THE WEST BLOCK
Episode 21, Season 13
Sunday, February 4, 2024
Host: David Akin
Guests:
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development
and Official Languages Minister
Location:
Ottawa Studio
David Akin: Alberta’s new plans for trans youth are making headlines across the country.
I’m David Akin, in for Mercedes Stephenson. The West Block starts now.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau: “The most anti-LGBT policies of anywhere in the country.”
David Akin: On Parliament Hill, Liberal and NDP politicians call it demonizing and extremely dangerous. But the premier of Alberta has a different view about her controversial plan.
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: “I certainly do not want children to be making decisions before maybe they’ve even had sex.”
David Akin: Premier Danielle Smith will join us for more on new plans affecting trans kids, plans some people don’t want to hear.
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: “The premier soft-pedalled that this was coming and then drops a bomb on youth.”
David Akin: The only Liberal cabinet minister in Alberta, Randy Boissonnault reacts and talks about Liberal tactics typing Pierre Poilievre to Donald Trump.
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: “Encouraging or enabling children to alter their biology or natural growth, no matter how well intentioned and sincere, poses a risk to that child’s future that I, as premier, am not comfortable with permitting in our province.”
David Akin: That was a social media post from Calgary that provoked strong reactions all across the country.
On Wednesday, Alberta’s Premier Danielle Smith laid out her plans for a series of changes affecting trans youth, everything from restrictions on gender affirming health care to rules that teachers will have to follow about pronoun use.
Premier Smith joins me now from Calgary. Premier, thanks so much for being here, and I want to go back to that social media post that you had last week, as you unveiled the package, and you had a phrase along the lines of as premier, I’m not comfortable with essentially the status quo. Now you’re not a parent, but you’re the premier for all Alberta parents. You’re the premier for all Alberta kids and yet here you are as a premier making a decision on this important issue. With all respect, what gives you the right?
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: Well I would say that what we’re seeing is an evolving discussion in the public realm, not only in Canada but internationally. And you’re seeing different standards of medical practice being proposed, and we felt like it was important for us to make sure that we had guidelines that were understandable and acceptable. We believe the starting point should be that kids should not be making irreversible decisions. And so the framework for what we put forward gives kids who want to transition, a clear guidepost of when they’ll be able to start hormone replacement, when they’ll be able to have top and bottom surgery, so that they can plan and be able to get the support they need to do that.
David Akin: Now surgery is one aspect of this package, but there’s also some new rules about when kids can and how they can’t use their own names, etc., you know, there’s more serious things, etc. This is a group of kids, minors that are most at risk of self-harm, most at risk of being homeless, most at risk of suicide. How do you reconcile the fact that your package here is going to increase the risk of harm to this group?
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: Well when a child embarks on a path of transitioning in gender, then that—it begins with pronouns, moves on to hormone blockers or across sex hormones, and then moves ultimately onto a decision about whether to have top and bottom surgery. It’s a continuum. And I believe that parents and families need to be there every step of the way, supporting a child through that process. It’s—it’s going to be a lifelong decision with lifelong impact to them. And I think the best thing for their mental health is to make sure that they know that the adults in their life are with them. So that’s part of the reason why if that—that kind of decision gets made at a very young age, families need to be looped in so that they can provide the support.
David Akin: But these are kids in their schools that are bullied, there are targets on their back already and this sort of—all this prohibitions are likely to increase, perhaps, depression among this group that they can’t proceed with what they would like to do. They can’t use their own names, and again, that puts them at greater risk of harm.
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: With respect, I just disagree. I think that kids who are going through these really tumultuous decisions, this tumultuous choice, they need to have their families with them. They need to have the support of mental health care. Sometimes they’ll need the support of physical care, and the parents need to be involved in that process right from the beginning. I—I don’t think it’s healthy for a child who is going through that kind of emotional and mental anguish, for them to be—for them to be separated from their families. I think just the opposite. I think—I think that we have to have families involved in those decisions from—from the very beginning so that they can support them.
