Western Standard - UCP AGM： Accountability Session

00:00:00.000 Thank you.

00:00:30.000 Thank you.

00:01:00.000 Thank you.

00:01:30.000 Thank you.

00:02:00.000 Thank you.

00:02:30.000 all right well thank you for being i can't believe the room is so full for this session

00:02:50.080 and i'm so glad it is i can tell you a little bit about why we're we're doing this and i'll let my

00:02:56.320 my colleagues speak about it as well i remember i've been involved in conservative politics for

00:03:01.040 a long time and i remember that there was one particular session where i think i saw minister

00:03:06.720 ray daniluk who was minister of municipal affairs at the time doing exactly this thing so i don't

00:03:10.960 know how far this tradition goes back in our conservative movement but i wanted you to know

00:03:15.760 before you go into your policy discussions this afternoon that we take seriously the direction

00:03:20.640 that you give us um all of the policy resolutions are drafted as we believe the government should

00:03:26.400 and so i want you to show what happens when we take that away we talk with stakeholders and

00:03:32.320 how we're able to to move on and if we can't move on some things i want to i want you to know some

00:03:36.720 of the things that we discovered that were difficult over the course of doing this but

00:03:40.480 let me uh of course you know mike ellis is my my deputy premier and minister of public safety and

00:03:46.240 emergency services did you want to comment a little bit about what you're hoping to get out

00:03:48.960 out of this session? Yeah, I do, Premier, and I just want to thank everybody again for being here

00:03:52.880 today, and I want to thank you. You know, just a few days ago was my 10-year anniversary of first

00:04:00.440 being elected to the legislature, and I'm always humbled by the people of Calgary West, and I know

00:04:08.020 there are wonderful people from Calgary West that are in the audience that are here today, and I

00:04:11.720 thank them also very much. But, you know, one of the things that I would say as an observation

00:04:17.240 is you know when we talk about accountability and i get asked this all the time about this

00:04:22.360 this premier and uh you know i don't want her to blush but she really does listen and and that's

00:04:27.420 the key and this is why we're doing this right now guys right um in my in my 10 years i never

00:04:33.460 saw something like this uh this sort of accountability session to to really uh sit

00:04:38.600 back and and and hear uh not only what what you had to say when we listened to that yesterday but

00:04:43.480 also to let everybody know that we have listened to you and that we are moving certain projects

00:04:51.000 forward because that is what grassroots is all about and that's what being in albertan is all

00:04:55.000 about so thank you to you and thank you to the premier for being the great leader thank you so

00:04:58.360 much for that dp and we want joseph scow who not only is tourism and sport minister but he's also

00:05:04.760 our house leader so it's his job to see all the pieces of legislation through and to pace it out

00:05:10.200 and so uh joseph what are you hoping to get out of things today well i think mike read right from

00:05:16.120 my script you know this is uh one of the first times i think we've ever done something like this

00:05:21.640 and it's just so commendable that as a government we always want to make sure

00:05:25.560 that we're accountable to you and we have a premier who absolutely listens and it's such

00:05:30.040 an honor to be up here because if there's something you want from a leader there's a lot

00:05:35.960 of things you can ask but i think one of the fundamental principles is someone who will

00:05:39.800 will listen to you in politics we know we're not always going to get everything we want but if

00:05:44.820 we're being listened to and being considered which i've seen this countless times from our premier

00:05:48.640 you've got the right leader and i know we do and you just heard that a couple moments ago with her

00:05:52.900 speech and so let's give her another round of applause for her tremendous leadership you guys

00:05:57.860 are awesome all right so i think we're going to put up on the screen each resolution is that right

00:06:02.900 vita and emma we're going to put the resolutions that up on the screen that passed from previous

00:06:08.400 years hmm we were going to do that can someone maybe find it because there's a lot to read here

00:06:17.120 there is a policy document that i have in front of me so maybe you can talk to one of my team and

00:06:21.280 you can get it up and we'll just uh we don't want to run out of time so we'll just get um my my two

00:06:27.200 companions here to read them out loud and then we'll tell you what we did with them so let's

00:06:30.240 start with uh with mike we're gonna go back to ucp policy resolutions from 2022 you may recall

00:06:35.680 That was the policy meeting that was just weeks after the leadership was over.

