Alberta's Surplus and Gasoline Tax Cuts
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Summary
In this episode, we are delighted to have with us this evening, Erica Barutz. Erica has been a conservative activist for a number of years in Alberta politics, and has served as a special advisor to Premier Danielle Smith, as well as being a Senator for the province.
Transcript
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good evening western standard viewers we're delighted to have with us this evening erica
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barut now erica you have been a conservative activist for a number of years in alberta
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politics and i think at one time you were the you were the founding president of the united
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conservative party you've also worked at the highest levels within the provincial government
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as a special advisor to premier smith and uh you have um you're still alberta's senator elect
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is that right i am still waiting for the appointment all right well you know for those
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for those who are recent arrivals in uh in alberta we do try to choose our own senators and uh
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miss barutz is uh is the is alberta's choice to go to the to the red chamber when the time comes
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and the time may come when the next government arrives because you won't expect to get appointed
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by a liberal not being a good conservative uh you're also an entrepreneur and you've launched
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the first of its kind applied politics and public affairs diploma through mckamee college i want to
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ask you about that in a few moments before we get to that uh it seems that wherever whenever alberta
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conservatives get together you're there and uh can we just talk a little bit about danielle smith
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and what she's doing and how she's doing let's start with this just for fun we've just had a four
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billion dollar surplus do you think that premier smith should have maybe given us a break on the gas taxes
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you know what i actually have a little bit of a different view in the in the gas tax because it
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did end um kind of phased out in this last budget um you know i i think that there's always opportunities
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to find uh affordable measures into ways to put money back into alberta's pockets but when it comes
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to the gas tax i actually think the government should have phased it out earlier and the reason
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i say that was because this was a relief tax this actually was supposed to be a short-term measure
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as opposed to a forever attack so this government i mean i wouldn't argue if the government wanted
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to always have the 13 cents uh off uh taken away at the pumps but that wasn't the intention of this
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this policy so i do think the government could look at other ways to find affordability when it comes to
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the gas tax i actually think that they left it too long that us albertans forgot that it was a relief
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uh in a short-term crisis and then kind of became accustomed to it so when it came back on it felt like an
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additional tax as opposed to the restoration of of something that was actually never meant to
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to stay stays longer i think they should have phased it out so that albertans didn't have that
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you know expectation or that it just became the norm um so i've actually been critical that the
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government should have phased it out before the budget because it actually didn't help the message
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when they didn't put in uh you know reduce the personal income tax well you know erica i think that's
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probably the right proper answer but having just driven back from bc and filled up close to two
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dollars a liter i'm still not buying it but anyway let's move on to uh i tried i tried to convince you
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you did um look disagree with me if you like but i think provincial governments stand or fall
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on how people experience the provincial health system i mean there are other things but basically
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that's where people's minds go so i know that the premier has launched a massive revamping of the
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alberta health system but i don't know whether a lot of people really know what it is that's being
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attempted and why it is being attempted um well i think the first thing is that um you know premier
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danielle smith came in at a time where every canadian and in this case albertan can agree that the
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health care system wasn't working so i do think that there is a need for significant reform or to
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look at it differently now to your point as a politician it is actually it will be i think her
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legacy whether that's a good or a bad thing because she's making a generational change and that's not
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common because as politicians always operate off of four years and this is probably to fully reform it
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going to take you know the eight to ten so when it goes to 2027 she's going to have to find ways to
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prove that these robust changes such as i mean first firing the entire age ahs board putting it in a
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new leadership team um putting it to four pillars of government as opposed to ahs kind of being that
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one point of contact because they saw it as a clog in the wheel so they they kind of are breaking it up
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into different sectors so that your access to care goes into one of those four pillars and they all
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operate in synergy but also complementary to each other so that's kind of her intention with how she
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structured the new body is that ahs was always intended to be hospitals um and it kind of got
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outside of that and i think that that's one of the places where we saw you know slow response times with
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ems and and not the highest support for frontline workers now coming back to the challenges though
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as i was saying is that it is going to be difficult for this government to have you know kpis when they're
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going to the ballot in the next election so i think that they're going to have to really focus on some of
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those things they campaigned on which is reducing wait times and an access to to the primary caregiver and
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i want to say primary caregiver because i think we all default to like family doctor but what the
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government is looking at is actually how do you get a point of care so that could be a nurse