David Akin: There are going to be families who are already very supportive of their minor child proceeding with—it might be puberty blockers or some gender affirming surgery—and you’ve now banned those procedures. And so again, there’s a family there: mom, dad, all siblings, supporting and ready to proceed with some health care for a minor family member, and your government is now saying you can’t do that. I don’t understand where the freedom is at that you, the state, are now interfering with a decision a family might want to make about the health care for a child.
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: Well there’s difference of opinion in the—in the medical profession about at what point a child becomes mature enough to make life-changing decisions that are irreversible. And there are many practitioners who believe that that happens somewhere around the age of 16. So that’s the reason why we identified that age 16 and 17 is when a child would be able to commence the—the therapy on—with using hormones with the support of their families, their psychologists, and also their medical practitioner, because there are also physical impacts that happen from lifelong hormone therapy. And then making the decision on top and bottom surgery happens when they’re 18, because those are decisions that are irreversible. When you make a decision that you’re going to remove your reproductive organs, then that’s a decision that you should make as an adult. There’s just certain decisions that because they have such a profound impact on that future course for that child that really it should be delayed until they’re old enough to bear the full consequences of it, and that age is 18.
David Akin: There is one major surgical procedure that your province allows minors to sign off on and that’s abortion. You only need to get—the physician must only agree that the minor understands the practice, that the minor knows the risk of this particular procedure. And if the physician’s satisfied that that hurdles been met, then that minor can consent to their own abortion without mom and dad’s approval. Why is it okay then that a minor, in those conditions, getting consent and informed consent, why is okay that that minor can get abortion but could not proceed with some other health care involving their gender?
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: If I understand the court jurisprudence around that, it’s because having a child also bears the consequences of having a lifelong impact on that person’s life. And so I would say that these are two very similar approaches, is that if you’re going to make a decision that is going to have a profound impact on your future, then you have to be making those kinds of decisions as an adult.
David Akin: Let me chat a little bit about the sex education—sort of new regulations around sex education, the opt-out, opt-in sort of procedures. Help with this, I think there’s probably a benefit—you may agree with me—there’s probably a benefit that you all—we all come out of the school system with a basic understanding about math, about biology, about reading. Why not have everybody come out with the same basic understanding about human sexuality? And I say that remembering that a member of your party—a candidate—had to be disavowed because that candidate—North Red Deer—didn’t have a very good understanding of people who are just not like her. She might have benefit—benefitted from a human sexuality class in high school.
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: Well I—I would say that what we’re doing is just making sure that parents are—are in the loop and that they’re—they know when these topics are going to be discussed in class, so that they can opt their child into it at the end of the day, perhaps to be able to have a conversation about what they learned in school so that they—so that they know. At the moment, my understanding is that the opt-out happens at the beginning of the year, and then parents don’t really know the timing of when this kind of instruction takes place. So I think just building a little bit more structure around it, so that we can ensure that there are healthy conversations happening in the home are important and quite frankly, it’s in our school act. Our school act does give us an obligation to make sure that parents have the right to make the—the decisions on when their children should have the maturity level to be able to have these discussions. So we’re just making sure that—that we bring a little bit more rigour to that process. I mean, it shouldn’t be that surprising. If you want your kid to go out on a skating field trip, you have to do an opt-in for that to happen. So if you’re going to have really consequential, difficult and highly charged conversations happening in the classroom, I think parents should also have the opportunity to opt-in as well.
David Akin: As we saw in Saskatchewan, there may be a situation where you’re going to have to invoke the notwithstanding clause in order to implement that legislation. Are you prepared to invoke the notwithstanding clause?
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: I—I hope it doesn’t come to that. I mean I—I look at this, and the framework I bring to it is what is in the best interest of a child. And what’s in the best interest of a child is to, you know, a loving, supportive home as they’re going through these really important decisions that they’re making, and making sure that they’re making decisions at a maturity level that they are prepared to—to accept the consequences of it. So I think because of—of that framework that we’re preserving the rights of children to make adult decisions as adults, I’m very hopeful that we won’t—it won’t come to that.