00:06:41.640 And so we wanted to go back and let you know what we did with those.

00:06:43.720 So, Mike, read out the first resolution that passed that year.

00:06:46.480 You bet, Premier.

00:06:47.460 All right.

00:06:47.820 So first one is from Edmonton Centre, and it was work with the province of Saskatchewan

00:06:53.040 and Manitoba to secure a transportation utility corridor to the port of Churchill to enable

00:06:59.840 expansion of our commodity exports into Europe.

00:07:02.960 What a great idea.

00:07:03.720 And I can tell you it was something that first, the first thing I did is I made Devin Dreeshan, our Minister of Transportation and Economic Corridors, and then he went out and drafted a memorandum of understanding, I think it was within six months, it was before the last election, where with Saskatchewan and Manitoba agreed in principle to establish economic corridors.

00:07:24.820 now we have had a change of government in manitoba but the idea behind it was to create a

00:07:30.180 corridor so that it could be for pipelines or transmission lines or broadband internet access

00:07:34.340 or highways or trains and so that is part of the the approach that we've taken we think that the

00:07:39.860 first aspect of that is going to be these cross-border agreements that we're getting with

00:07:43.540 our dear friends in saskatchewan uh nathan newdorf has an agreement an mou to work together on

00:07:50.100 interties for electricity because we think saskatchewan is going to be the first mover

00:07:54.020 on nuclear as well as create that last 50 kilometer stretch from fort mcmurray to laloche

00:08:00.740 not only does that give an additional access point going all down through saskatchewan to a 24-hour

00:08:05.860 commercial border crossing but it also gives our friends in fort mcmurray another way to egress if

00:08:11.940 there's ever another threat of fire so that's how we've been acting on it there's more that we're

00:08:16.420 going to do because i have a number of our mlas who go down south and are working on the ports

00:08:22.020 to plane projects and so that is another entire economic corridor that literally would have us go

00:08:27.940 i believe from texas all the way up to alaska so we we took your advice for working on it

00:08:32.660 and i just want to thank devin dreeshan for his leadership on that

00:08:41.220 okay the next resolution comes from the good people of cardston six sky are you in the house

00:08:45.780 cars in six seconds what they're voting let's be another room of course mla is here on the other

00:08:52.420 room uh and crickets wow it's hot up here uh you know what that's right they're all voting for the

00:09:06.020 premier of course uh updated wording so protect agribusiness and federal from federal regulations

00:09:13.700 that are harmful to agribusiness and the global food supply yeah and and on this one and i think

00:09:18.900 you heard rj say it best last night when he said that bill 2c 293 if we need to pass the sovereignty

00:09:26.260 act motion to block the federal government from interfering in our our business that's

00:09:30.500 what we're going to do so that you should know that we're prepared to do that

00:09:36.420 in the meantime we have a made in alberta labeling program helping consumers to identify high quality

00:09:41.860 the Alberta-made products. And our agri-food processing, our value-added investment tax credit,

00:09:48.600 this is an idea that came out of the leadership race. Rebecca Schultz looked over at what was

00:09:52.440 happening in Saskatchewan and said, they're literally eating our lunch. We have to do

00:09:55.740 something. And so we brought through the 12% non-refundable tax credit, and it's been

00:10:00.840 extraordinary. RJ Secretson, our current agriculture and immigration minister, tells me

00:10:05.060 that we've had $3 billion worth of investment announcements in the province since that

00:10:09.480 happen so that is our commitment to agriculture on the processing side on making sure our beef

00:10:14.440 industry stays strong and really going out there to project on the international stage how incredible

00:10:20.280 our product is you may recall a bet i made with governor john uh governor greg abbott in texas

00:10:30.680 so the stars lost against the oilers and he had to eat a delicious piece of alberta beef and

00:10:36.520 declare it the best in north america so that's what we're prepared to do right on and uh i'll

00:10:44.280 take let's continue on mike yes all right uh the uh wonderful people and friends from vermilion

