Speaker tour comes to city
Thousands of Alberta school children and adults visit the legislature building every year to get a glimpse of how government works.
While that can be a day trip for students in the Edmonton area, it’s far more than that for school groups from southern Alberta. So the legislature’s Speaker is visiting schools here instead.
And he’s bringing Alberta’s ceremonial mace, which must be in place before each day’s speeches and legislative debates begin.
“Many Albertans living outside of the capital region have never had the chance to visit and experience the legislature for themselves,” says Robert Wanner, the elected Speaker and an MLA from Medicine Hat.
So Wanner is hosting a public presentation today at 6 p.m. at the Galt Museum in addition to school visits across the south this week.
“It is a priority of mine to reach out to Albertans across the province and inspire active citizenship by bringing the heart of democracy to their hometowns.”
Since being named Speaker, says Wanner, he’s taken the mace — and the legislature’s sergeant-at-arms — to communities in all corners of the province.
This week’s schedule, he says, includes sessions at Father Leonard Van Tighem and R.I. Baker Schools on Tuesday, a run out to Matthew Halton High in Pincher Creek on Wednesday, and a presentation at Lethbridge Collegiate Institute on Thursday.
For students, he says, the ceremonial mace becomes a focus of attention. Designed in 1955, it’s crafted with 5.7 kilograms of silver, overlaid with gold and hand-etched with images of Alberta emblems. While a mace was originally a weapon to defend the monarch from the common people, it’s become a symbol of the everyday citizen’s power to be represented and heard.
Students — and teachers who’ve invited him to visit — have responded favourably to the one-of-a-kind presentation, he adds.
“I’m amazed by the capacity of some of the young people,” Wanner says.
“They clearly have a understanding of politics and democracy.”