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The Sask. NDP’s Aleana Young spoke outside the legislative building Friday morning to call on Premier Scott Moe to condemn separatism and to defend her party’s attention to the topic.
Young, the Opposition’s jobs and economic critic, pointed to the group Unified Grassroots, which has been collecting signatures for a plebiscite on Saskatchewan separation and has several dates booked for town halls to discuss the issue — the poster for the Saskatoon event on Sunday says they’ll discuss the advantages of Saskatchewan sovereignty.
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The threat of separation has been a frequent topic for the Sask. NDP since the Liberal government won the federal election, spurred on by louder talk in Alberta. It was the subject of a dozen questions from the NDP during the spring sitting and several news conferences, calling for the premier to denounce the idea.
Young made a similar call on Friday, saying Moe needs to come out and clearly condemn the work Unified Grassroots is doing.
“Silence is complicity and … scaring the job creators looking to invest here is a bad call for Saskatchewan,” said Young.
She said the group has talked about organizing for the Sask. Party leadership convention and its leader has been connected to the premier previously. Young wondered whether Moe is too worried about keeping his party together to call out the separation talk.
“I think it’s incumbent upon him to say clearly that he does not support this work that they’re doing,” she said.
Young said taking the issue lightly is at our own peril and it needs to be condemned by all levels of government.
The president of Unified Grassroots, Nadine Ness said on The Evan Bray Show Thursday that she’s a separatist and 95 per cent of the group’s members polled were in favour of separation.
Ness said the group is for Saskatchewan being treated fairly and is trying to gather everyone who’s not happy about the way things are.
The group sent out a news release in response to Young’s news conference Friday, saying it’s not campaigning for separation or U.S. statehood.
“We are gathering citizens who want more sovereignty so we can listen, not dictate,” Ness said in the release.
“With their recent antics, (the NDP wants) to silence the people and dictate. They are the real threat to democracy.”
The statement also said the party isn’t collecting signatures at town halls and that if it pursues official petitioning that it will be transparent, legal and announced.
There’s a form on the group’s website for a referendum, for people to register for ease of organizing when a petition does go live and in a recent online video, Ness said it had 7,000 signatures. About 124,000 verified signatures on a petition would be required to trigger a plebiscite, which would not be binding.
In her news conference, Young said people are free to talk about separation, but that it’s still a bad idea and that it’s okay for her to say that to people who might have different views.
“This isn’t about people organizing or meeting with their friends, they’re free to do this, absolutely. The problem is the premier’s unwillingness to lead and the tone starts at the top,” she explained.
The premier’s office sent a response, claiming the Sask. NDP has been the ones promoting western separation, speaking about it more than 130 times during the spring sitting and holding seven news conferences about it.
“The Government of Saskatchewan is committed to ensuring that this province and the people that live here are part of a strong, united, growing and prosperous Canada,” read the statement.
The premier said his government wants to work with the new federal government on the priorities of Saskatchewan people. The statement made no mention of Unified Grassroots, its petitions or town halls.
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