Orange is the new black
As PCs and Wildrose struggle, Alberta NDP plots its big move forward
Joe Ceci’s campaign office is ready for the provincial election call that most Albertans expect to come next week.
A former art supply store decorated with amateur selfportraits, the space has been cleared for the business of winning votes; big signs cover the windows, lawn signs lean against a desk, a bank of phones lines the wall and a well-stocked candy bowl sits ripe for raiding.
It smells like paint. Fresh paint. Bright orange. NDP orange, in Tory-blue Calgary.
“It’s not futile,” Mr. Ceci insists. “I’ve got a track record of working hard for people in this area, this riding. All seven communities in Calgary Fort were represented by alderman Joe Ceci for 15 years. So I don’t think it’s a futile effort at all.”
He knocks on one door in the mid-market neighbourhood just outside one of Calgary’s trendier downtown districts; the owner supported Mr. Ceci the alderman — who retired from city politics in 2010 — but not Joe Ceci the NDP candidate.
This is Alberta, after all, the land of low unemployment, high wages, low union membership and a visceral, almost genetic aversion to taxation.
Yet, in a parallel to the 2011 federal election, the Alberta NDP appears to be making inroads. Buoyed by the collapse of the Alberta Liberals, and exasperation toward the longgoverning Conservatives, the NDP is showing consistently strong and surging poll numbers in the province’s progressive strongholds.
A recent poll published by the Calgary Herald and Edmonton Journal showed the NDP with a strong firstplace position in Edmonton — with 35% support to the Wildrose’s 15% and the Progressive Conservatives at third place with 14%.
While the NDP did not poll anywhere near as well in the rest of the province, it has organizational strength that stand in contrast to the other opposition parties’ apparent struggles to prepare for the coming vote.
An emerging, and entirely possible, scenario: the NDP could become Alberta’s official opposition for the first time in more than three decades.
Rachel Notley was declared the new leader of the NDP in October — just before the infamous floor-crossing of the Wildrose Nine that denuded Alberta’s legislature of its official opposition.
Ms. Notley quickly emerged as a forceful and articulate substitute, albeit from the left.
In the fourth quarter of 2014, the NDP raised $259,000. By comparison, the Wildrose Party — the upstart opposition that once rivalled the fundraising powerhouse of the Tory dynasty — collected $305,000.
Wildrose’s fortunes have begun to rebound — from its nadir in late 2014, several polls now put them neck-andneck with the Tories. But with an election call likely a week away, Wildrose had nominated only 40 candidates in 87 ridings. The Alberta Liberals had nominated only 25.
The only two parties that seem likely to have a full slate of candidates by the time the writ drops are the Progressive Conservatives and the NDP.
“Before Wildrose crossed, we started sniffing in the air that they were likely to go [to a vote] early and we were not caught as flat-footed as everybody else,” said Ms. Notley, sitting in her Edmonton office shortly after the PCs dropped their pre-election budget.
“They’re all nominated or scheduled right now. And we have 52% women, so that’s good.”
Ms. Notley recognizes her good luck.
Mr. Prentice’s fiscal plan — replete with $1.5 billion in tax hikes, real cuts in health care and spending restraint in education — has landed with a thud. The Alberta Liberals have witnessed steady decline since 2012, culminating in the sudden resignation of leader Raj Sherman in January. And then there was the Wildrose implosion.
“There’s no question that there’s been a bit of serendipity that we’ve benefited from. But, again, to be fair to us, it’s also because we’ve been hard at it.”
The last time the NDP witnessed a surge of this nature was during the ’ 70s and early ’80s. Under then-leader Grant Notley — Ms. Notley’s father — the party even formed official opposition, albeit with only two seats.
The late Mr. Notley died in a plane crash in 1984 — just before the party won 16 seats in 1986.
Currently, they hold four. Wildrose has five.
“I’m calling it Davida vs. Goliath,” said political analyst and Mount Royal University professor David Taras. “That’s the role she’s playing. She’s taking on the out-oftouch government on behalf of the ordinary people, and I think there is room in that narrative.”
Mr. Prentice could easily be painted as detached, stiff, elite, he said. Anger at the government is palpable. Ms. Notley has respect, and offers an increasingly compelling alternative, he said.
“What I’ve noticed in Alberta politics is that the cycle gets tighter and shorter,” Ms. Notley said. “It’s like the Tories have to keep reinventing themselves over and over again and each time they do it, the shelf life of the new leader is shorter and shorter. People’s patience with them is decreasing significantly,” she said.
“That’s the kind of thing we’re seeing on the ground. Jim Prentice was brought in as a theoretical saviour. But what I’m finding is that that’s not how Albertans are perceiving him. They’re perceiving him with a great deal of skepticism.”
There’s little question that the PCs will form government, again, in this election.
New Wildrose leader Brian Jean admitted when he took the reins last Saturday that his party is aiming to keep its place as opposition. But Ms. Notley is going to give them a run for the title.
Wildrose MLA Shayne Saskiw acknowledged Ms. Notley’s strength as a leader, and the political dynamics that have buttressed the NDP’s seeming rise.
“Obviously we’ ve been dealt a body blow since December. But we’ve had time to re-group. We sped up the leadership race to have a new leader and it’s amazing how fast you can get organized if the right ingredients are there,” he said.
However, he also noted that the party’s base is confined to Edmonton. Wildrose, by comparison, enjoys support across the province.
Ms. Notley concedes the point. She knows she needs a breakthrough in Calgary.
One of the most likely seats to tip is Calgary Fort. Mr. Ceci knows this community. He’s on the streets, knocking on doors, sprinting between homes, all big toothy smile.
He stops to chat with a middle-aged woman walking a mini Lassie-like dog named Sunshine. She knows an election is coming. Everyone does.
“I haven’t decided yet,” she admitted. But she’s angry.
“Well, we may be the only alternative,” Mr. Ceci responds.
“How many times have they promised 120 schools?” she asked.
The former alderman laughs: “There will be one for every child in Alberta.”
“Well, I haven’t decided yet, but I’ll let you know if I do.”
Obviously we’ve been dealt a body blow since December. But we’ve had time to regroup