Evan Scrimshaw: If Nenshi has a vision of Alberta, he should share it ... soon

Smith is getting to run against a leader who refuses to make an affirmative argument for his own existence.

The Canadian Press.

By: Evan Scrimshaw

This post originally appeared on Evan Scrimshaw’s Substack Scrimshaw Unscripted, and is reprinted here with permission from the author.

On a recent episode of Steve Paikin’s podcast, Danielle Smith was asked about comments from the Bloc leader on Alberta separatism, and the fact that he isn’t certain “oil and gas qualify to define a culture.” Her answer was revealing to her mindset — a story of self-determination and problem solving without the need for government that invoked the Stampede and the difference in “founding story” between Quebec and Alberta, and also of her view of politics.

Smith’s answer is cogent, and forms a through line of her politics. She thinks the answer is to get off people’s backs, because that’s the Alberta Way. It’s an eminently contestable one, and one that my politics hates, but it’s a story that at least explains how she ended up at the place she does.

What’s notable is that I’ve never heard Naheed Nenshi say anything nearly as cogent about what he thinks Alberta is. He talked in 2024 about how Danielle Smith’s policies regarding trans health care and parental notification were “unAlbertan,” and he has vaguely talked about how his elections as mayor were a turning point. But I don’t know what he thinks has changed in Alberta to now make progressives viable.

There’s an opening, as Smith’s UCP is split on separation and the National Question, to reframe Alberta’s cultural identity in a way that will be useful for the NDP. That the UCP is split is undeniable — the latest Janet Brown/CBC poll had UCP voters 54/39 in favour of leaving Canada — while New Democrats are united. In the runup to the 2023 election, I wrote about the fact that Alberta has three roughly equal political traditions — progressives, centrists/business-focused moderates mostly found in the cities, and a more rural, culturally conservative right faction. The Alberta NDP’s success in 2023, real as it was even in a loss, was in peeling off a significant amount of that centrist faction, most of which has gone back to Smith.

If you’re Nenshi, you’re not going to win the next election by telling Albertans things that will play well to Laurentian ears. Winning in Alberta will require a lot of triangulation that makes me want to break things, but that’s the point. Nenshi needs to make the case not for Canada, but for a different Alberta than Smith’s hard scrabbled tale of toiling the lands alone. And there’s a version of that message that can work, if Nenshi wants to make it.

Albertans might hate government, but they don’t actually hate helping each other. There’s a collectivist streak in Alberta, a sense of helping each other, that has extended throughout the province’s entire history. It might not be the way progressives would like that collectivist streak to shine through, but anybody who thinks Camrose or Leduc or wherever are cold and selfish places don’t understand. There is a sense of community there, it’s just not the same sense of community as New Democrats usually understand.

A message of hope, one that acknowledges the challenges we face both as Canadians and as Albertans but that can find optimism and hope in the communities of Alberta, is one that can land. Nenshi needs to reframe the questions from “Why doesn’t Ottawa care about us?” and “why won’t the government get out of our way?”, fights that the left will never win, to focusing on what people need. If Nenshi is talking about caring for our neighbours and ensuring everyone gets a chance to make a real run at life, then he’s talking about a message that plays just as well in Strathcona as it does in Stettler.

That frame would enable Nenshi to talk about hiring more nurses and doctors or building new hospitals in places that need it, more teachers and schools where that’s an issue, and relentlessly focus on job creation and economic diversification everywhere. Whatever their views on pipelines or oil now, people understand that in 20 years Alberta’s economy will have to look different, and presumably there are ideas Nenshi has (or can find) to ensure that the decline in the oil patch isn’t the decline of the province.

It would also allow Nenshi to take a more active stance on the various corruption and mismanagement stories that are floating around. It really seems like the entirety of AHS and MHCare need to be dismantled brick by brick, given the constant stream of stories about incompetence or allegations of outright corruption that are showing up in the Globe and elsewhere on the regular. Why Nenshi isn’t promising an anti-corruption agenda that would also tie in the Oilers playoff scandal of 2024 and show he’s not scared of bold action is beyond me.

(Also, to the scum of the earth trying to intimidate the great Carrie Tait, go fuck yourselves. Tait’s a pro’s pro and one of the many reasons Alberta has such a great press corps.)

Nenshi has been absent from the conversation, but this is his opportunity to reclaim the mantle. He can pitch an optimistic vision of Alberta, one that can solve its own problems without constantly hectoring about Ottawa. Albertans are smart people who can listen to an argument more complicated than “Ottawa Bad,” and a progressive leader who taps into a more complex and interesting cultural context could be rewarded.

There is often a lot of handwringing about Smith and the support she has, but I don’t find her vote that impressive. She’s just getting to run against a leader who refuses to make an affirmative argument for his own existence. What is the Nenshi NDP? Who knows? If the NDP want to win the next election, or help stem the tide of Smith’s worst and most insular instincts, they have to get off the sidelines and in the game.

Smith’s a vulnerable premier in theory — with splits in the UCP clear and a tightrope to be walked of getting results for Alberta with little leverage outside of openly supporting separation (which would end her career), she should be on the hot seat. But Nenshi hasn’t yet shown anything that suggests he can do anything about it.

There is an opening for Nenshi to step into the void left by the UCP’s internal conflicts and reframe a message that can play in all corners of Alberta. Will he take it? I have my doubts, but he’s free to start at any time.

Evan Scrimshaw is a political commentator whose work about Alberta, and the rest of Canada, can be found at Scrimshaw Unscripted.

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