A reputation can last a very long time in politics. Indeed, the re-election of Ralph Klein's Tories is based largely on an enduring impression which the Alberta premier created in voters' minds during his first term.

When Klein was elected leader of the Progressive Conservative party and the province's premier in 1992, Alberta's debt stood at $20 billion. Interest payments on this debt consumed 12% of provincial tax revenues. Billions of tax dollars had been lost through government support for business boondoggles, carried out - as they always are - in the name of "regional development" and "economic diversification." Over 25,000 Albertans signed a petition calling for the gold-plated MLA pension plan to be scaled down to reasonable levels. Alberta's Liberals were far ahead in the polls, led by a conservative Laurence Decore who toured the province with an electronic "debt clock," promising the fiscal and democratic reforms the government had failed to deliver.

By reducing cabinet from 26 to 17 members, and abolishing the gold-plated MLA pension plan, Premier Klein outmaneuvered the populist Liberals. In his first term he cut spending on government programs by 30% in real terms, making Mike Harris seem timid and cautious in comparison. Balanced budget legislation and a legislated schedule for debt repayment restored Alberta to fiscal sanity, paving the way for tax relief in 2001.

But much of this revolution is now reversed. Alberta's spending on government programs is up 86% in the past eight years, while population has grown by 17%. In 2001, Klein's Tories - fully supported by the Liberals - voted themselves severance pay packages so large that Klein will get $669,000 if he retires in 2008. It's a gold-plated pension through the back door, and betrays Klein's 1993 reforms which got him elected.

Still, Alberta is debt free and its provincial tax rates are the lowest in Canada. No one disputes Klein's success on fiscal issues.

But when it comes to democratic accountability, the way Klein's Tories govern Alberta is little different from how the Liberals of Paul Martin and Jean Chretien govern Canada.

The absence of citizens' initiative legislation in Alberta is but one example. At the United Alternative conference in Ottawa in 1999, Premier Klein declared that "We need practical approaches to issues such as recall, referenda, plebiscites, and other ways to increase accountability." More accountability through direct democracy is exactly what Albertans want. A 2001 Environics poll revealed that 79% of Albertans favour legislation giving them the right to initiate and vote in referendums on issues which they consider important.

But accountability rhetoric aside, Premier Klein has not introduced a citizens' initiative law or any democratic reforms since taking power twelve years ago. Alberta does not have recall legislation. Provincial elections are called at the premier's whim for partisan advantage, just like federal elections are called at the whim of the prime minister. Free votes in the Alberta Legislature are as rare as they are in Canada's Parliament. Power is concentrated in the premier's office much like federal power is concentrated in the prime minister's office. Like our federal Parliament, the Alberta Legislature is a rubber stamp, providing legal legitimacy to what has already been decided behind closed doors, without public debate. Alberta's MLAs - just like federal MPs - retain the unfettered right to raise any tax at any time for any reason, without the consent of taxpayers in a referendum.
With regard to judicial accountability, the gap between perception and reality is equally large. At the same United Alternative conference, Klein received a spontaneous standing ovation when he denounced "the maddening trend towards judge-made law." Yet several months earlier his own government humbly accepted the Supreme Court of Canada's Vriend decision to bypass Parliament and give constitutional status to homosexuality and to read it into Alberta's human rights legislation. By refusing to use the notwithstanding clause to opt out of this decision, Klein joined the maddening trend. Contrary to his rhetoric, judge-made law suits Klein just fine.

In short, we Albertans don't practice provincially what we preach federally. We send MPs to Ottawa who support citizens' initiative legislation, recall, referendums on major issues, fixed dates for elections, free votes on every bill except the budget, and an end to judicial tyranny. But provincially we run our affairs much like the federal Liberals run Canada.

Klein established his reputation as a fiscal conservative from 1993 to 1997. Combining this with clever rhetoric and a folksy charm, he has created an illusion of democratic accountability which simply doesn't exist.

Albertans will have to decide how much longer we will continue with the hypocrisy of preaching one thing federally while practicing the opposite in our own province. If Albertans are not willing to adopt policies of real democratic accountability at home, we cannot expect other Canadians to join us in supporting these reforms at the federal level.