Federal-provincial fight over Manitoba landfill search inflames volatile situation: political scientist

When politicians like Danielle Smith or François Legault get into public spats with the federal government, the disputes have all the shock value of a Manitoba snowfall in December.

You don't get to be premier of either Alberta or Quebec without engaging in Ottawa-bashing.

The expectations for a premier in Manitoba are different. This is a province where premiers typically only experience success by embracing radical moderation: hugging the centre of the ideological spectrum and judiciously avoiding inflammatory rhetoric whenever possible.

Former premier Brian Pallister defied that norm, growing combative during his time in office. His successor, Heather Stefanson, spent her first 18 months in office trying to present herself as a kinder, gentler Progressive Conservative leader.

That effort died nine days ago.

The unilateral manner in which the Stefanson government decided not to fund a search at the Prairie Green landfill north of Winnipeg, where police believe the remains of two First Nations women lie following their deaths at the hands of an alleged serial killer, damaged the premier's efforts to portray herself as consultative and sensitive.

The subsequent sparring match with federal Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Marc Miller over that decision transformed the premier into the very sort of combative figure she tried to avoid becoming.

In the process, the two levels of government appear to have sidelined the emotions of the family members of homicide victims — and the moderate sensibilities of the broader electorate — due to their inability to do what governments are supposed to do: work together to solve complex problems.

Paul Thomas, professor emeritus of political studies at the University of Manitoba, says that's "very disappointing and highly unfortunate."

"It is the very opposite of what should be happening. The accusations flying in all directions is inflaming an already emotional and volatile situation that could erupt into even more dangerous confrontations," he said.

"There will inevitably be political and financial calculations made by all governments, but they need to recognize and accept that they have a moral duty to do everything possible to lower the temperature, to minimize conflict, and to seek consensus on actions which are both ethically defensible and feasible in terms of practicality," Thomas said. 

"All three orders of government should be in discussions with one another and with the families, to develop a range of responses."

Those responses, Thomas said, must balance the emotions of the victims' families with the financial, technical and safety considerations involved in trying to exhume human remains from a landfill. There are no easy solutions to this, politically or logistically.

Instead, we have Miller calling Stefanson's decision "heartless" on Wednesday, Stefanson accusing Miller of politicization on Thursday and a bewildered nation watching Friday, when the Winnipeg Police Service was left to decide how to remove angry demonstrators from the entrance to the Brady Road landfill following a court decision that is easy to issue but difficult to carry out.

'Against the rules and norms'

Jared Wesley, a political scientist at the University of Alberta, said Miller and Stefanson are violating long-standing political norms.

"It's actually very rare for federal ministers to punch down, quite frankly, in engaging with premiers directly. It's also against the rules and norms of intergovernmental relations for premiers to engage with federal ministers directly instead of engaging with the prime minister," said Wesley, a former Manitoban.

"So it's a really weird situation where we have these norms and typical rules of intergovernmental relations being ignored."

The motivation for the unusual bickering among usually staid leaders could be due to election cycles, Wesley said.

"Canada's been in a permanent campaign mode for a long time. At the federal level, we're in a minority government situation. An election can happen any time.… And Manitoba's on its way to the polls as well."

Wesley is not certain, however, that Miller is just trying to score points to differentiate his government from the federal Conservatives, saying the federal minister has developed strong relations with Indigenous leaders.

"I wouldn't say he's trying to impress them, but to reflect their frustrations and amplify them to get some kind of action," Wesley said.

Meanwhile, Stefanson may be getting caught up in "a national brand of conservatism driven out of Alberta, and driven out of Ottawa, that is far less compassionate and far more combative," he said.

"Manitoba Progressive Conservatives historically have done well when they portrayed a kind of compassionate conservatism," said Wesley.

Stefanson is "trying to rebrand herself and the party as being more empathetic and more sensitive on social issues and on Indigenous issues, [but] she's running headlong against these currents of Canadian conservatism that are precisely the opposite."

Stefanson's harder turn is baffling so close to an election, said Kelly Saunders, a political science professor at Brandon University.

"I'm not really sure what the premier is hoping to get out of this, because I don't really see this playing well with voters," said Saunders.

"She has been actively trying to rebuild her image as being more conciliatory, more compassionate and more consensus oriented, particularly when it comes to issues of reconciliation and with Indigenous peoples," she said.

"We know that that is the Achilles heel of this PC government: their apparent lack of empathy and compassion and a more conciliatory approach. So this just seems to have undermined all that."