The Leader of the Wildrose Independence Party and a candidate for the Federal Conservative Party’s leadership spoke atĀ Freedom Talk- Shaping Alberta’s Future Wednesday.
The event was put on by the Streamstown-based Economic Education Association of Alberta. One of the speakers was Paul Hinman, leader of the Wildrose Independence Party, which formed after the Wexit movement and the Freedom Conservative Party merged in June 2020.
Hinman says his group seeks a more autonomous Alberta, including establishing an Alberta run police force and new immigration policy for the province. Also on the list is pressuring Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier Jason Kenney for more support for the oil and gas industry, getting oil to western shipping ports and economic reform.
“Most important, because of the massive sucking out of the oxygen of our industry here in Alberta, we need to have an Alberta Revenue Agency, and we need to start collecting all the federal and provincial income tax, and being able to pay our bills, support our civil workers, our teachers, and not be running massive deficits.”
Hinman adds that another WIP goal is to run candidates in all 87 Alberta ridings and pass a recall rule, which would allow aĀ by-election to be called if “50 per cent plus one” of voters in a constituency sign off on a petition.
The event also served as a campaign stop for Conservative Party of Canada leadership hopeful Derek Sloan, who also spoke on issues including re-tooling equalization, creating more Alberta based seats in the House of Commons and reducing legislation on firearm ownership.
He also spoke on energy and environmental issues, including his plan for further support of the heavy oil industry and a call for Canada to pull out of the Paris Climate Accord, calling it “a sham.”
“China and India and other places are allowed to increase their emissions for the next ten years, where countries like Canada have made aggressive goals to reduce their emissions. To me, if we stay in the agreement and we reduce our emissions from 1.6 per cent or whatever of global emissions to 1.5 or 1.4, while China goes from 30 per cent of world emissions to 40 [per cent,] we’ll be no further ahead.”
Sloan also stated his opposition to Bill C-48 and C-69 and the creation of a national energy corridor to push ahead pipeline projects.
While delivering a speech to attendees, Sloan touched on several social and health issues. These included his opposition to a mandatory COVID-19 vaccine and defunding for the World Health Organization. He states he would repeal Bill C-16, which changed the Canadian Criminal Code to include hate speech directed to gender identity or expression, which he calls “compelled speech,” repeal Bill C-8, or the conversion therapy bill, on the grounds that he believes it harms children, and re-open the abortion debate federally.
Sloan is one of four candidates running for CPC leadership. Dr.Leslyn Lewis, Peter Mckay and Erin O’Toole are in the running, with Lewis also having visited Lloydminster Wednesday night. Conservative Party members will be sending in their ballots by August 21st and a leader will be chosen by the end of the month.