New Alberta NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about his first few weeks in the role and his priorities for the party
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Michael Higgins: What’s challenging you most in making this transition to provincial party leadership?
Naheed Nenshi: It’s been hitting the ground running. The fun parts have been great. Traveling all over Alberta, visiting communities large and small, meeting Albertans, sensing the excitement that they’ve got. That’s been great. There has been a lot of organizational work, the sort of less sexy stuff. Figuring out how things work, how they have worked, how they could work better, bringing some of my expertise to the table, getting to know my colleagues, my caucus team a little bit better, all 37 of them, and getting ready for an upcoming by-election in Lethbridge West. So it’s been a busy, busy summer.
MH: What kind of marching orders have you given to your caucus of NDP MLAs?
NN: Things are looking a little different. We have to recognize the fact that this party has done extraordinary things. Three quarters of a million Albertans voted for us in the last election, we got very nearly half of the vote, but I’ve also been saying that what got us to 45 or 46 per cent of the vote is not what’s going to get us to 55 per cent of the vote. So the trick is to ensure that the 45 per cent of Albertans that are with us still see a home here and really pivoting a little bit to think about how we get that next 10 or 15 or 20 per cent of Albertans on board with the movement as well. And that’s been sort of the exciting thing to say, ‘Let’s honour what we’ve done and then let’s think about new ways that we can really engage Albertans.’
MH: You were met right out of the gate by UCP attack ads. You’ve countered with your own self-identified harsh language, calling the Smith government things like uncaring and competent. How indicative is that of the dialogue Albertans should expect of the relationship between your two parties?
NN: I think a little bit of Tim Walz, who’s the new VP candidate in the United States, people think he’s Minnesota-nice. Well I’m Calgary-nice, which means that we’ll always be kind, we’ll always be empathetic, but we will not pause in calling out things that are wrong.
Those attack ads I find hysterical. They’re so predictable. It’s exactly what they were going to try to do. They failed miserably. They’ve spent tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars on these things. Let them waste their money. I filmed something in five minutes in downtown Calgary when I was walking by and it got something like 10 times the engagement that they got. So let them try. It’s all they’ve got. All they’ve got is personal attacks because they don’t have policy to stand on. Similarly, the conversation on the green line in Calgary, it’s a big problem, but rather than the government stepping in to try and solve the problem, they’re trying to use it to score cheap political points on me. And here’s the thing, it ain’t working, so let them keep wasting their money, as far as I’m concerned.
MH: Anyone who reads columnists in Calgary knows full well you’ve become something of a punching bag over the Green Line cost overruns. The UCP calling it the Nenshi nightmare. What degree of responsibility do you take for the challenges now facing that project and how does that weigh with your new role as NDP leader?
NN: I’ve recorded a video on this that people should take a look at. Here’s the thing, if Rick McIver and Jason Kenney hadn’t interfered with the Green Line when it was going forward we would have been in the ground. We would have procured it in the middle of the pandemic when construction companies were tripping over themselves to get better prices. Instead the UCP wasted almost two years in trying to figure out if they could do it cheaper and better, they couldn’t, and the one change that they did ask for – only one – we warned them would make it much more expensive, which is what happened. So when Minister Dreeshen is ready to take some responsibility, we can talk about responsibility. The real issue here is how is it going to get done because right now the UCP seems intent on just letting it die But people need that transit. Anyone who’s driven on Stoney or Deerfoot trails knows the importance of alleviating that congestion. The people in Mackenzie Towne in Southeast Calgary have been asking for this kind of transit for 40 years. Where is the UCP solution here?
MH: Calgarians are bracing for more water restrictions needed to fix those newly found feeder main issues. What role do you see for the province where these municipal infrastructure woes are concerned moving forward?
NN: Property tax is a terrible way of funding this kind of municipal infrastructure. In Calgary, we actually had a world leading pipe inspection program ever since about 2000, 2004. One of the reasons that we use so little water compared to other cities of our size is precisely because we’ve been plugging leaks and fixing old pipes. Now this feeder main, no one saw this coming. This is a big deal and ultimately the province’s best thing they can do is show up with money because you can’t afford this kind of infrastructure fixes with only the property tax. We see nothing of that from the province so far.
MH: If there is one Smith government policy or issue your party will be most focused on with the fall sitting on the not too distant horizon what is it and why?
NN: There’s so many of them. Certainly the premier has spent the summer talking only to UCP members, she seems a bit nervous to talk to the general public, but she’s really been signaling in these private meetings that she’s going to take a hard right-wing turn this fall to protect herself in the leadership review that’s coming up in early November. So we’re going to see things like an amendment to the bill of rights to prevent us from requiring firefighters to be vaccinated against diseases they can get on the job, we’re going to see movement maybe on the Alberta Pension Plan, heck, she’s even talking about Chem trails. So I think what we’re going to see is a significant shift to the right, right up until her November 2 leadership review. And you know, again, it’s a matter of calling them out and asking this government to focus on the very real issues Albertans are facing around affordability, health care, education, growing the economy, instead of just trying to save her skin in that leadership review.
MH: How do you maintain the degree of momentum and party growth that came with the leadership race? What’s weighing on your shoulders?
NN: The momentum has been extraordinary. It’s building and building and building. Everywhere I go, everywhere in the province people say, ‘Thank you for giving us an alternative.’ We are growing our membership in places you never would have imagined the NDP growing. The latest poll shows us neck-and-neck with the UCP, which means we would actually win because our vote is more efficient than theirs is. So we’ve just got to keep going and we’ve got to keep Albertans understanding, as we did all summer, that a better Alberta is possible, that there is a terrific alternative, and that we are ready to govern.