![\"Text](\"https:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/a\/assets\/texttospeech.svg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Listen to this article<\/p>\n
Estimated 4 minutes<\/p>\n
The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.<\/p>\n
A second recall petition to oust a member of Alberta’s legislature has failed after falling well short of required signatures.<\/p>\n
Derek Keenan, who has been petitioning since November for the removal of United Conservative Party MLA and deputy speaker Angela Pitt, says he’s giving up the campaign after collecting about 2,200 names.<\/p>\n
Keenan needed to have just under 15,000 signatures by the end of Tuesday to force a constituency-wide vote on whether Pitt should keep her seat in Airdrie-East.<\/p>\n
It means the first two of 26 petitions launched against members of Alberta’s legislature late last year have failed.<\/p>\n
A petition against Alberta’s education minister also fell short of required signatures last month. The petitioner in that case collected just over 40 per cent of the amount needed. <\/p>\n
Keenan says he feels good about his petition campaign despite the result.<\/p>\n
“I feel positive,” he said in an interview Monday. “It really wasn’t about winning the recall \u2014 if you want to call it a win \u2014 or pushing the vote; it was really about raising awareness in our riding and calling attention to some of the concerns.”<\/p>\n
Keenan had launched the petition campaign by claiming Pitt was failing in her role as a representative by prioritizing partisan politics and failing to address or solve local concerns.<\/p>\n
He said that since the petition was launched, Pitt has been more active in the community.<\/p>\n
“That was what started the whole thing … so that has helped,” Keenan said.<\/p>\n
The campaign faced a number of roadblocks, Keenan said, as canvassers faced frigid winter temperatures, and Pitt doesn’t have a high profile compared to other provincial politicians.<\/p>\n
“You say the name, and people go, ‘Who?”‘ Keenan said.<\/p>\n
“People just don’t seem very politically engaged or aware. And I think that is part of the problem that we’re facing right now.”<\/p>\n
Pitt dismisses petitioners as ‘small fringe minority’<\/p>\n
Pitt, who has represented the Airdrie-East constituency just north of Calgary for more than a decade, accused Keenan in November of abusing his position as a high school principal to launch what she called a politically motivated campaign.<\/p>\n
On Monday, she said the petition was clearly baseless.<\/p>\n
“I will not be deterred by a small fringe minority of left-wing activists with dangerous ideological views,” she said in a statement Monday.<\/p>\n
“I remain focused on the work voters elected me to do \u2014 advocating for policies that help our community grow and thrive.”<\/p>\n
Keenan applied for the petition in October during a provincewide teachers strike. Nearly a week later, the government invoked the Charter’s notwithstanding clause and ordered teachers back to work. It also forced on educators a contract with terms that were previously rejected.<\/p>\n
He had said his motivations were unrelated to the strike and that he tried to keep the petition and his day job separate.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for Elections Alberta said it would announce next steps for the petition against Pitt after the deadline passed.<\/p>\n
Dozen more deadlines in February<\/p>\n
A dozen more recall petitions come due later this month. <\/p>\n
Of the 26 against legislature members, 24 targeted members of Premier Danielle Smith’s UCP caucus, including Smith. The other two are against members of the Opposition NDP.<\/p>\n
Petitioners get three months to collect signatures equal to 60 per cent of the total number of votes cast in their constituency in the 2023 provincial election.<\/p>\n
If successful, a constituency-wide vote would be held on whether the politician keeps the seat. If the member loses, a byelection would be held.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 4 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":451142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-451141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=451141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451141\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/451142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=451141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=451141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=451141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}