents to arrive for pickup and drop off because
Carter: because all too often i don't you know elementary
Carter: elementary schools you know how many people stand around the park having a conversation when they're picking up their kids absolutely and it is the most powerful social network that exists and there's never any teachers there the
Carter: teachers don't go there because the teachers are wrapping up their day the teach if you put three teachers in that in that conversation foundationally changes the the the the outcome of the uh of this this mobilization uh to use your word zane that needs to occur so that would be my talking
Carter: point and if teachers don't want to do it then
Carter: they're missing out on on their only real chance to change the outcome of this because my great fear is if you don't talk to the parents if you're not mobilizing the parents you're going to get steamrolled by thank god my kid's back in school shannon
Zain: have your say in here what does mobilization need to And we're
Carter: we're
Zain: we're
Zain: we're now venturing into the civil society conversation too, right? So we talked about in the sense of the broader public here, because I think that's where mobilization comes in, unless you two have a different approach for the civil society aspect or supplemental approach, and we can definitely talk about that. But your take on what mobilization needs to look, and arguably more importantly, feel
Zain: feel like over
Zain: over the course of the next number of days and weeks as a response to this invocation? I
Shannon: think from the NDP, the broader labor movement, the teachers, everybody involved, it needs to be out in the space of communicating. Everybody needs to be doing paid. I want to see so much paid that I'm starting to get sick of it. Like, I want to see it a level of saturation, like the government tried to do when they wanted to take
Shannon: away our CPP, right, on every available channel. We know that costs them, I don't know, $7 million or so. So between
Shannon: all of those organizations, there is an ability to absolutely saturate the province in every corner. And I would like to see that happen. What Carter has described is a peer-to-peer, you know, sort of communication strategy that is brilliant and should absolutely happen. You know where it should happen the most and the teachers that should be the most supported to do it are in the Edmonton Donut ridings and in five or six ridings in Calgary.
Carter: in every corner.
Shannon: And parents there should be then mobilized and pushed by teachers and pushed by, you know, by, well, I mean, push themselves, whatever, but there should be specific focus on those seats. And I think we all know why. Because that's the path to power for the New Democrat. And those are the seats where most, like, you're most likely to get UCP MLAs who are actually have any clue what time it is.
Carter: And those
Zain: The question I have regarding parents. I'm
Zain: curious if parents play a very distinct role. Carter was talking about the role teachers play to parents. If parents want to, let's say, make a
Zain: protest mark of their own, withholding their child from school, something like that. I'm just thinking out loud here, right? Just as we try to absorb it. What unique role can parents play here, both symbolically,
Zain: but also strategically, in a sense? Can they band together? Is there an avenue for them? Because I'm wondering if there is – they have not necessarily been organized in that same way as obviously
Zain: obviously a political party or a labor movement have. Either of you want to take a shot at parents and their unique sort of role in organizing them into structures, Carter, from a campaign perspective? Yeah,
Carter: I mean, I just think that the only thing to do would be to focus on calling your MLA. I mean, I don't
Carter: think it's reasonable to ask parents to keep their kids home. I don't think it's reasonable to say we're going to educate the kids at home. I don't think it's reasonable. I think that the reasonable elements of I will support you when band is canceled, I think they're prepared to do that. I think that parents are prepared to pick up their kids a little bit earlier instead of having volleyball practice. this but i'm not sure that parents want to participate in anything
Zain: don't think it's reasonable
Carter: anything larger than that because ultimately the schooling is required this
Carter: is why i'm so fearful if
Carter: if parent because parents very easily can fall into the thank god we're back camp that's
Shannon: because parents
Carter: why we need to see that one-to-one communication now and i think that the the drive should be pick
Carter: up the phone and call the mlas Because the MLAs are ridiculously sensitive to this kind of shit.
Carter: And they
Carter: don't get 150 phone calls a day.
Carter: If they got 150 phone calls a day, they'd shit their pants.
Carter: So start doing that. Start giving them a reason to shit their pants. And, you
Carter: know, I take a small difference with Shannon. I appreciate the
Carter: donut. I appreciate the five or six ridings in Calgary. But I think this can have just as much impact in rural Alberta as it has in urban Calgary and suburban Edmonton. I think that this can have tremendous impact on MLAs that have never fucking had any impact before. They just generally don't have to sweat any decision that this government is making. If they if we finally we have to put so much pressure on this government that it is in it is inconvenient
Carter: to the extreme to be doing this type of action right
Carter: right now it is just not.
