Alberta MLA dies while trying to rescue motorist
• A Conservative member of the legislature has been killed, apparently after stopping on an icy central Alberta highway to help a motorist whose car had flipped in a median.
Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi issued a tweet Monday night confirming that Manmeet Bhullar, 35, had died.
RCMP did not identify Bhullar but issued a news release about the death of a 35-year-old man on Monday afternoon on the Queen Elizabeth II Highway north of Red Deer.
RCMP said a vehicle lost control and rolled, and two other vehicles stopped on the shoulder of the highway to assist.
A semi-truck then lost control and struck the rear of the first vehicle, then continued into the median and struck the driver and sole occupant of the second vehicle, who was standing in the median.
RCMP said the man was seriously injured and taken to hospital but later died of his injuries.
Interim federal Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose tweeted her condolences, saying “we have all lost a friend.”
Nenshi called Bhullar, who was a Sikh, “a true warrior for fairness and justice, a big man with a giant heart ... a man who defined integrity, who was genuine in everything he did, who never stopped fighting so that everyone could live a life of dignity.”
Bhullar was one of only 10 Conservatives to win reelection this spring when the party was swept from power by the NDP.
He had been minister of human services in the government of former premier Alison Redford, held the infrastructure portfolio under former premier Jim Prentice, and was most recently serving as the Tory party’s critic on finance, the Treasury Board and infrastructure.