A former Progressive Conservative Deputy Premier stopped in Drayton Valley last week to thank the local volunteers for their efforts to collect signatures for the Forever Canada petition.
Over the past two months, local volunteers have been out and about in the community collecting signatures for the petition put forward by Thomas Lukaszuk in June. Last Thursday, Lukaszuk made a stop in Drayton Valley with his Unity Bus to personally meet the volunteers.
Dawn Hook, the first canvasser in the area, says Lukaszuk was calm and professional when speaking about his reasoning for the petition and the current political climate in the province.
She says he expressed that in a democracy everyone should be heard.
“He had his opinion, and he had what he felt was his duty, and went through and did the best that he could do,” says Hook. “And I’m glad that he did.”
Lukaszuk and his family immigrated to Canada when he was 12. He says that when they arrived in Canada, everyone was welcoming, and he says he loves the country as a whole.
As a former MLA, Lukaszuk was aware of the political discourse surrounding the Elections Statute Amendment Act (ESAA) last spring.
“It became abundantly obvious to me that Premier Danielle Smith amended the Citizens Initiative Act to roll out the red carpet to the separatists,” says Lukaszuk. “She lowered the number of signatures, extended the time period, and really liberated fundraising rules where they could actually raise money anywhere in the world without the limitations.”
When he learned that a separatist group was planning to apply for a petition on the same day the Province was putting the act into effect, Lukaszuk wanted to work fast.
He applied for a petition at the beginning of June and was given the go-ahead at the end of June, just a few days before the ESAA was put into place. Wishing to turn the conversation on its head, Lukaszuk decided to ask, “Do you agree that Alberta should remain in Canada?” for the petition.
Hook was the first local volunteer to sign up as a canvasser, but she was soon joined by five others, and three volunteers who helped out.
“I’ve never done anything like this in my life,” says Hook. “I’ve never ever gotten involved in politics.”
She says she had been hearing about some of the claims the Alberta Prosperity Project (APP) was making in favour of separation and she didn’t think it was a good idea or that it would end well.
“When I saw that [Lukaszuk] had started this petition, I thought, ‘Enough being angry; now I can actually do something,’” says Hook.
Once his petition was accepted, the APP had to wait until he’d had the opportunity to gather his signatures before they could submit their own petition on the same subject. If successful and the petition goes before the legislature or forces a referendum, the APP will have to wait five years before they can file another petition about separation.
While there were benefits to Lukaszuk’s move, there were also risks. Lukaszuk got the jump on the APP filing, but his petition falls under the rules that were in place prior to the Election Statutes Amendment Act (ESAA). Forever Canadian needed to have 300,000 signatures gathered in 90 days. When the count was completed on October 28, the total number of signatures was in excess of 456,000.
The subject of separation is a polarizing issue, so Hook’s friends came to sit with her when she first started. However, Hook set up her table many times in the community, as did other canvassers when they joined, and she says there was only one individual who was agitated when they spoke.
“We had a lot of people that didn’t want to sign, for their own reasons, and we did have a few discussions with people who absolutely want to separate,” says Hook. “But I never felt that they were threatening in any way.”
She says she heard that some other communities did report threatening behaviour from some, but that was not their experience in the Drayton Valley area.
Hook says that the five canvassers, along with help from the three volunteers, in the area gathered 600 signatures for the petition.
If successful, Lukaszuk says the Province can put the question to a vote in the legislature rather than hold a referendum, which is what he hopes they will do.
“Referenda are very divisive, and this province is already divided,” says Lukaszuk. “And they’re very expensive as well.”