Zain: I
Zain: want to I want to kind of close off talking about two groups. Well, actually, one is not even a group. One's the country. And I'll talk about that second. But I want to talk about a group that will probably get, unfortunately, Carter overlooked,
Zain: overlooked, but will still be married to the notwithstanding clause, which is the trans rights organizations. organizations and i'll you know assess i'm helping skipping stone when a calgary-based trans rights group or assisting individuals programs and services and advocacy but carter how does the allyship work here this is a notwithstanding clause that is unprecedented that admits that what we are suggesting would not stand up to the courts potentially being used back to back all focus of the ndp as you guys have both discussed should be on the teachers what happens to trans How do they get protected in this broader sort of fight that we're having? And I want to talk to you both about messaging before I leave as well. But Carter, your take on this small group, for sure, but vulnerable and often overlooked and seems to be the case yet again with our political dynamics in this situation. Yeah,
Carter: Yeah, I mean, I've got a ton of empathy and challenges. I mean, a small
Carter: group like the trans children and trans community in general has been easy to target with the notwithstanding, because ultimately, you know, they didn't come after me, right? The old adage, it wasn't me, I wasn't impacted. Yes,
Carter: Yes,
Zain: Yes, and also, and to be just to add on top of that, a group that other minority groups are okay picking on a broader divide and conquer strategy. And I speak of my broader Muslim community in which the transphobia is at extremely high levels. But frankly, it's a divide and conquer strategy to have one minority group pick on another so that you can go back and forth. And the main sort of instigator of this in this case, the government can kind of do their thing. So I want to just frankly acknowledge that brutal political reality as well. The
Carter: Yes, and also,
Carter: The best case scenario for the trans organizations is that the notwithstanding clause returned to its place of this is a bad thing to do.
Carter: If we can societally make the notwithstanding clause untenable, toxic,
Zain: If we
Shannon: we
Zain: we
Zain: toxic, then great
Carter: then great news for trans groups. My fear, and I retain this positioning and I've repeated it I think three or four times, people are going to see the
Carter: the ends
Carter: ends and they're going to say that the means were justified, right?
Carter: right? So the
Carter: ends justify the means. It's going to be the outcome that the UCP is counting on.
Carter: And then
Carter: they'll be able to – then the notwithstanding clause isn't this great, big, horrible piece of legislation. But hopefully I'm wrong. Hopefully I'm wrong.
Zain: Shannon? What do you think here for the Notwithstanding Clause 2.0 potentially coming later this week, early next week, being applied to trans groups, trans individuals?
Shannon: I think that on this one, we already have, there's a reference case before the Supreme Court around what are the parameters of judicial review when a government uses the Notwithstanding Clause. That's happening in the context of Quebec's Bill 21. And
Shannon: And to my mind, a lot of what, if Alberta does it, a lot of the pushback should come via the courts, because they are such a small group of folks. I mean, you're going to get broader mobilizations during Pride and other moments where civil society comes together. But really, like
Shannon: like with same-sex marriage 20 plus years ago, the
Carter: the
Carter: the
Shannon: the
Carter: the
Shannon: the
Carter: the victories came through the courts. Now,
Shannon: it's not just like on these three pieces of legislation. I think the one that is probably the most likely to have some variance is the one that gets between parents and kids and medical decisions and has the state insert itself between parents and doctors. And it essentially takes
Shannon: takes away the right of parents to choose certain avenues of medical treatment for their kids. That is certainly,
Shannon: certainly, I mean, obviously, it impacts our fundamental freedoms, but it also affects
Shannon: affects parental responsibility. And that might be the one where there's enough wiggle room
Shannon: to find a way for the courts to be able to apply judicial review and reconsider this one.
Shannon: I do think that resources should be, obviously,
Shannon: obviously,
Shannon: people should give generously to those legal pushbacks because that's ultimately where the pushback will come. There's not a lot that can be done in the context of a legislature, once again, if this gets run through. Carter,
Zain: talk
Zain: to me about messaging before I talk about the pressure that the rest of the country can provide to Alberta, if any.
Zain: The message for the NDP is squarely focused on teachers, both agreed.
Zain: Message for the ATA has to be focused on teachers. Where does the union messaging, if I'm kind of using the pie being 100%, focus between teachers and the unprecedented nature of the notwithstanding clause? And then what is the broader sort of civil society sprinkling need to look like in terms of teachers versus unprecedented nature of something that that fundamentally acknowledges that our rights are being taken away?
Carter: Oh, boy. You know, I'm
Carter: not even sure I know, Zane. I mean, how
Zain: I mean, how
Zain: how do you think it will shape out? Even if you don't know, even if you're not like waving a magic wand and saying this is what Alberta needs to look like next week in terms of the response, how do you think it will shake out in a sense? because I'm curious about this myself. The clause is hard to explain, but once you understand it, you understand how crazy its application in a case like this is. It's like as soon as people get it, like, what the fuck? And it's exactly, that's my interpretation. That's how I feel about it when you understand it. So I'm curious how you think, even if you don't get to wave the wand, Carter, how you think it shakes out between this being absolutely about teachers versus this being about something more than teachers?