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practitioner it could be within a clinic and that you know getting getting care and having that access
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point is the most critical thing so i do think that they're taking quite quite a um robust approach to
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this and again i think for them they're going to have to find some low-hanging fruit of return on
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investment that they've done and all of these these large changes um because it is going to be a ballot
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box question as you mentioned it always is so they're going to have to figure out how to talk about
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the long-term gains of this reform and then the short-term gains now i could ask you how you think
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it's going and you would tell me but if i were to ask oh i'm not i'm yeah i was going to say i'm like
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i'm not a pundit anymore i get to our staffer i get to say what i want yeah no no but uh that's why
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you're here uh yeah um no you absolutely but if i were to ask a person on the street they'd probably
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say well you know it's still like going into solzhenitsyn's cancer ward you know it's grim
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it's awful i'd have to wait for hours and you know people people tend to view the state of the
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health system by their own personal experience of it so what hope do you have that this that the
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frontline experience is going to improve for people and above all those people who need i'm
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talking about need uh the kind of surgeries that you have to book months even years in advance
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what's what's happening there i would give them you know maybe a a minus b plus on how they're
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doing and managing all this i do think that there's a really negative um narrative out there like you said
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about wait times we've seen some government announcements on that we've seen government
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announcements of recruiting of nurse practitioners or changing clinic models or reaching agreements
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and starting to have a better relationship with the alberta medical association but you're right
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they're also operating off of this perception of what that experience now i've been fortunate i haven't
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had to go use an emergency room or take one of my kids there um in several months so i can't talk
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about the specifics but i do think that they need to focus um you know on on what each region in our
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province needs and so is that focus the recruitment of family doctors especially in rural and then again
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i think that the wait times um and the you know the the state of the emergency rooms are are not
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amazing across the entire province but specifically in those large and urban centers and i know that we'll
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probably talk about you know the other challenges with recovery and addictions and how that also
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adds to your emergency wait times but i think that they're i truly believe they're headed in the right
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direction they've had some hiccups i don't think they've nailed it on the communications of exactly
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what they're doing and how it's not just like the money that you're putting in it because i can't fathom
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you know what two billion dollars does but i think that they need to start talking about what it actually is
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doing for individuals and individuals in different regions across the province because the situations
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are very different from you know north central and south yes well i know people do tend to have a
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very high expectations like going in to get a you know to make a purchase you sort of go in and you get
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seen and you get fixed and you're on your way that's that's what people want but i do want to say i
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think yeah i think a lot of people you know look at this and it's like what's the challenge we need to
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put more money uh into the health care system and i don't think that that's the right solution i think
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it is you know how are we investing where are we investing and so you know even when the government
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brags about the most you know the highest level of investment in health care i as an albertan is more
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concerned i'm more concerned with okay but where is it going and what is it going to address because
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we all know the issues um but and i think the left is horrific at this where they just like they think
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just throw money at a problem and that goes for education and health care and like you know doctors
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should have a competitive wage but they shouldn't be where they were 10 years ago in this province
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making 17 more than any other jurisdiction right like i think there's conversations on par but also can
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there be people that are working on their teams that can help solve some of the challenges of
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volume too so you know i could talk about health care all day but i think it's important that a big
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differentiator of of where albert is divided is a lot want to throw money at the problem
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and hope that that will fix it and i think on the the right we are always looking for efficiencies
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good use of tax dollars and then again that let's provide the best quality care for for those in need
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yep okay well look the second biggest expenditure in the provincial budget is education and i noticed
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that something like 10 percent of alberta children are in some kind of alternative education whether it's
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you know charter schools or homeschooling uh that's a lot that's to me and by the way i i think we both know
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about uh kaylin ford's school is has something like 2500 people waiting to enroll their kids there's a huge
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demand for the classical education that she is offering now what's going wrong in the education
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system that so many people want to take their kids out of it you know we have actually one of my
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stepdaughters is in public education because she's in an immersion program and another is in a catholic
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program both in edmonton and i cannot tell you the night and day experience that we even have in the
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catholic versus the public school system less pd days um obviously smaller classrooms in the catholic like