00:10:52.360 lloyd minister that's right uh review our electricity pricing system with the uh goal

00:10:59.080 of reducing transmission and distribution costs done uh our minister of affordability and utilities

00:11:05.640 Nathan Newdorf when he came in I think it only took him a couple of weeks to say this system is

00:11:10.440 broken from from top to bottom we have to address the issue of the regulator rate option we've got

00:11:15.640 to address local access fees we've got to address distribution charges transmission charges we have

00:11:21.000 to ensure that we have a moratorium on solar and wind so that we're not eating up prime agriculture

00:11:26.520 land we've got to bring on more baseload power so all of this yes and on top of that we've got to

00:11:34.040 see how we might be able to integrate nuclear into our grid which is now his file so he is working

00:11:40.120 on all of these things he's brought forward legislation on some pieces to it but the

00:11:45.320 transmission and distribution that's the next piece we've heard you loud and clear especially

00:11:49.240 those of you in northern alberta and thanks for your direction on this all right resolution four

00:11:55.400 this comes from the good people of calgary fish creek and it reads continually advocate for a more

00:12:00.760 equitable federal provincial system and initiate discussions with provincial counterparts to start

00:12:06.520 negotiations for a more equitable federal provincial fiscal arrangement i can tell you a

00:12:11.800 couple things that we've done first of all we my department put out an equalization transformation

00:12:17.480 paper last april before the election and it charted a pathway for us to essentially get

00:12:24.840 equalization down to only include the very smallest provinces in the maritimes and so that's

00:12:30.200 what we put forward and in return newfoundland and labrador has said you know what we don't think

00:12:34.360 this is fair either like we're being treated unfairly in alberta there's no question about

00:12:38.920 it but imagine being newfoundland and labrador one of the smallest provinces that is a net

00:12:45.160 contributor to confederation while they watched both ontario and quebec receive uh transfer

00:12:52.760 payments through equalization that is not how this program was supposed to work so they've

00:12:56.760 launched a lawsuit british columbia has joined it i believe that saskatchewan is contemplating

00:13:02.280 doing the same and uh at the table i can the the conversation that we have and i thought

00:13:07.160 saskatchewan came forward with a pretty good model of uh converting the equalization program

00:13:13.320 into per capita grants and and that's the most fair way for the federal government to fund

00:13:18.280 provinces is to fund them on an equal per person basis because that's the way that we get more of

00:13:23.000 those dollars coming back and i'm at the council of the federation table that's our premierial

00:13:27.800 counterparts i can tell you that when we talk about those kinds of transfer programs for the

00:13:33.480 provinces we talk in terms of per capita and so that's part of the culture that we're developing

00:13:38.600 is the provinces working together to push back uh against ottawa on that so i'll be looking forward

00:13:43.800 to seeing if that lawsuit is successful but the conversation is going to continue with our

00:13:48.280 provincial counterparts and if we get a federal government that uh that is interested in working

00:13:52.840 with us we might be able to make even more progress on that all right thank you very much premier

00:13:59.480 all right the next one uh from my friends in wataskwin mackwiches uh you're gonna like this

00:14:04.680 one premier all right the united conservative party believes that the government of alberta should

00:14:09.480 protect alberta's right to choose what is best for their own bodies done that's what the bill

00:14:14.440 rights changes introduced this week are all about there's a special line in there that says

00:14:20.760 that you can that the government cannot force anyone to have vaccination um and in addition

00:14:25.720 it's got other protections to make sure that you have the right to accept or refuse medical

00:14:29.480 treatment if you're of a capacity to be able to do so so that is uh those are two different

00:14:33.240 provisions that we have in the bill of rights excellent resolution number 10 coming again from

00:14:39.560 our good friends at calgary fish creek this one's a banger instruct the alberta electric systems

00:14:44.120 operator to not implement the federal government's net zero power grid plan done pass the sovereignty

00:14:51.000 act to make sure that that was not going to happen we launched an eight million dollar ad campaign

00:14:56.200 to let the rest of the country know that alberta would not be left in the dark and we were so

00:15:01.400 successful that the canadian electricity advisory council agreed with us they said that they