David Akin: Premier, I’ve known you for a while. I’ve known you’ve not backed off from a fight with the federal government or anybody else. Can you tell us, are you going to commit to the notwithstanding clause to make sure that you achieve your objectives here as Premier Moe did in Saskatchewan?
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: Well as I say, I mean I—I don’t—I don’t see any reason why I would necessarily have to go down that pathway. One of the things we are doing is that we’re expanding the options for health care for—for the individuals who—who have transitioned. That’s one of the things that I found disappointing over the years. I’ve just spoken with many transgender individuals who had a hard time getting a doctor who understood their unique needs, who needed to get ongoing hormone replacement treatment, who needed the extra care in dealing with the consequences of some of that long term use, and who needed better surgical aftercare, after having surgery. So we’re going to be recruiting a doctor to be able to assist so that we can do those surgeries here, rather than in Quebec. Make sure that the surgical aftercare takes place, and make sure that there is a roster of doctors able to be—able to provide that service to those who want this—this kind of treatment. We’re also going to be expanding the amount of mental health support, including the counselling support to families. So, I would say that if the federal government want to do anything, maybe they could encourage other provinces to—to bridge this gap. Because if it was a gap in our health care system in our province, I would say it’s probably a gap at other provinces as well.
David Akin: Premier Danielle Smith in Calgary, thank you so much for joining us.
Danielle Smith, Alberta Premier: Thanks. Talk to you again.
David Akin: Coming up, Liberal reaction.
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: “This is our NATO moment as an LGBTQ2 community. An attack on one of our communities is an attack on us all.”
David Akin: There has been lots of reaction to Premier Smith’s announcement right across the country and from federal sources here in Ottawa, including our next guest. Randy Boissonnault is the only MP in Justin Trudeau’s cabinet representing Alberta, and he joins us from his riding in Edmonton Centre.
Minister Boissonnault, it’s great to have you on the program. And I guess the first thing I’ll—I’ll try to get from you is I challenged Premier Smith by asking her what gave her the right to essentially get in the way of kids growing up. Let me turn it a little bit on your ear and what gives you the right in opposition to what they’re doing, to interfere in the parent-child relationship with Ms. Smith seems to think she is supporting? Give me your thoughts about the proposal she’s put forward.
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: Well thanks David, and I appreciate the opportunity to be on your show today. And I’m still getting phone calls from, you know, people in the community that are quite rightly terrified by last week’s announcement by Premier Smith and the forthcoming legislation. I think if I can just be really clear, the state has no business in interfering in the development of a child and the relationship that they have with parents. And what Danielle Smith is trying to do with this broadside on the LGBTQ2 community and really targeting trans kids is she’s trying to insert herself between kids and their parents. She’s trying to insert herself between kids and medical professionals. She’s trying to mandate that teachers out kids. And I think, David, if we’re really thoughtful about this, I’m—I’ve grown up in Alberta all my life, I was born here. I’m now 53. I lived through the 80s and 90s as a young person and that was a really homophobic, hateful time. I was in the closet well into my—into my 20s. And the vast majority of Albertan parents love their kids: straight, gay, trans, bi, other, you know, orientation combinations. But there is a small minority of kids, David, who literally fall through the cracks because when they come out to their parents, something breaks down. And I know because I’ve seen the numbers on the street. I’ve seen, in Edmonton, up to 65, 70 per cent of the homeless kids come from the LGBTQ community. The numbers are as high in Calgary. They are numbers that we see across the country. And so these kids, and other kids that could end up like these kids, need the safe space of school because they haven’t yet figured out how to tell their folks. Look, it took me ‘til 28 to tell my own parents. And why did I do that? Because the last relationship in my network that could tell, because you actually don’t know if your parents are going to be with you when you tell them…
David Akin: And so I want to…
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: And I feel a little bit for them because…
David Akin: If I could just interrupt, then because you used—you used the word terrified at the beginning. That’s a strong word.
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: Yeah, I did.