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it's it's interesting i think what's what's happening is again we're a province and i am personally a
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person that believes in choice in education and if something's not delivering to the standards in
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which you want to have set your child up for success i love that we have all these options
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independent schools charters public catholic you know um uh i think it's so great that we offer all
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of these things but it's really unfortunate nigel to what you're saying is that like we have a public
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system we're not the us like it's not the same um where you you have to pay for your child to have a good
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education um we we do offer how our tax dollars are allocated i think properly um because we want
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to equal the playing field for every child but at the same time if you're a parent and you want to
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give a good opportunity or you're realizing and i think in the most case that the public school system
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isn't teaching or offering or coaching and developing students in the way that parents
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you know our generations had and so that's a shift away from that to find the best alternative
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and i would love if we could hit reset and the public school system was everything that everyone
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wanted but i don't think that's the case and i don't think that there's a return to it
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well let me okay let me put this in a provocative way i say that the education system is dominated by
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progressive left-wing unions both in the teaching profession and in the administration and they're
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preparing the next generation of ndp voters even while we're sitting here talking about it
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how say you well i would say there's a lot of things that teachers are saying in classrooms and
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we hear it at the dinner table um that isn't in their scope it isn't in their person like they're
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not there to teach their perspective they're there to teach curriculums so you know i'd love to be able
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to argue with you on that point but unfortunately again i think that's where whether it's curriculum
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where whether it's values and beliefs being shared in the classroom i think that there is a big shift
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unfortunately um and again like i said we hear very different messages um of kids that are in
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relatively the same grades uh from a public and a catholic school as well so i can't disagree with you
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there i want to come back to the education part of it in a few moments and what you are doing with
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makami college but before we do that let's just talk about mr nenshi i am rather surprised that he
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has not yet found a seat to run in and i was equally surprised by an opinion poll that came out last
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week showing that he was actually trailing the premier by 14 points now that doesn't surprise me
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because i know him and i know the premier but on the other hand um i don't think that's
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what the ndp were expecting clearly he has a wonderful ability to organize and mobilize he's
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a great persuader but i i wonder if people are looking back at his uh time as mayor of calgary and
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thinking maybe he's not the ceo we want or maybe they just don't know about him at all i mean if you
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were in edmonton you probably wouldn't you wouldn't have been on your mind much where how do you think
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that's going for the ndp well i think that the ndp the new membership will say because they had a
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significant and i'll commend them on how much their party grew uh during this leadership race they
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haven't had one in quite some time um and that and it's not atypical to to have a significant surge
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however i think that where the party is going to have um a lot of wedges is on the point that one
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you and i know nenshi and i'm more than happy to watch him for three and a half years show the rest
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of alberta his personality and his characteristics and how he you know how he um loves increasing
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taxes and all of those things that will really come to light in when he's in the spotlight as the
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leader but i do think that the ndp you know voted not based on their values and beliefs
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but more so on the desire to win and they looked at nenshi or someone that maybe didn't have a
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political home uh in alberta bought a membership voted for nahed nenshi because they saw him as the
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best competitor against daniel smith and that's not uncommon within politics but i think what's
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going to happen is it's going to come to he doesn't have the values of an ndp or he is you know
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liberal light um and he's gonna have you know his color is purple you don't get purple from orange red
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uh you get it from blue and red and so i think he's gonna have a lot of challenges within his membership
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and again i think a lot of people expected big things out of him right away and from my understanding
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you know he hasn't come out doing really anything i know he's been meeting with industry behind closed
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doors but he's not coming out and didn't during his election on policies so i think people were
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excited about him i think that they compromised maybe what the they believe the ndp to be
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uh and now they're gonna have to deal with the consequences so i would love to fast forward a
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year from now and when all those memberships expire see um how many actually stick around
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as well as what happens when this party has to decide if they're going to leave their federal
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partner because that's a lot of resources that's a lot of um supports that i don't i think nenshi
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will take for granted and i'm more than happy to watch him do it you know if i were if i were a
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frivolous person with a better sense of humor i would imagine a conversation between naheed nenshi
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and tommy douglas because i don't think they're both ndp but they're not the same kind of people
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also are they um look makami college you have just been i think you've been in the job now for three
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months and well i've been on the job for for a year but i haven't been able to talk about this program