00:15:06.280 cannot implement a 2035 net zero power grid in alberta or saskatchewan so we're making great

00:15:11.640 progress they are still working on some kind of amendment that they think will will appease us

00:15:17.720 but the only thing that will appease me is them staying in their own jurisdiction electricity is

00:15:22.520 the sole jurisdiction of the provinces and we're just going to say no all right the next one coming

00:15:30.200 from my good friend grant hunter and the friends in tabor warner uh actively and transparently

00:15:37.560 reduce overheads and accelerate the elimination of the layers of bureaucratic administration to

00:15:43.720 improve outcomes for cost effectively and and so conservative-minded voters may see

00:15:50.600 that it is happening premier again done dale nally is our service uh alberta and red tape

00:15:57.080 production minister as of september 19 2024 we've cut red tape by 37 percent in our ministries in

00:16:03.960 the last four years the next move that we're going to make is to dramatically reduce the time it takes

00:16:09.800 to get permits and licenses approved so watch out for that next step all right next one comes from

00:16:17.800 our friends in edmonton decor reads amend both elections finances and contributions disclosure

00:16:23.880 act and municipal authority act to restrict third-party advertising funding to the rules

00:16:30.600 for people running for political uh for provincial office and introduce rules for third-party

00:16:35.800 advertising funding for people running for municipal office in alberta done now we actually

00:16:41.080 went one step further than you guys suggested and we were putting a pilot program forward for

00:16:47.880 uh for political parties in calgary and edmonton we'll see how that goes we've actually heard from

00:16:55.880 a few mid-sized cities saying uh can you choose us too and so we'll see how it goes this time

00:17:00.760 around but in doing so that will give more transparency we know that especially in calgary

00:17:05.960 and edmonton there are third parties that are running massive campaigns with millions of dollars

00:17:11.240 funding slates of candidates that are already running political parties they're just not being

00:17:15.160 forthright and honest about it how do you know that there's a socialist running for for council

00:17:19.800 they'll tell you how non-partisan they are and how neutral they are and how they don't have a

00:17:24.440 partisan bone in their body and then guess what they go and decide to run for leader of the ndp

00:17:28.920 when they get a chance to do so so we are we are making sure we're making sure that's transparent

00:17:36.200 so that you know when somebody is running for for office who is backing them and so we're creating

00:17:41.160 more transparency around those uh those election financing laws for both political parties as well

00:17:45.720 as third party advertisers done so thanks for your feedback on that we're just waiting to

00:17:49.160 wonder when he's going to run for a seat in the legislature right that's right i have so much to

00:17:53.480 add on this but we're going to move on to the next one uh next from our friends from calgary

00:17:58.240 northwest all right a little wordy here but uh okay so achieve perceived in real transparency

00:18:02.860 associated with lobbying the alberta provincial government by requiring disclosure as lobbyists

00:18:08.040 from the following members of a council or other statutory body charged with the administration of

00:18:14.020 the civic or municipal affairs of a municipality or individuals on the staff of any of those members

00:18:20.860 and officers or employees of municipalities?

00:18:25.020 I'm not, I can't really go back in time

00:18:27.780 to remember why it is this one came forward,

00:18:30.720 but I can tell you how I look at this.

00:18:32.580 Someone who gets elected to municipal office

00:18:35.120 will lobby me as a member of the provincial government.

00:18:38.920 That's part of the job.

00:18:40.100 It just, it is.

00:18:41.240 They have a relationship where we govern

00:18:45.020 all of their activities through the municipal government

00:18:47.400 and we fund a lot of their activities

00:18:50.060 through our local government fiscal framework.

00:18:54.120 So my view is anytime I meet with an elected council member

00:18:58.040 that they are a lobbyist, they are asking me for something.

00:19:01.820 They're always very transparent about it.

00:19:03.760 There's no secret about what it is that a municipal council is asking forward.

00:19:08.300 So we have not moved on this.

00:19:09.940 We don't want to create more red tape,

00:19:11.740 which will essentially just lock in what we all know to be true anyway.

00:19:14.520 So that's the reason why we haven't moved on that one.

