'When you leave people off, then ultimately they will become polarized, and they will become the source of your greatest opposition...'

After four years in the premier’s office, Rachel Notley is getting used to life in opposition again.

Though Alberta’s New Democratic Party may not be in government anymore, they are a massively different outfit from the ragtag, four-person team that existed when Notley won the party’s leadership in the fall of 2014. She is now the head of an opposition party with 24 MLAs, many of whom are former ministers desperate to give Jason Kenney’s United Conservative government as many headaches as possible.

Distroscale

Notley was in Ottawa last week to record an episode of No Second Chances , a podcast that “follows the political journeys of Canada’s 12 female first ministers” and spoke to the National Post about her new role.

The podcast producers put her up in the capital city’s historic Chateau Laurier and Notley had strolled into the ritzy hotel’s dining room with a paper coffee cup in her hand. When a server came over with jug of coffee, she pulled the lid off her cup, dumped her half-finished latte into the white porcelain mug on the table and asked the waiter to “just pour some coffee on top of that, please.”

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The dumbfounded Chateau Laurier waiter reluctantly complied.

In a half-hour interview with the Post’s Stuart Thomson, Notley discussed her legacy, especially on climate policy, the rise of U.S. President Donald Trump and the vaulting ambitions of new Alberta premier Jason Kenney.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

National Post: The UCP is dismantling a lot of your government’s climate policy right now, but how much of that is already in the water supply? The federal Liberals copied a few of your ideas…

Rachel Notley: Most of our ideas.

NP: Yeah, this conversation kind of started with you guys. And when (federal environment minister) Catherine McKenna talks about the economy and the environment, she sounds like (former Alberta environment minister) Shannon Phillips. When you look at that, do you feel like the legacy is bigger than Alberta?

RN: I do think that the legacy is going to outlast the current misguided actions of the Alberta government. And, even if some of it is reversed in Alberta, or in other parts of the country, or it’s not executed with the same precision that we had had in mind, in other parts of the country, I think that we will ultimately get back to it because it was a good plan. I’ve said from day one that this whole idea that you pit the economy against the environment, or the environment against the economy, is bound for failure. And I say that when I’m in NDP rooms, as you know, I also say that when I’m in chamber of commerce rooms. We are not going to make progress on either front, if we continue to pit them against each other.

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NP: Do you think that in general, people who are in favour of climate actions have done a poor job of persuading others to come along for the ride?

RN: I think that you have to meet people where they are. And so when you talk about issues, the important things we need to do to combat climate change, we also need to acknowledge the real-life concerns of people who worry about their jobs and their economic security. It’s very easy for people who are not on team climate action yet to hear someone who is and then dismiss them as, ‘Oh, yes, well, this is somebody who lives in downtown Toronto, who has the benefit of A, B, or C, economic livelihood, and doesn’t understand what it’s like when your trucking company doesn’t get a bunch of contracts, and suddenly, you can’t afford to send your kids to school with lunch money.o

And so what we need to understand then is that we have to approach climate action with a plan that supports people through that process. And that’s how we win, because when you leave people off, then ultimately they will become polarized, and they will become the source of your greatest opposition. You know, you look at what happened in the U.S., you look at who was supporting Trump, I mean, a lot of people who voted for Trump were working people who were left behind. And we can’t do that. So we have to meet everybody where they are and understand what’s front of mind for them. And the reality is that it makes perfect sense that fear about the climate and fear about where your next paycheque comes … regular humans have both those concerns, and we need to speak to both of them.

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NP: Assuming Justin Trudeau’s Liberals wanted to see a Notley government rather than a Kenney government in Alberta, is there anything they could have done differently to help you get re-elected in 2019? Is there anything that you just wish they had done or hadn’t done?

RN: I mean, obviously, I think they could have come to the table more aggressively and fulsomely for the people of Alberta. I mean, yes, we got the pipeline and that is good. But at the same time, you know, they were pushing ahead in a pretty tone deaf way with C-69, pushing ahead with C-48. And not stepping up with the kinds of supports that workers in our industry could have used. For instance, matching some of the kinds of supports that you saw for other industries in central Canada.

And so I think working people in Alberta were viscerally destabilized by what happened within the economy. And when it didn’t pick up again within that 12-month cycle, which it had done the previous couple of times, they started getting really, really worried. And they didn’t believe that Ottawa was listening and Ottawa seemed to have to be dragged to the table to do what needed to be done. And so it’s not unreasonable, this sense of not being front and centre in the deliberations of decision-makers here in Ottawa. The fact of the matter is that the farther away you are from Ottawa, the less attention you get.

You know from a purely policy point of view one can make the argument that this federal government has achieved more for Alberta than the former federal government, especially as it relates to the position we’re at right now with respect to this pipeline. But they didn’t do a very good job of responding to what exactly it was that Albertans were looking for.

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I mean, we made a lot of asks. We wanted more support through employment insurance, we wanted more support for reclamation, we wanted more support for adaptation, we wanted support for crude by rail. We wanted them to seriously reconsider some problematic areas of C-69. You know, C-48 is almost a symbolic bill — why in God’s name do they have to do it?

NP: How will you feel if Jason Kenney claims credit, or tries to spike the football, if shovels go in the ground on the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion?

RN:It’s interesting, when it was approved they did everything they could to undercut the value of that decision. I think because they are so obsessed with fighting Trudeau and making him the enemy that they’re prepared to forgo acknowledging the progress.

But my bigger concern with TMX is that they’re going to undo the work that we’ve done, in terms of forging greater levels of support for the pipeline. I mean, when we started this in 2015, the majority of Canadians were opposed to TMX. And the majority of British Columbians were opposed to TMX. Now the majority of Canadians are in favour of TMX, and the majority of British Columbians are in favour of TMX, and I believe a large part of that came from the more reasoned form of persuasion that we adopted when we were in government talking about what Alberta has done on our climate plan.

Now, Kenney is threatening to demonize anyone who ever once said something positive about the environment. And I think that’s going to drive up opposition again, to the pipeline. I think that he stands to put the project at risk if he doesn’t stop playing politics. And this is all about politics. And in my view, I mean, the war room , it’s not about promoting the energy industry. It’s about fighting an election. And quite honestly, I don’t even think it’s about fighting the election with Justin Trudeau. I actually think it’s about Jason Kenney’s leadership campaign.

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NP: Leadership campaign?

RN: For the federal Conservative Party.

NP: Well, he’s premier of Alberta. Why would he risk all that power to run federally?

RN: Well, I can’t get into Jason Kenney’s head. I don’t know. I love Alberta. I personally think that there’s no better or greater honour than to lead Alberta. But it’s clear to me that Kenney’s ambitions go well beyond the border of Alberta. But, you know, if Justin Trudeau isn’t the prime minister after October — and I’m not suggesting that’s going to be the case — but if he’s not, then Jason Kenney runs out of enemies to run against. And his whole campaign has been about running against enemies. It hasn’t been about running on a record or running on a real plan.

NP: Talking federally, did (retiring Edmonton NDP MP) Linda Duncan’s soon-to-be-vacant seat tempt you at all, even a little bit?

RN: No.

NP: Why not?

RN:I’m quite fond of Alberta. That’s where I want to stay.