Bruce Anderson

The most powerful thing that a referendum can do is to create uncertainty.

The least likely thing that it can do is, as I think Premier Smith suggested, settle the matter once and for all.

It's inconceivable to me that with all of the evidence that there is, and I was looking at the Brexit evidence where the estimates of how much damage Brexit would do to the economy of the UK, where it was 4% GDP over five years, I think it was, turned out to be wrong.

Turned out to be completely underestimating the long-term impact of it in investments down something like 12% to 18% over what it would have been.

So there's evidence out there for when you create disruption at the same time as you're trying to attract more investment, that creating uncertainty about the political climate and the political risk associated with investment is a very harmful thing.

Nobody who's making the case for separation is even really bothering to try to make a case that this would be helpful to the economy or wouldn't be damaging to the economy.

And

The case that also isn't being made is the, well, why wouldn't it settle things once and for all?

Well, why wouldn't it settle things once and for all?

Starts probably with the questions about Indigenous rights and treaty rights.

And

what would happen if by some circumstance enough people said, yes, we want to start the process within the context of the federal law towards having a referendum that was kind of binding and conclusive.

That just feels to me like the opposite of the thing that

many small c conservatives have been saying the country needs and i don't want to equate conservatives with separatists i think it's important and it was a good thing that pierre polliev said what he said yesterday and probably will come to that too but the alberta separatists can't have it both ways they need to be challenged on this question there is no argument that they're making about how to solve

the well who can break up what parts of canada under what premise with what kind of legal authority with what kind of legal assurance so they're really just kind of lighting matches all over the economy and the body politic of alberta and canada with no with with absolutely no common sense behind it and with a premier who lacks

The spine, maybe?

The judgment or spine?

I'm not sure which is the more serious problem to call it out and to speak truth to the people in her party who believe that what they're doing deserves her support or deserves the support of Albertans.

Yeah, so I think, look, I mean, if there had to be a question, and there doesn't really have to be a question, but Alberta politicians created this scenario where they wanted to –

nurture or some kind of, some would say lionize, certainly give oxygen to a lot of disaffection to the point where they created momentum towards this idea of a referendum that they couldn't then stop or they didn't have the political courage to then stop.