00:19:16.620 Okay. Resolution 16. Again, from the good people of Karsten Siksika. The United Conservative Party believes that the government of Alberta should protect an individual's right for their own health care choices and ensure individuals are not discriminated against for their personal health care choices.

00:19:40.500 Yep. And again, done. That's what the Bill of Rights is about. Now, look, I mean, I know that there are some who say that we could go further and look at the Alberta Bill of sort of the Human Rights Act. That was my initial thinking behind this. And we'll watch and see what happens and see if private sector operators are discriminating against their employers.

00:20:03.500 but i have to tell you my personal view is this and let's remember what happened the only reason

00:20:09.020 why private employers treated their there's uh their workers the way they did is because government

00:20:14.940 put pressure on them too government created the framework for government required the mandates

00:20:19.100 government put in the restrictions and so we're just not going to do that because because i suspect

00:20:25.660 that uh that any private business that did so did so reluctantly and we just want to make sure

00:20:30.860 that any business knows that we are not going to do that to them again so if there's any additional

00:20:35.420 problems that we see then uh then we'll see if we have to go further but we figure figured that this

00:20:40.220 is the right approach and Preston Manning was the one who recommended that we do this instead

00:20:45.100 because he thought it would be more overarching in setting the frameworks that's what we did

00:20:48.620 excellent uh next one's from my friends in Airdrie East um affirming the family as the foundation of

00:20:56.380 of a society in Alberta and the decisions regarding children should reside solely with

00:21:02.100 the parents, legal guardians, and caregivers, upholding and protecting parental rights and

00:21:07.720 authority in healthcare and education, and also ensuring that parents and legal guardians

00:21:13.580 and caregivers have the right and responsibility to oversee the healthcare and education of

00:21:18.300 their own children, including, but not limited to, the cultural, linguistic, religious, spiritual,

00:21:23.500 and moral upbringing and heritage of their children.

00:21:26.160 absolutely well we we believe with the intent of of this motion and we let me let me address it in

00:21:32.320 in two ways so first let me address the issue of education we have already and this was uh

00:21:39.040 done under the under the previous government we have already established in the bill of rights

00:21:44.240 the parents right to choose the education for their kids so we've already done that it is in

00:21:49.600 the school act it's reflected in the changes that we're bringing forward with the education act with

00:21:54.320 the requirement for parental notifications on a social transition as well as the requirement for

00:22:02.640 yes requirement for change for social transition as well as the the opt-in on anything dealing with

00:22:08.800 human sexuality and gender ideology so that one i think doesn't have any exceptions to it

00:22:15.040 where it gets complicated on health care is that um we just simply don't believe that anyone can

00:22:24.240 make a decision about cutting off body parts or taking cross-sex hormones other than that

00:22:30.760 individual and i know that there are some parents who want to make those decisions for their child

00:22:36.260 when they're 10 or 11 or 12 years old and i know uh sometimes there are parents who who and i've

00:22:43.480 talked to a couple of parents who I think are well-meaning and want to do what's best for their

00:22:47.100 kids, but we don't think that a parent has a right to sterilize a 10-year-old child. So that's part

00:22:53.020 of the reason. So I know the intent that you want. You want to be able to say no, but we're worried

00:23:04.340 in some of these cases that parents are making decisions that really are the child's to make

00:23:11.040 when they become adult enough to make them.

00:23:13.200 So we're trying to find the balance between that.

00:23:15.780 If we put this health provision in the Bill of Rights,

00:23:21.340 it would invalidate the legislation

00:23:23.820 we're trying to bring forward to protect kids.

00:23:27.080 So that's part of the reason

00:23:28.380 we have this conversation dialogue.

00:23:29.960 I think we know the intent that you want.