Carter: how do you
Carter: know what I think, honestly? Honestly, honest
Zain: honest to God,
Carter: honest to God, I think that the government's going to win this. I
Carter: think that at the end of the day, that the unions and the civil society, the progressive side, isn't going to be able to put together an argument that defeats the ends justify the means.
Carter: And that the message that we're talking about in a week is going to be the ends justified the means. And
Carter: And that's going to be
Carter: be what parents glom onto. I don't care. My kid went back to school. And I think that we'll see the
Carter: unions have a harder time explaining why the notwithstanding clause is bad than
Carter: than the government has a time
Carter: time explaining that getting kids back in school is good. Shannon,
Zain: what does the message need to look like or what do you think it will look like broader than the NDP focused on teachers, the ATA focused on teachers? The
Shannon: through line here is that you don't have any power because Daniel Smith took it away from you. You
Shannon: have a shitty education system that you want to speak out about as a parent. Nobody cares what you think because Daniel Smith will decide. You have a health care system that is busting apart at the seams, even though you think you public that it is your number one political concern, as per every public opinion survey. Doesn't matter. She doesn't care what you think. You're
Carter: because Daniel
Shannon: You're not going to get what you're speaking up. Doesn't matter. I, you know, asking for your individual liberty doesn't matter in the case of use of notwithstanding clause for trans people. None of those things matter because Danielle Smith will decide because
Shannon: because she's decided to take up that power for herself, for her own ends and to do her and to push forward with her priorities rather than yours. You don't matter to her. And I think ultimately it's a broader values question. And the things that you want to live in a good society are not going to be things that you get from this government. And
Carter: and to do her
Shannon: ultimately, that's what's got to be the through line for everybody. In the next week or so, I hope that I see all channels that kids are going back to overcrowded classrooms that are far too complex for anybody to get a good education.
Zain: You're shaking your head, Carter. You disagree with the strategy or you disagree that that's going to be the reality? I
Carter: I want to live in Shannon's world. Shannon's world sounds like it's a great place. I'm trying to be
Shannon: I'm trying to be as optimistic as I can. I'm usually the person who like rains the poor cold water on leftist dreams. But here I am trying.
Carter: I'm usually the person who
Zain: who
Zain: Let me end with this. Shannon, I'll start with you. Any value or do you think any impact, maybe I'll put it that way, that external pressures outside of the four walls of our province could have on Alberta, whether that be teachers from across the country, whether that be other provincial governments, whether that be the feds, whether that be media, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. You get the point.
Zain: Mass protests elsewhere. Do you feel like any of that could have an impact here? Yes or no? Carter, final question to you right after Shannon. Not
Carter: really. I
Carter: totally agree. I think that the problem is that Albertans feel like they're we're a unique species and the rest of the country doesn't matter what they think. And fuck them if they think so. Except
Zain: totally
Carter: maybe Saskatchewan.
Zain: Carter, I'll end with one final follow up for you. You are the one who admittedly voluntarily said that you think the government's going to win this. What can they do? I'll give you a one week timeline to fuck this up for themselves in a week. If you feel like they are going to be the victors in these raw political terms that we often talk about on this show, then
Zain: what can they do to themselves or to others to fuck up a victory on their part, Carter? Allow
Carter: Allow anybody but the Premier to speak to this.
