Good afternoon,

Welcome to the Alberta Party's weekly digest, a round-up of news and information for Alberta Party members.

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Update from Acting Leader Jacquie Fenske

Jacquie started the week by meeting with doctors and discussing the potential agreement with the province.

Later, she met with municipal leaders and talked about infrastructure funding and how there is no predictability and how cuts will hurt everyone.

She also met with small business owners and heard that they are still having a hard time being heard by the province.

Upcoming Events

March 23 at 7 pm, Lethbridge-East, Lethbridge-West and Taber-Warner CA Meeting

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March 24 at 7 pm, Shaping the Future of Education

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March 25 at 7 pm, Camrose and Area Alberta Party 101

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All Alberta Party events are listed on the events page.

First Quarter Fundraising

March marks the end of the first quarter, and we need your help to finish strong!

To continue to show our momentum from Q4 last year, we need your help to finish strong. If every member donated $20 a month, we’d blow our targets out of the water.

Can we count on you to chip in $20/mo to end the quarter strong?

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This Week in Alberta

Screenshot from Netflix

The Canadian Energy Centre (the War Room) has caused international embarrassment by “defending Alberta” from a “vicious” Netflix cartoon. The cartoon features Bigfoot and his son protecting a nature reserve in Alaska from a comically evil oil company.

This is just another example of how the War Room continues to embarrass Albertans. Just as with the War Room logo controversy or the contract sole sourcing, the Bigfoot story is now about how a provincial government corporation (the War Room) attacks a kids cartoon.

Attacking this cartoon has had no upside for taxpayers and just makes the province look emotionally fragile.

It’s well past time for the UCP to acknowledge that the War Room has been a massive waste of taxpayer money and that the province should spend this money on things that’ll actually benefit Albertans such as supporting small businesses or keeping nurses and educational assistants.

Sign the petition calling on the UCP to stop funding the War Room.

With Kenney’s reaction to Bigfoot dominating the news cycle, you may have missed that Cenovus is laying off up to 1000 employees as part of their acquisition of Husky. While layoffs during a merger is expected, the outlook for jobs in oil and gas is grim.

The Alberta Party continues to call for the UCP to take economic diversification seriously and provide real solutions. To read the Alberta Party’s take on diversification, check out our shadow budget People, Economy, Jobs.

Rogers Communications made a bid to take over Shaw Communications, an Alberta company that was founded by the Calgary entrepreneur JR Shaw and continues to be majority-owned by the Shaw family.

Opinions on the take-over are mixed, as some see the tie-up as stifling competition in the mobile communications market (which will be bad for customers), but others, including Jason Kenney, tout the merger’s promise of increased jobs in Alberta.

Canadian consumers pay the cost of the low level of competition in the mobile communications industry. The deal is not settled yet, as federal regulators still have to take a close look before approving it.

Recall Legislation was introduced into the Alberta Legislature this week. The proposed Recall Act would allow Albertans to fire elected officials, including MLAs, school board trustees and municipal politicians.

The legislation would require 40 percent of the electorate to trigger a recall. While it could prove difficult to mobilize 40 percent of the electorate (it is not uncommon for municipal elections to have less than a 40 percent turnout), it is not impossible. This legislation is based on BC’s recall legislation, which has successfully been used.

Legislation was also put forward that would allow for citizen’s to push for policy initiatives to trigger a referendum, though caveats in the bill would make the votes essentially non-binding.

The UCP has finally updated their recycling program, something the Alberta Party called for in 2019.

The newly introduced Extended Producer Responsibility program puts the onus on companies to reduce waste in packaging, easing the load on government waste management systems.

Albertans in the southwest of the province are concerned about the effects of coal mining on their water quality and are calling on the UCP to ensure they have safe, uncontaminated water.

This past week at the Rural Municipalities Association’s convention, attendees passed a resolution with 85% support that called on the province to ensure that Alberta’s southwest region will continue to receive adequate supplies of uncontaminated water.

The Environment and Parks Minister Jason Nixon, meanwhile, insisted there is no threat. His claim is suspect since there has been limited consultation with regional residents and a lack of government studies investigating the issue.

The process around coal mining on the Eastern Slopes is yet another example of the UCP continuing to deceive Albertans.

Interesting Read

Biologists at the University of Alberta have found that a system of livestock grazing that uses multiple fields and altering grazing patterns can actually reduce greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere. Read about this good news story here.

Get Involved with the Party

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• Join our Shadow Cabinet Feedback Group
• Join your Constituency Association

Looking to volunteer? Tristan Patterson is our Volunteer Engagement Chair. Reach out to Tristan at [email protected].

We are recruiting volunteers with HTML experience. Is that you? Let our comms team know! [email protected]

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If you have any questions or concerns, you can get in touch by replying to this email or using the button below.

See you next week,

Alberta Party Team