Bell: Unions, teachers want Smith out so it's the Fire-the-MLA recall game

No, We Ain’t Gonna Take it Anymore! The Real Freedom Convoy!

Signs, so many signs with so many slogans. Rallies, so many people vowing to go to the wall for their cause.

Talk, such tough talk, some of the words ripped right from the history of labour back in the day when workers didn’t have two pennies to rub together.

At the time I even penned a column saying Premier Danielle Smith, slumping in the polls, was facing a war with unions.

The teachers were plenty peeved. Smith imposed a deal on them.

It had a double-digit pay hike over four years but it wasn’t high enough.

It promised to hire more teachers and educational assistants but they were not hiring enough.

The government would build more schools but they weren’t building enough.

The teachers did not get what they wanted. They got what they rejected.

And so there was the tough talk, even serious-sounding chatter about a general strike.

A mass walkout. Hundreds of thousands of workers out on the streets aiming to topple the Smith government.

Something big, something bold, an unprecedented response, as I recall.

Something so big and so bold the cops couldn’t arrest all of the strikers or fine them all or jail them all.

The hibernating labour movement in Alberta had awakened.

Why it was the teachers who had managed to light the fire of revolution was beyond the comprehension of some souls.

Teachers were angry. That much was real but they were hardly qualified for membership in the oppressed masses.

Related

Despite despising Smith, many of them are living the good life.

I’d backed strikers in print, those facing harsher realities.

I’d seen brutality directed at strikers who stood their ground but they were willing to pay the price because they had little to lose.

A general strike is a big step.

So instead we get recall. Every day or two another UCP member of the legislature is singled out.

Smith herself is expected to be targeted sometime this week. The unions and the teachers insist they are not running the show.

Here are the rules.

You sign up. You try to score enough signatures on a petition from people in any Alberta riding who want to bounce their member of the legislature out of office.

If any of those petitions in any of those ridings get enough signatures there is then a vote in that riding on whether the politician being targeted should be turfed.

If more than half of those voting in the riding vote Yes the politician is no longer a member of the legislature and there is a byelection.

The aim is to have every UCP member of the legislature recalled. Now it is 17 and counting.

Operation Total Recall has a pretty cool, pretty professional-looking website and looks to be quarterbacking the recall efforts throughout the province.

Why are these people wanting these MLAs to be recalled? What conduct is bad enough to fire them before the election in less than two years?

First, let’s turn back the time machine to the 1990s.

In B.C., a provincial Liberal politician by the name of Paul Reitsma wrote letters to newspapers under phony names praising himself and attacking his opponents.

He was ejected from the Liberal group of MLAs but stayed in office, remaining in the legislature.

People in his area were appalled by his behaviour. A local newspaper called him a liar.

The voters gathered enough signatures on a petition to punt him and there would have been a recall vote but he resigned just before the vote was called.

Years later he said his acts were “utter foolishness.”

Many of these UCP MLAs face possible recall because they supported sending teachers back to the classroom.

In other words, some people don’t agree with what they did.

Besides that supposed sin, some of those who want MLAs recalled don’t like how they voted, don’t like what they stand for.

They “refuse to engage in meaningful dialogue” or don’t respond adequately to concerns.

One MLA is seen as unfit for office because of “social media posts” with “divisive rhetoric.”

Divisive rhetoric? Every politician in Canada would have to be recalled.

Another is guilty of defending “Alberta’s role in promoting fossil fuel disinformation in schools across the country.”

You can shake your head now.

So it goes.

On Monday, folks bellyache about UCP cabinet minister Nathan Neudorf.

There is a campaign to get signatures to punt Neudorf. People claim they have a tough time signing up to help out with the campaign.

They allege it is a fake recall campaign while Neudorf insists he is “not actively involved in his own recall.”

The result? Anther news story and another episode in the Fire-the-MLA recall game.

rbell@postmedia.com