Glad to see that apology. You were about to get a mod note over your previous post. The difference between taxing every province and taxing the people of every province is terminological.
I would disagree with “placate” there; this was a stunt to rile up their political faction. What happens the next time anyone discusses transfer payments with these people?
“Hey, didn’t we vote to scrap those payments?!?! I thought we were a democracy! What’s next, is Trudope just going to give us to CHINA!?>!?”
It really isn’t. As a Canadian I pay federal taxes. As an Ontarian I pay Ontario provincial taxes. I do not pay federal taxes as an Ontarian. Further more the province of Ontario does not transfer funds to the federal government.
By allowing people to lazily describe federal taxation as taking money from provincial coffers you allow those people to argue that “if only those federal bastards didn’t take money from us we could afford to xyz”.
You are, however, an Ontarian who pays federal taxes. It’s not two different people.
If you want to be nitpicky about terminology, well, gosh, no one said that, did they? What Sam Stone said was that the province was taxed, but YOU said “provincial coffers,” and darn it, that’s different. You see, the province could (and obviously, obviously was meant to mean) the population of people who make up the province. Sam never said that money was taken from “provincial coffers,” which unambiguously means the government of Alberta. (But now on the other hand, the PAYMENTS to go provincial coffers.)
See, nitpicking gets us nowhere. You know what he meant, I know what you meant. Albertans pay more into equalization than they get out. That is fact, we all know it, let’s move on.
I’d like this thread to consider the DST question more thoroughly. Newfoundland went to “double daylight saving time” in 1988, moving the clock 2 hours instead of 1. Bad enough that “the world will end today at 4 pm. 4:30 in Newfoundland” all the time, but the extra DST hour was…interesting
Apparently, the results on the DST referendum are still to close to call. Curiously, permanent standard time (as in Sask) was not on the table. That’s what I would choose.
Saskatchewan is permanent DST. I mean, we say we’re Central Standard Time year round, but we’re geographically in the Mountain time zone so effectively we’re year round DST.
I did not realize that. Thanks.
I just read somewhere (forgot where) the claim that permanent DST is unhealthy. The idea seemed to be that you are interfering with the body’s natural rhythm. I guess it amounts to always getting up an hour earlier than you really should. I don’t buy it.
And hey, take a look at this post on Reddit:
https://www.reddit.com/r/alberta/comments/qgnf91/not_photoshopped_kenney_is_trying_to_project_an/
Called it!
What Alberta Premier doesn’t want to look tough with the feds? The 62% of 33% of eligible voters being used out of context is politics/lobbying 101.
I’m just having significant difficulty taking seriously a guy whose campaigning on “The system I helped devise when I was in power is unfair, and it’s the new guy’s fault!”
That’s your sensible side talking. Learn to strangle that part, and you’ll find it much easier to believe.
This isn’t quite right. The problem is that the dividing line for Mountain Time and Central Time is right in the middle of Saskatchewan. It’s based on the time on the 105 parallel West of Greenwich/Prime meridian. Regina is on 104/36, while Saskatoon is 106/41. Roughly half the province would fit nicely in Mountain time, and roughly half in Central time.
Where I grew up in Saskatchewan, Central time made sense, because we were close to the Manitoba border, quite a ways from the normal start point for Mountain time.
My dad was on the town council for a while, and a delegate to the SUMA conventions on occasion. He said that SUMA had a standing rule that they would not accept any resolutions calling for Saskatchewan to go on Daylight time in the summer, because it always split on an east-west basis. The towns in the eastern part of the province always wanted it, because Central Standard time in their area meant darkness came early in the summer. The towns in the western part of the province didn’t want it, because they were effectively on Mountain daylight time and saw no need to go to Central daylight in the summer. Since the motions always were divided on a close to 50-50 basis, with no resolution of the issue, SUMA didn’t see any point in debating it any further.
That sort of local dynamic may be involved in the Alberta government’s choice to go to a referendum on this issue.
Welcome to the world of Cabinet government. Cabinet collectively decides on a policy. That doesn’t mean everyone in Cabinet agrees with the policy, or wouldn’t prefer a different option. But once the policy is decided, everyone in Cabinet has to support it, or resign.
I would imagine that every Cabinet minister at some point takes the position in Cabinet that “I don’t agree with the position, I think there are different options, but I can live with it for now.” No large body (and Cabinet is over 30 members, closer to 40) will ever achieve unanimity on all decisions, but once there is a decision, that’s the decision of Cabinet.
As Prime Minister Melbourne is reported to have said to Cabinet:
Yeah, but it’s not just “It’s not MY fault!”, there’s also the “It’s HIS fault!” part. You want to blame “Cabinet” policy making? At least admit that it was an entirely Conservative cabinet that did it, a cabinet with significant Western, and specifically Albertan, representation. This isn’t something that was imposed on them by some bunch of “Eastern Elites” or whatever.
Would it change anything if he did? Does it matter?
I’d at least respect his intellectual honesty. Or any honesty, really, at this point.
I don’t think it is mentioned above, so for the record I will say it appears they voted by 50.2 to 49.8 % against the DST question.