Resource committee faces backlog

Advocacy groups aiming to discuss resource issues with Alberta legislators have been waiting more than two years to meet with a committee.

“It’s frustrating,” United Conservative Party MLA David Hanson said Thursday. “We haven’t met with a single stakeholder to my knowledge.”

He raised the issue repeatedly at the legislature’s standing committee on resource stewardship, which put its regular mandate on hold when committee members were tasked with reviewing government legislation.

“I don’t have a problem with being delegated this work,” Hanson added, “but we shouldn’t have our hands tied the whole year that we’re in that discussion.”

Groups planning to present to the committee included the Alberta Association of Municipal Districts and Counties (AAMDC), an organization focusing on advocacy and local governance for 69 member municipalities, as well as the Alberta Used Oil Management Association and the Alberta Recycling Management Authority.

AAMDC president Al Kemmere said the association would discuss issues ranging from orphan well management to the future of wind and solar power.

“It all depends how long this takes and what the burning issue of the day is,” he said.

But NDP MLA Brian Malkinson said legislative business takes precedence over everything else.

“The standing orders are very clear,” he said Friday. “(The committee) has just happened to have several pieces of legislation referred to it.”

Public engagement can still happen through constituency offices and events such as the AAMDC’s recent annual convention, he said.

“We’re aiming to get these reviews done in a timely manner,” he said.

“This isn’t something where we’re saying ‘No’ for the heck of it.”

Hanson brought forward a motion to the committee Thursday that aimed to change its standing orders in an effort to get groups in front of the committee sooner. Hanson’s UCP colleagues supported the motion, but it was defeated when NDP members voted against it.