Bill 10 Alberta Land Stewardship Amendment Act, 2011

April 27, 2011

Mr. Anderson: Thank you, Mr. Chair. It’s good to be back. Obviously, I want to continue on with some of the comments about Bill 10, the Alberta Land Stewardship Amendment Act, 2011. Yesterday I started speaking a little bit about it, and I went through several things on the bill. I talked about one of the important things that we need to realize, that when we make a mistake, it’s important to fess up to that mistake and say: “You know, we made a mistake. We need to correct it, and we need to back away.” That’s what Premier Klein really taught a lot of politicians, that when you do make a mistake, it’s important to admit to it, try to make up for that mistake, and make restitution as quickly as possible.

I find myself feeling somewhat like that with regard to Bill 36 and so forth. One of the things that I didn’t read or understand, I guess would be a better way of putting it, in the first go-round with Bill 36 was the issue around statutory consent and the power that Bill 36 gives the cabinet to revoke property rights and to extinguish – this is the language used in the act – property rights, things such as land titles. Obviously, Bill 10 works to correct that. The government says clarify, but let’s look at what Bill 36 says and then how Bill 10 clarifies, hopefully, what their intent is.

In Bill 36 under section 11 it says: “A regional plan may, by express reference to a statutory consent or type or class of statutory consent, affect, amend or extinguish the statutory consent or the terms or conditions of the statutory consent.” Now, there was some argument about whether statutory consent in Bill 36 meant land titles and other forms of licences, and there was quite a de-bate around that. In Bill 10 there was an effort made to clarify that, but the government continues to say that the original Bill 36 never did allow the government to unilaterally extinguish land titles. Well, this is just simply not the case. This isn’t just a matter of one lawyer disagreeing with another lawyer. As any first-year law student would know, when you’re trying to look for the definition of something in a bill, the first place you look to – it’s not the only place you look to – is the act. You look to the act, right? Isn’t that true, hon. members? You look to the act first.

What does the act say about statutory consent? According to section (z) of Bill 36 statutory consent means a permit, licence, registration, approval, authorization, disposition, certificate, as in a certificate of title, allocation, agreement or instrument . . .

Titles are instruments. . . . issued under or authorized by an enactment such as the Land Titles Act or regulatory instrument. So there’s really little doubt in the definitions section of what statutory consent is and that it can include land titles. If one looks to what instrument means, we can go further to instrument. They even clarify it further. Instrument means

(i) a grant, certificate of title, conveyance, assurance, deed, map, plan, will . . .

Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

It also includes a judgment of the court, so that could include a maintenance enforcement order or a marriage annulment, or

(iv) any other document in writing relating to or affecting the transfer of or dealing with land or evidencing title to land.

That’s the definition of instrument, okay? So this whole idea that it did not apply to land titles or mortgages or these types of things is garbage. It did.

This government, that is famous for not understanding, you know, the unintentional consequences of its actions, has come and said: “Okay. Well, under Bill 10 we’re going to make a difference. We’re going to make some exceptions. We’re going to make it clear in section 3(2).”

For greater clarification . . . This is kind of funny. . . . the definition of statutory consent does not include any permit, licence, registration, approval, authorization, disposition, certificate [et cetera, et cetera, et cetera] under or authorized by

(a) the Land Titles Act,

They put it right in there.

(b) the Personal Property Security Act,

(c) the Vital Statistics Act,

(d) the Wills Act,

(e) the Cemeteries Act,

(f) the Marriage Act,

So they can no longer get rid of your marriage. That’s good.

(g) the Traffic Safety Act, or

(h) any enactment prescribed by the regulations.

It’s pretty clear when we look at this clarification that the fear that people had that the government would be able to unilaterally take away their land titles when this bill is passed – that will not be the case. Under the law right now under Bill 36, indeed the government, the cabinet can seize people’s land titles. I don’t know how you missed that. You obviously did.

Now, let’s be very clear. Was it ever your intention to seize people’s land titles? I certainly hope not. I don’t think it was. But the fact is that that is what the act, Bill 36, clearly authorized or else why would you be passing Bill 10 and one section to clarify that?

That lawyer in a silk suit, as the government always likes to say, that was running around Alberta telling people that the government had just authorized giving itself the power and authority to seize your land title if they felt it was in furtherance of their regional land-use planning, was correct. He was not lying at all. Thankfully, he pointed it out because now it has been dealt with in Bill 10.

