NDP launches new spending plans
Opposition wonders who will pay for school fee cuts, other measures
The Alberta government promised the world in its throne speech Thursday, but the opposition wants to know who’s going to pay for it.
Slashing school fees, capping power bills, more affordable housing for families and seniors, new mental health programs — none of it was wildly off the mark from the NDP’s stated goals of helping families and Alberta’s most vulnerable.
But as MLAs filed out of the house, Progressive Conservative interim leader Ric McIver demanded to know how those and other promises, such as free school buses and $25-per-day daycare, will be funded.
“The government thinks they can bribe Albertans with their own money,” he said.
“The government is taking $20 out of Albertans’ left pockets, putting $5 back in their right pocket, and expecting to be thanked for it.”
Wildrose Leader Brian Jean also pooh-poohed what he called the government’s “flashy buzzwords” about making life more affordable, saying if the NDP was serious, it would repeal the carbon tax and formulate concrete plans for fiscal recovery.
“(The government) should get out from under the (legislature) dome every once and awhile,” he said.
“These people are very, very fearful of what the economy holds for them.”
Alberta Party Leader Greg Clark said “it’s almost as though the NDP doesn’t understand that the money it borrows needs to be paid back.”
With the economy expected to see improvement this year, the government said families can expect help on the road to recovery.
To that end, it promised to go to bat for pipelines.
Using stronger language than before, it vowed to defend the Trans Mountain pipeline to B.C. in the federal court and do all it can to get a thumbs up for the Energy East project to New Brunswick.
“We’re going to head in as interveners ... and show Canada that we have something to be proud of,” Energy Minister Margaret McCuaig-Boyd said later.
The throne speech, delivered by Lt.-Gov. Lois Mitchell, kicked off the legislature’s spring sitting.
While more aspirational than detailed with hard and fast promises, it was a chance to urge calm about both the economy and a world “growing more uncertain.”
Mitchell also went back to a theme the government has repeated in the past two years: “Now is not the time to let our steady hand waver.”
“We are on our way to breaking the land lock, jobs are coming back, our kids have good schools, and our loved ones have the care they need,” she said.
The speech mentioned the word “energy” 30 times, “jobs” 28 times and “families” 27 times, but by far the most-used phrase was “your government,” which seemed an attempt to unite the swaths of Alberta that haven’t exactly embraced the province’s first NDP government.
The government also said Alberta can’t afford to bank only on oil.
Diversity is key, the NDP government, and it’s critical to create jobs across the economy, from agriculture and forestry to tourism, manufacturing and in emerging sectors like technology and craft brewing.
That means trade missions to India, Japan and China to pursue new markets, and taking advantage of low-interest rates to bolster infrastructure projects.
The government also plans to push Ottawa to solve the clean drinking water crisis on reserves, introduce new laws to protect whistleblowers and provide more timely, more accessible services to Albertans with disabilities.