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because it's under legislation you can't promote it until it's been approved okay well i'm i'm glad
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the constitution applies in alberta at least so look this is a program on public affairs and and do
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policy right what what exactly are you um are you training the next generation of conservatives
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all about well hopefully we have some conservatives in the program but um no so we this was not my
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brainchild but i i'm very happy that i got to be the the creator of this program so go back we won't
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see how many years but i took poli sci and the only reason i could get a job was because i was you know
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the kid that on thursday nights before going to the den i went to ufc i was at a boardroom table
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um in calgary varsity my connections i did summer internships i did with ron steven so like the reason
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i got my job or got into politics and actually found my home uh early on was because of my involvement
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and so this is the applied politics so you learn some of the foundations you would learn at poli sci but
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i graduated learning how to write a 10 page paper never have i ever had to do that i had to learn
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how to write a briefing note how to do stakeholder relations events planning um how to how to brief a
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minister manage their calendars conflict resolutions uh policy analysis uh campaigns and elections as you
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know i've been in many a war rooms so this program is actually going to teach individuals that really
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want to get into the game of politics or policy or political affairs public relations um all of those
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types of things breaking this down in a two-year diploma program starting with and this might be
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a good thing for some university students coming out of uh uh you know our elementary public school
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program you know how democracy works how the constitution and the roles of government work
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um you know why what federalism truly is supposed to be and so it'll go through all of that and teach
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students so that they can get jobs in political offices government um constituency offices public
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affairs firms you could even go into the not-for-profit we're going to teach some fundraising
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stakeholder relations as i mentioned so it's going to build what i wish my skill and toolbox had when i
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graduated after four years but in a in a two two-year program with three practicums so you're also
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getting some some real life experience to see too like are you a fit for fit to work at the the ledge
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or are you more uh one degree of separation but it should equip everyone with the things i wish i knew
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and paid the money for is this a little bit like what the manning institute was trying to do for its
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particular part of the market well i did i did engage with them and i will give preston manning um
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credit in conversations i've had not directly with him but an important one was actually professional
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and political ethics and so that's a course that we'll have because of the need to be able to
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navigate that both from your values beliefs your political parties etc so it it does have something
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like that it does take from what i think carlton is trying to do um in their master's program of
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political management but again you don't need a poli-sci degree and you don't need to do this in a
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master's to learn um what i think everything that i've learned from working for politicians to
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working you know in the party or or on the outside um so yes the goal is i mean obviously
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back me college is uh is a public institute so um you know we welcome individuals of all stripes but
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i wouldn't i i would be honest i would love to see some some strong conservative campaigners and strong
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conservative um staffers coming coming out of the program well that is something to aspire to and
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quite frankly even if they're not conservatives if they at least understand that there is a constitution
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and that the constitution would be respected and that there's a way of doing things
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that would be a huge improvement on what we're seeing erica i really want to wish you all good luck
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with that and good fortune is there anything else you want to tell us about alberta politics because
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we're rapidly running out of time and i want to thank you properly but um your last point yeah so
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two quick things because i never met a microphone i don't like um if people are interested come over
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to mackamy m-a-k-a-m-i-college.com to learn more about the program we'll be doing our first pilot in
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september so i'm doing curriculum development day and night right now um but the other thing is just
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like to watch the characters i think this is going to be you know a monumental period in our history of
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like two very strong communicators but who can do the inside work with their party um who is going to
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be able to be true to the values and beliefs of what their base is as opposed to sometimes what they
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believe and i think this is going to be one that i'll be using case studies for years to come in the
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applied politics program because they're very different people like to paint and head nenshi
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and daniel smith is very similar i mean they were in a classroom together once upon a time but they're
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so different in how they communicate how they interact and how they like are you know the captain
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of a team so um i think that's going to tell be very telling of how 2027 is going to go thank you so
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much for this erica that i want to wish you all good fortune and uh i don't think it's going to be
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good luck you're going to make your luck as you go along but what you are doing at makami college
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seems absolute best use of the skills you've accumulated so far and it could be profound
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significance for the future thank you for coming on the show been great to see you
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ladies and gentlemen for the western standard i'm nigel hanaford