There are many things that Bill 10 does not include. For example, it does not specifically exempt the Mines and Minerals Act although it does now exempt the Land Titles Act from extinguishment of a property right. We saw that in action. We saw what happens when you don’t have something exempted under this act, that in fact the government can come and seize. It is doing so right now with the lower Athabasca regional plan. It is seizing a couple dozen mineral and mine leases that belong to these companies. It’s unilaterally coming in there and seizing them.

Now, there is still a question around what the compensation would be, which is amazing, that the government would allow that kind of uncertainty. But there still is a question. We don’t know much the government plans to compensate these companies if at all. We don’t know if they plan to give them the value of the lease when they bought it and that’s it or if it’s going to be the value of the lease plus interest or if it’s going to be – who knows? I mean, it’s kind of weird. You’d think that when you take somebody’s land, if you expropriate someone’s house, you don’t pay them what they paid for their house. You pay them what the house is worth when you expropriate it. Fair market value. But we don’t know what the government wants to do. Are they going to pay fair market value for it? Who knows? Unintended consequences. It’s banana republic stuff is what it is.

According to the former Minister of SRD at the Keith Wilson event in Eckville the other night, when Keith Wilson was going at it with the former Minister of SRD on this, the former Minister of SRD actually gave me credit for moving international stock markets with the power of my words. It was incredible. My banana republic comment was the reason the international stock market fell 150 points according to the Member for Foothills-Rocky View. I didn’t know I was that influential, hon. members, but I guess I am. I guess I caused the stock market to go down 150 points.

Ms Blakeman: That was an unintended consequence.

Mr. Anderson: That was an unintended consequence. Banana republic: whoosh, stock market crash. Well, I said it, so it must be true. Anyway, that was an interesting argument to say the least.

What it does demonstrate is that because there’s uncertainty in the market, because the market did not understand what was going on, because they didn’t understand what the value of their assets were on their balance sheet for some of these companies, the market got jittery for sure. But, as the minister says, the market came back up. Well, you know what? That may be true, but you have to understand that just because the market comes back up, just be-cause people realize, “Oh, you know what; this doesn’t affect a lot of the mineral leases up there; it only affects a few of them,” it doesn’t make it right. It’s still a Mickey Mouse, banana republic way of doing things.

Property rights are property rights. You hold to them. You respect them. You respect the licences that you give out. If you want to make a no-go area or a conservation area, you make sure that existing licenses and leases are allowed to proceed, that the land is reclaimed, and it becomes part of the no-go zone if that’s what you’re going to do. But that’s not what this government does. They just go ahead, bulldoze ahead, damn the torpedoes, and then Albertans can be left paying the bills and the uncertainty that comes from it.

So there are many problems with Bill 10: the fact that it does not include that specific exemption to the Mines and Minerals Act. I think we have an amendment coming forward later on in the evening.

Before we get there, I would like to touch on another issue, and I’d like to do so by proposing an amendment to this act. This is the first amendment. The Wildrose has roughly 20 amendments that, I guess, we’ll have to read into the record at the end of this because we’ve been cut off on our debate. This is the first one, and hope-fully we’ll get at least one or two on here.

The Deputy Chair: Hon. member, we’ll pause for a moment while it’s brought up here.

Hon. members, this is amendment A1.

Hon. member, please proceed.

Mr. Anderson: Thank you, Mr. Chair. A1 is the amendment. Section 5 currently deals with before a regional plan is made or amended, so after cabinet decides they want to change a land-use plan or, you know, change the zoning, and say: “You know what? We didn’t get that right. We actually want to protect this area. We want to change everything here again.” So they make a change.

Well, before a regional plan is made or amended, the steward-ship minister must (a) ensure that appropriate public consultation with respect to the proposed regional plan or amendment has been carried out. Okay? So, basically, the stewardship minister is going to have to settle it in his own mind through whatever process that means. I don’t know. Maybe he calls his mom. Maybe he googles a few things. Once he’s sure in his own mind that this is the right regional plan, so a regional plan is made or amended, then he needs to present a report of the findings of such consultation to the Executive Council and then (b) lay before the Legislative Assembly the proposed regional plan or amendment. Okay? Well, that’s really great. That’s warm and fuzzy. They’re going to tell us, according to this act: here’s the regional plan for this area or here’s the amendment to the regional plan. They’re going to lay it down before the Legislative Assembly. Fantastic. It’s always good to have disclosure about how you’re going to be changing every-one’s property rights in an area or dealing with them. That’s great.