David Akin: And it sound to me like the most terrifying thing of the many things that Premier Smith has decided to legislate on, it really is the pronoun issue. The idea that teachers will be required to tell parents about a child’s behaviour, that’s—like it was in Saskatchewan, like it was in New Brunswick. Am I right about that? That’s the real—that’s the one that’s going to put targets on kids’ backs? Is that what you’re saying?
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: Yeah, it’s going—it’s going to make the—the school system less safe for people. And I think what the premier is doing—and this is the comments that I got from people in my community and in my city—is it’s going to make the school system less safe, and what’s going to happen is the teacher is going to have to call the parents if they even think a kid is queer. Or if they think a kid is going, you know, wants to try a new pronoun. And look, we don’t—teachers don’t call home when, you know, kids break up with their girlfriend or boyfriend. They don’t call when they, you know, go—join the chess club. And I understand that parents want to be involved in the development and the lives of their kids. That’s totally normal and natural. And guess what? For the vast majority of relationships in the province, those loving parents find out because their kids are going to tell them. But here’s the key, David, those kids, if they haven’t told their parents yet, it’s because they’re not quite ready. They don’t feel confident enough yet, but given time and space they will. And I’ll use my own experience. When I told my parents who I was, and I was pretty emotional at the time, and they looked at me, and I remember my mom looked at my dad. My dad looked at my mom and my mom said we knew. And then I shot back and I said well why didn’t you tell me? And they smiled and they said you had to be ready to tell us on your own when you were ready. And that’s what the premier is taking away.
David Akin: It looks like watching the Saskatchewan fight over this issue and Saskatchewan—just to remind our audience—it’s just the pronoun law, if you will, that consent is required for kids to be able to call themselves what they want and refer to themselves in the way they want. And it looks like the premier had to use the notwithstanding clause because he knew that would be a Charter violation otherwise.
Similarly in Alberta, I’ll bet there’s going to be groups that will bring something forward, and we’ve already heard there’s some threats on this, that Danielle Smith may have the Charter in her way. Maybe she—she’ll invoke the notwithstanding clause, maybe not. Long way of saying, you probably got the law on your side, if you want to fight that aspect of what she’s proposed. But we’ve seen polls where there’s like 60 per cent of parents go yeah, I’d kind of like to be at least notified. The consent issue, a little less support, but there’s a lot of parents out there who think they’d like to be notified and they may not be as forward thinking as your parents. How do you then win in Alberta and around the country, the political battle, if you will, to suggest that this is a bad idea?
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: I think this—it’s having conversations like we’re having today, David, and being really open and honest about the fact that conversations about gender identity, gender expression, your kids sexual orientation—like that is like a whole step more than just the birds and the bees conversation, right? It’s confusing. People are worried about the price of their mortgage. They’re worried about the price of groceries, and then all of a sudden their kid decides that they are, you know, they want to change their gender. People—like parents are just saying help. And guess what? Those—those supports are there, and loving parents who find this out about their kids, and when their kids tell them, navigate that with their kids. My concern is for those kids who don’t have those supports, and the safe space that was the school system is now going to be taken away because what’s going to happen is any kid who’s different is now going to be called out. And so you’re literally going to have kids looking over their back wondering if they’re safe and that has real damaging consequences. I mean, the—the really sad thing, David, is we have way too many kids in the trans community and in the LGBTQ community who take their own lives. And it is really horrifying when they end up on the street, like they get prostituted. They are living homeless on the street, and they end up dying. And as a, you know, as a—as a leader in my community and as an MP and a federal minister and former special advisor on LGBTQ issues, I want to see all kids, you know, live to adulthood and, and—and be who they’re meant to be. And certainly in the LBGTQ community, to not have the state tell them who they can and can’t be when—when and how to live their lives. And so this is about Danielle Smith interfering in the development of kids, and I think it’s wrong.