00:23:32.060 I think what you do want

00:23:33.360 is you don't want parents finding out

00:23:36.660 that kids have been sent to a gender reassignment clinic

00:23:39.380 get cross-sex hormones without parents being involved. Totally agree. We have to also think 0.93

00:23:43.800 about it the other way around. So we'll monitor to see if there's any more that we need to do on

00:23:48.940 this. But the first step that we want to take is just affirming that these adult decisions have to

00:23:53.480 be made by the child when they're an adult. And I hope you understand why we had to struggle with

00:23:57.800 this one a little bit. But I think we've done a lot through different pieces of legislation to

00:24:02.500 be able to address both sides of those. And if not, I'm sure I'll be able to hear more from you

00:24:06.400 on that. So thanks for your direction on this. Thank you, Premier. On to Resolution 20 from

00:24:16.100 Calgary Klein, a constituency we will take back in 27 for sure. And it reads, establish statute

00:24:22.140 requirements for consultations with stakeholders and the public before enacting significant

00:24:27.840 legislation. Now, again, I kind of wish I could go back in history and remember where this one

00:24:33.620 came from because i can tell you in my 20 plus town halls i did over the summer i actually got

00:24:39.700 the exact opposite feedback from members my our members were saying why haven't you done everything

00:24:45.060 that we passed at the resolution at the at the policy conferences yet and my answer was always

00:24:50.660 we we have to do broad-based stakeholder consultation i mean in the case of the

00:24:54.820 the bills that we introduced a couple of days ago i i know that for instance tanya fur had

00:24:59.780 multiple roundtables talking with 51 different groups and members of the lgbt plus community

00:25:05.060 i know that uh that uh talk actually joseph you should talk about all the consultation that you

00:25:10.740 did um on tourism and sport and the changes that that you were making because you had to talk to

00:25:16.020 a whole pile of different groups uh demetrios had to talk to a whole pile of school boards

00:25:21.460 and teachers and uh and parents as did adriana lagrange on the healthcare system so do you want

00:25:27.060 want to just talk a little bit so that people understand the consultation process that we

00:25:30.500 already do because i i think they might this implies that they think that it is deficient

00:25:35.220 and i can tell you it's very robust and if we put it into statutory regulation it would just slow

00:25:42.580 our agenda down even further and so i'm just trying to gauge uh where the membership might

00:25:48.420 be at today because i i just i just am not getting the feeling that you guys think that

00:25:52.500 we're moving too fast i'm thinking that you think that this the consultation process is already

00:25:57.460 slowing things down but do you want to talk a little bit about what you did for for yours

00:26:01.460 certainly well speaking exclusively to the bill for safety and fairness in sport the consultation

00:26:07.140 actually started before the official consultation started as i had countless parents and and

00:26:12.340 student athletes coming to me and talking about their concerns about future competition for girls

00:26:17.620 in sport in alberta and so with the premier's announcement we put the wheels in motion to

00:26:24.020 start working on this and consulting with a broad number of stakeholders across alberta everything

00:26:29.460 from between my department and my ministry we consulted with the lgbtq community we consulted

00:26:35.140 with parents coaches school boards athletes um provincial sport organizations like we just went

00:26:41.540 down the list of everybody who could be affected by this to make sure that we're going to get this

00:26:46.260 right i think we've found a really good balance here in making sure that we do have a women and 1.00

00:26:51.940 girls only category in sports and that's for people who were born and registered as a female 0.98

00:26:56.500 at birth and let me tell you another example of why sometimes a faster consultation process is

00:27:02.420 better too first of all a statutory process is kind of like what they have at the federal level

00:27:08.500 for pipelines and has resulted in 10-year regulatory approval processes for pipelines

00:27:13.300 which cause so many companies to abandon them if they can't see the end of the finish line but i

00:27:18.740 would put forward an example of one of the most effective consultations that we did that was done

00:27:23.300 in lightning speed and it was on the issue of banning cell phone use in classrooms dimitrius

00:27:28.820 put that out to online to teachers to uh to parents we got 68 000 responses in four weeks

00:27:37.220 and it was overwhelming go ahead and do this so i um again i remain open-minded when you guys give

00:27:45.140 us this kind of direction there's obviously some problem that you think we're trying to solve

00:27:49.220 i think we've addressed it by being robust where we need to but also acting quickly where we think

00:27:54.660 we need to so i hope that that's uh that satisfies the intent of what you uh wanted us to do here