Unfortunately, I don’t think it is enough. What I’m proposing is that Bill 10, the Alberta Land Stewardship Amendment Act, 2011, be amended in section 5 of the proposed section 5(a) by striking out “and present a report of the findings of such consultation to the Executive Council” and substituting “lay before the Legislative Assembly a report of the findings of such consultation for the Assembly’s approval.”

Now, the reason for this proposed amendment is simple. All the folks in this House are the elected representatives of the people of Alberta, okay? So it seems pretty important, in my view, that a decision to alter land-use planning in an area should be left to the people’s representatives, not 22 or 23 or 24, however many there are of the day, cabinet ministers behind closed doors making the final decision on something.

There needs to be accountability to this House, to the people’s representatives, and the only way to do that is to say: okay; we’ve made changes to this plan. Let me be very clear. I don’t agree with the stewardship minister having the authority to bring these plans forward. I think that should be left to regional planners at the local level. But if we’re going to go this way, if that’s what we’re going to do, if this is the way the government wants to do it, then at least have the accountability and the transparency to take the report and to bring it to this Legislature and to lay it before this House so that we can examine it and make suggestions, et cetera, and so that we can ultimately approve it in this Legislature. I think that is a fair thing to ask, and it’s a fair transparency and accountability measure that I think the people of Alberta are owed in this regard.

These are big decisions. I mean, look at the LARP. Look at the lower Athabasca regional plan. You’re talking about a monstrous land area there. You’re talking about revoking mineral leases of industry holders. Who knows with the South Saskatchewan and these others how many private landowners it’s going to involve? You’re talking about extinguishing or rescinding property rights, changing property rights. You’re talking about putting in conservation areas and no-go zones. You’re talking about a lot of different things: cumulative effects management, water management, et cetera. These are life and region altering decisions that are being made by cabinet.

It makes sense that before those plans go forward, the people of this Legislature, the people’s representatives, would have the ability to sit here, debate it, make sure there were no unintended consequences, make sure that the government wasn’t going to accidentally seize someone’s land that wasn’t needed, things like that. You know, have the opposition throw some things at the wall. Let’s do some more research on this. Let’s talk a little bit more about this so that we make sure we get these plans right or we make sure that the amendments to these plans are right, okay?

I mean, I look at some of the members in there: the Member for Drayton Valley-Calmar. I know full well you trust the people’s representatives to make a good decision here. I think that it’s important that we let them do that. To just say that the government is going to come here and, you know, is just going to plunk the regional plan or the amendment to the regional plan in front of us and say, “Okay; this is what we decided; here you go,” is not accountability at all. I don’t even know why that’s in the act. They would do that without this act, without it saying that they had to lay it before the Legislative Assembly. Of course, they’re going to put the plan out there. They’ve got to give it to somebody to implement.

So that’s not really an accountability measure. But having the Assembly have to actually vote on it elevates it and at least makes sure that the people in this House have the final say.

I mean, we have the Speaker of the House, remember, who goes through every month and tells us all the recognized days that come up, you know, like basket weaving awareness day and kiss your lawyer day and all these different days that we . . .

Ms Blakeman: Administrative support day is today.

Mr. Anderson: Administrative support day is today?

Ms Blakeman: Yes.

Mr. Anderson: There you go. Administrative support is important, I’ll tell you, especially when you’ve got the resources and the office that we have. I mean, you really rely on that staff.

The point is that he’s making us aware of that. That’s all this is saying right here. This is saying that somebody is going to come and make us aware of this report. It’s basically at the same level of importance as the Speaker standing up and telling us all these different days and awareness weeks, et cetera, that are out there.

Now, the difference is that this amendment, if passed, will make sure that the people’s representatives have the final say on whether they want to go ahead. I think this is a reasonable amendment. I would like to hear from government the reasons. If they support it, that’s great, but if they don’t support it, why not? Why is it not important that the people’s representatives have the power and authority to make the final decision with regard to one of the seven regional plans in this province? Why wouldn’t that be important to you, or why would it be important to you? I’d like to know that.

With that, I’ll leave this amendment for some debate.