David Akin: We’re going to—I want to switch gears—we’ve only got about a minute or so—to a bit more of the federal battle coming. I’ve been—it’s my job—I get to watch everybody’s stump speech and I’ve been watching Pierre Poilievre on the stump. He brings up some vague comments about parental rights. He talks about a lot of other things. Your party, for the first time since Justin Trudeau became leader, is running some what we call negative ads in some of which compare Pierre Poilievre to Donald Trump.
Donald Trump: “We’re spending a $170 billion for a faraway land.”
Pierre Poilievre, Opposition Leader: “He’d rather spread falsehood about lar—faraway foreign lands, Mr. Speaker.”
Donald Trump: “These newspapers and the media are totally dishonest people, folks. Remember that.”
Pierre Poilievre, Opposition Leader: “Contrary to the false and dishonest reporting of the liberal media.”
Donald Trump: “We have to bring it home, right? We’re going to bring it home.”
Pierre Poilievre, Opposition Leader: “Let’s bring it home. Thank you.”
David Akin: Do you think this comparison to Trump—Poilievre and Trump—does it work? Is it the right idea? Would you like to see you and your party be a little more aggressive—“contrasting” the Conservatives”? Where do you stand on that Trump versus Poilievre—Trump is Poilievre kind of thing?
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: I think it’s more than a strategy, David. I think it’s a fact. I mean just look at his stand on Ukraine. Joe Biden—President Biden is trying to get a, you know, a multi-hundred billion dollar aid package, military package to Ukraine, and Donald Trump’s forces in the Republican Party are stopping that from happening. It’s the same approach that Pierre Poilievre is taking with opposing our own free trade deal with Ukraine. And go back to this issue that we talked about before. I mean, Trump went after trans people in the United States, and what’s happened with Poilievre? He has sent an edict to all of his MPs, many of whom I was on a plane with last night—earlier this week, coming back to Edmonton and they have to be silent on this issue. He has gagged his MPs, not just in Alberta but across the country, and because he is complicit with Danielle Smith and other Conservative premiers to bring U.S. style Republican governor and Trump like ideas to our country, and I think we’ve got to call them out on it, each and every day. And I will be saying these things in the House, and I think we have to take Pierre Poilievre to task because why does he want U.S. style politics and ideas coming north of the border? I think it plays to his base, but I can tell you the Canadians that I talk to do not want to see that kind of politics here in Canada.
David Akin: Minister Boissonnault, thank you so much for joining us. We’ll see you next week here in Ottawa.
Randy Boissonnault, Employment, Workforce Development and Official Languages Minister: Thanks David, all the best.
David Akin: Coming up, one last thing…new heights in political fundraising.
David Akin: One last thing…political contributions …
We got new data from Elections Canada last week, which shows how each party has done every quarter in terms of raising money, and that’s what this chart behind me shows. The blue are Conservatives, red are Liberals, New Democrats are orange, and green is Green Party or so on. And we’ve mapped out how each party did in each quarter, stretching back each year to 2015 so 2015, right through to 2023. And the most recent data shows us how dominant the Conservative Party of Canada is when it comes to fundraising.
In the last quarter of 2023, that’s this dot right up here. Look at that from the Conservatives: $11.9 million raised in just three months, and it wasn’t even an election quarter. The previous record, also held by the Conservatives right here, that’s 2019. Yellow lines represent election periods. So in 2019, that’s Andrew Scheer’s party and they raised $10 million. That was a big number, but to raise $11.9 million, more than all other parties combined in just one quarter, incredible. But of course, one, two, three elections, the Conservatives are 0 for 3 in terms of winning elections. Great you’re doing all the fundraising; you still need to win the most seats.
And folks, one more thing… Don’t forget in our system, no donations allowed from corporations, from unions, from NGOs. It’s just individual Canadians writing a cheque to the parties they support. And you’re—you’re maxed out at $1,700 a year. You can’t give any more than that in any given year. And so in the last quarter, 66 thousand Canadians helped the Conservatives get to $11.9 million. That’s quite an accomplishment for that particular party.
That’s all the time we have for The West Block. Thank you so much for watching. We’ll see you next week.
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