While COVID-19 was chief among the challenges facing residents in his constituency, Peace River-Westlock MP Arnold Viersen also highlighted the need for fairer equalization for Alberta and fighting against aggressive expansion of the federal carbon tax and Canada’s euthanasia laws in a year-end review.
On Dec. 22, Viersen sent out a news release discussing the difficult year that was 2020, as well as some issues that will carry over into the new year. The Town & Country Today then reached out to Viersen to discuss a few points from the release.
First, Viersen acknowledged that 2020 had been a challenging year for everyone across the riding.
“Everything has been in flux. I feel we are extremely blessed to live in Alberta where neighbours come together and help each other out,” he said.
Viersen said that his office spent much of March, April and May fielding calls from constituents around “confusing” pandemic programs introduced by the Liberals that were supposed to help them through lockdowns.
He said that under Erin O’Toole, who became leader of the Conservative Party in August, their team in Otawa was united and focused on helping Canadians through the pandemic.
Viersen said they pressed for the Liberals to be more transparent in the government’s COVID-19 response and got them to increase the wage subsidy from 10 per cent to 75 per cent. He also noted they uncovered “many spending scandals” such as the controversy over the WE Charity.
One of the questions posed to Viersen was whether or not he expected there to be an election in 2021, rather than waiting for the as-scheduled election in 2023.
Viersen said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had recently mentioned an election in the spring, though he wasn’t sure if that was simply a slip of the tongue or Trudeau had tipped his hand. Nevertheless, “it did send shockwaves through our world,” Viersen added.
He said the Conservatives are ready for an election if it happens, though the NDP are not overly interested in having one and have been propping up the government to avoid one.
“My gut instinct is that we will have an election, but I don’t have a good reason for that,” he said.
When asked if it would be wise to force an election amidst the pandemic, Viersen pointed out that there were three provincial elections this year despite COVID-19.
On that note, Viersen said Trudeau had taken advantage of the pandemic to “significantly alter Canada as we know it” by announcing the carbon tax would be tripled by 2030, increasing from $50 per tonne to $170 per tonne.
This, he noted, was a violation of promises made by former Environment Minister Catherine McKenna in June 2019, who dismissed a report suggesting Canada needed to raise its carbon tax to $102 per tonne to meet its Paris Accord targets.
Back in September, the Supreme Court of Canada heard arguments from Saskatchewan, Alberta and Ontario as to whether or not the Government of Canada could actually impose a national carbon tax. The court then adjourned to a future date, which will likely be in 2021.
When asked about whether the Supreme Court’s ruling would impact his stance on the carbon tax, Viersen said it wouldn’t, as the Supreme Court was only considering whether or not it is constitutional for the federal government to impose such a tax.
Viersen said even if the court ruled in the Liberals’ favour, the Conservatives would simply abolish the carbon tax if elected, making it a moot point.
He said the Conservatives and Liberals approach taxation from fairly different places – Conservatives try to determine what the government needs to do and then generates the revenue necessary, while Liberals approach taxation as a way of addressing social issues, untethered from considerations like revenue and expenses.
Equalization and Bill C-7
Viersen said a big focus for Conservatives has been achieving a fairer equalization for Alberta, noting that his colleague, Calgary Shepard MP Tom Kmiec, has been working on legislation to achieve this.
Viersen noted that Alberta has been the biggest contributor to the federal equalization program since the 1960s, having contributed over $600 billion. And yet, Alberta has not benefited from the program despite experiencing a jobs crisis and economic slowdown made worse by Liberal legislation.
“We are calling on the Liberal government to work with Alberta to address the equalization program’s unfair treatment of our province and ensure a fair deal,” he said.
Viersen also discussed at length how Conservatives stood with disability advocates this year to try and defeat the Liberals’ “aggressive expansion of euthanasia laws.”
He said Conservatives are opposed to Bill C-7, which effectively divides Canadians into two categories of people — able-bodied Canadians who will be offered access to suicide prevention and vulnerable Canadians eligible for euthanasia on the basis of their disability.
When asked to elaborate, Viersen said the original legislation allowing euthanasia allowed it to occur if Canadians had “a grievous and irremediable condition” and had “a reasonably foreseeable death.” (Both terms, he noted, were in themselves kind of nebulous, since technically all of our deaths are foreseeable.)
In September 2019, a Quebec court struck down the requirement that one’s death be reasonably foreseeable in order to receive euthanasia. Viersen said he had spoken to lawyers and suggested that the judge’s order was worded in such away that they expected it to be appealed.
But the decision was not appealed, and instead the Liberals came up with Bill C-7, which expanded access to medical assistance in dying for individuals whose deaths are not reasonably foreseeable.
This is where the two categories come in: under Bill C-7, an able-bodied Canadian seeking euthanasia would be directed to mental health resources, but a disabled Canadian could be eligible for euthanasia amidst a dark period in their life.
While he hoped most doctors would be unwilling to offer a disabled person assistance in dying because they were depressed, Viersen said they had heard “fairly traumatic stories from the disability community” where they were offered euthanasia.
Viersen said he had received some pushback on this issue, particularly when he had posted a cartoon to Facebook of two doors labelled “Suicide Prevention” and “Assisted Suicide.” One had a set of stairs going up to it, while the other had a ramp.
“And that’s where this goes, when it becomes a treatment option. That’s where I would like to prevent that from ending up,” he said.
