Smith, Alberta Next panel's first town hall hears support, calls for separation vote
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The event in Red Deer was the first in a series of town halls to address public concerns with the federal government.
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Some 450 people showed up to put questions to Smith and the 15 other members of her Alberta Next panel about the grievances inspiring separatist sentiment in the province.
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Most of the attendees lauded Smith and the panel's strategies to wrest more control from the federal government, including pulling out of the Canada Pension Plan and creating a provincial police force to replace the RCMP.
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Jon Sedore came from the town of Trochu, about an hour's drive south of Red Deer. He told the panel he agrees with Alberta independence, and noted that even with the majority in the room expressing agreement with its proposals, Ottawa still stands in the way.
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'If you ask for permission for freedom, you're never going to get it. If you declare your freedom, that's where we can start,' he said to applause.
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Smith has repeatedly said she believes in a sovereign Alberta within a united Canada, and that one of the reasons for the panel is to address the concerns inspiring more vocal separatist sentiment in the province.
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But on Tuesday, the conversation kept circling back to the elephant in the room: putting the question of separation to a ballot. Several attendees said only a yes vote will give the province the negotiating leverage it needs.
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Jeffrey Rath, a co-founder of the separatist group Alberta Prosperity Project, took to the mic to argue that there is a legal mechanism for the province to collect all the taxes currently handled by the Canada Revenue Agency.
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'That is voting Alberta the hell out of Canada on a clear question,' he said.
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Before the crowd could get in its questions and comments on each topic, it had to watch a total of more than 30 minutes of government-produced videos, first released with the announcement of the panel last month. Among the issues at play is the idea of withholding social services from some immigrants.
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In a session dedicated to that topic, many argued reform is needed to stop the bleeding of jobs to unqualified newcomers.
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Other attendees said the panel's process has been biased from the start, and expressed frustration its online survey presented leading questions with no option to disagree.
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