Carter: Whereas when I talk about getting the entire NDP talking about the same talking points, I want everybody talking about it. When I'm talking about the UCP, the best communicator they have on their bench is Danielle Smith. If she's the one out there in the front talking about this, she will make parents believe that this is in their best interest. we're
Zain: gonna leave it there what a yeah
Zain: yeah what a what a truth bomb of an episode as we just start rolling the entire thing changes and i'm sure we're gonna revisit it we're gonna leave it there that's a wrap on episode 1889 of the strategist my name is zane velgey with me as always shannon phillips steven carter and we shall see you next time
Zain: carter we got more information so we're back to come back yeah we're back we're back because we we it's we're
Carter: we're back because
Carter: we're letting information change our discussion points you know what this is like this is so off brand this
Zain: this is off brand because information should not you're going to double down i mean this might be the rare time you don't double that i'm actually curious to see what you say because this is a kind of unrelated information but we've just learned that the premier is leaving for dubai uh today so like this this so just to be able today is monday october 27th uh the bill is uh bill two not withstanding class invoked teachers back to work daniel smith is getting on a plane and saying fuck you to alberta going to another oil rich destination which we can talk about in its own course but carter the reason i wanted to come back is this kind of interrupts the stephen carter model of things doesn't it in terms of what you because you've the last thing we talked about was the the government was headed to a w fuck this
Shannon: terms
Carter: terms of what you because
Carter: government was headed to a w fuck this up the only thing that could fuck this up is if daniel smith's not here to message it and she's not going to be here to message it and um the clown car that is the ucp caucus uh being left alone without uh you know adult supervision Oh my gosh, Daniel Smith's the adult in the situation,
Zain: gosh, Daniel Smith's the adult in the situation, Carter? Really? Listen,
Carter: Listen, Danielle
Zain: Danielle
Carter: Danielle Smith is a spectacular communicator. We can find
Carter: find fault in what she communicates all day long, but she communicates things clearly and in ways that I mean, her whole, you know, I just take the number of students and divide by the number of teachers and, you know, fuck
Carter: you, Danielle. But that is the simplistic shit that people buy into. And without Danielle Smith around, I don't think that the rest of the caucus, the clown car that is her cabinet, is necessarily going to be able to carry this in the same way because they're not going to have the tools that Danielle Smith has. Are
Zain: Are you taking away the W from the government here? Is that what's going to— I'm
Carter: I'm now saying it could end in a draw. Oh, interesting. Shannon,
Zain: Shannon, you may have felt differently around like the inevitable government win that Carter has suggested. But is this a big deal that she's leaving on the heels of this?
Shannon: Holy hell, is it ever?
Shannon: This is a massive deal. She is going to Saudi Arabia and the UAE to go Saudi as well.
Carter: go Saudi as well. Yeah,
Shannon: Yeah,
Shannon: Yeah, yeah.
Shannon: She's gonna go meet with a bunch of people who, you know, invest in sovereign wealth funds, you know, probably the same people who gave Jared Kushner $2 billion for looking the other way on Khashoggi. No, look, this is disgusting that you can go, like, hang out in the Sultan's Palace. Meanwhile, the rest of us are stuck here with 40 kids in a classroom. It's ridiculous. And it's a beautiful opportunity for, you know, the exact message that I was talking about.
Carter: No,
Zain: You
Shannon: You
Shannon: You don't get good health care and education. Danielle Smith gets whatever she wants. And in this case, she gets to go hang out with the glitziest, richest people in the world and talk about oil company investments and all the rest of it. It is ridiculous. Her primary job is to be here managing a health care and education system, and she's not doing it. And there is no doubt in my mind that a good case for like Redford on steroids level scandal that could be made here. Well,
Zain: Well, let me let me ask you this, then, because this also goes back to another sort of theory. And I think this is both of your sort of models of response here for the NDP.
Zain: Should they be paying any attention to her leaving? Because this then distracts from teachers, right? If the 100% of the pie is teachers, does any of it come back to Daniel Smith leaving and the Saudi and the UAE stuff, Carter? Or are you just laser focused on what's happening here? Or can you make
Carter: are you just laser
Carter: make this one and the same? doesn't care about teachers so much that she fucked off to Dubai.
Zain: this one and the same? doesn't
Shannon: that
Zain: that she
Shannon: she fucked
Carter: More to the point, she doesn't care about your kids so much that she fucked off to Dubai. She fucked off to Saudi Arabia. She's taking a two-week vacation in the desert so that she doesn't have to deal with your kids. She's doing this on purpose because she doesn't want to be the one holding the notwithstanding fucking pile of shit. This is why she's going.
Shannon: More to
Zain: Notwithstanding, of course, is also the name of her one-woman play at the Riyadh Comedy Festival,
Carter: Notwithstanding, of course, is
Zain: which is part of the holdovers that she's going to master on. Yes, yeah, that's good. Do we have anything more to say here? That was a good one, Zane. Yeah, you're welcome. Do we have anything more to say here? Because this changes some things. It doesn't change others. I don't want to keep you guys too long. We'll revisit this. No, it's practically
Carter: which is part
Carter: she's going to master on. Yes, yeah,
Carter: have
Carter: anything more to say here? That was a good one, Zane. Yeah,
Shannon: practically good. I think we just recorded this segment so that you could have that Riyadh Comedy Festival line. Oh, yeah, that's right. That's right, that's right. I didn't get anything good in.
Zain: think we just
Zain: Festival line. Oh, yeah, that's right. That's right, that's right. I didn't get anything good in. Yeah, you're welcome. You're welcome. We're good. We're wrapping again. Again, Stephen Carter, Shannon Phillips. We will see you next time.
Shannon: We're good.