00:27:59.220 and that's it for 2022 we still have 35 minutes left to get through 2023 so let's hit it yeah

00:28:06.180 that's amazing let's give a round of applause for the work done by that government the government

00:28:09.620 for 2022 and those kinds of members members because it really is about listening to you

00:28:14.420 and that's what this is about and let you know the work that we've been doing as a government

00:28:18.420 and certainly as a caucus so congratulations to everybody involved so as the premier indicator

00:28:22.100 we'll go to 2023 so the first one here from kelly edgemont the united conservative party

00:28:28.260 believes that the government of alberta should defend alberta's economy and autonomy

00:28:32.660 by opposing all attempts by the federal government to impose net zero by 2035 see look at you guys

00:28:39.140 this is uh this was our two years in a row you gave us this guidance and we followed it i've

00:28:44.340 already answered this question done and we just simply are not going to implement the uh the

00:28:48.980 federal clean electricity rigs next number two from bonnieville cold lake st paul the united

00:28:55.300 conservative party believes that the government of alberta should protect an individual's right

00:28:59.460 to free expression yep done this is key to our bill of rights amendments introduced next uh

00:29:04.180 this past week so that's in there all right calgary law heed is next the united conservative

00:29:09.860 party believes that the government of alberta should protect a medical practitioner's right to

00:29:14.180 research speak and write and protect medical doctors and all health care professionals

00:29:19.300 from having their licenses to practice threatened for publicly expressing professional medical

00:29:24.100 opinions in any public setting so we've got two approaches that we're taking to this one is

00:29:29.380 a little bit broader off of medical practitioners.

00:29:33.500 We believe this is a problem almost across the board

00:29:36.840 with our medical professionals,

00:29:38.540 that they are, with all of our professionals,

00:29:40.880 pardon me, there's 118 different regulated professions.

00:29:44.660 And I think Dr. Jordan Peterson provides the prime example.

00:29:47.540 He puts mean tweets online

00:29:48.780 and all of a sudden he's being sent for re-education,

00:29:51.000 which is absolutely absurd.

00:29:52.540 We've seen similar problems in law societies.

00:29:54.460 We've seen similar problems as well

00:29:56.180 with the College of Physicians and Surgeons.

00:30:00.660 So we are doing a full review

00:30:02.840 to make sure that they are not straying in

00:30:05.740 to limiting the rights to free speech, freedom,

00:30:08.260 and freedom of expression of their members.

00:30:09.780 That's one part.

00:30:10.720 The second part is I asked Dr. Gary Davidson

00:30:14.560 to lead, I call it the red team,

00:30:17.520 sort of a team of doctors to look at our COVID response

00:30:20.360 and to give us some advice about what we needed to do.

00:30:23.640 And he has written me a 300-page report

00:30:26.040 with a very, very long section on the College of Physicians and Surgeons

00:30:30.020 and what needs to be done to restore the doctor-patient relationship

00:30:34.760 and restore the freedom of physicians to prescribe.

00:30:39.200 So we're just going through that.

00:30:42.080 You can talk to Dr. Gary.

00:30:43.160 I think he's here.

00:30:43.880 I think I've seen him.

00:30:44.660 But we are just going through putting the finishing touches on that report.

00:30:47.780 It will be released, and then we will have more to say about how we're going to act on it.

00:30:51.380 But that's also a vitally important freedom that we've heard from the medical profession

00:30:55.360 and also from you as as patients that you want us to address so that one's coming

00:31:00.720 all right back to bonnieville cold lake st paul united conservative party believes that the

00:31:06.160 government of alberta should protect an individual's right to informed consent decisions regarding

00:31:12.160 their own body done yeah that was the in the bill of rights last week and there's an issue in there

00:31:16.880 i just want you to know because i know that there is some question about capacity and the reason we

00:31:21.280 put that in there to be able to give informed consent you have to be of sound mind and there

00:31:26.080 are a couple of instances where i just want you to know why we put capacity in there one is to make

00:31:32.160 sure that we are accepting that young children can't make decisions um on about life uh altering

00:31:40.400 surgeries or medicalized pathways until they're old enough to that's one because they don't have

00:31:45.680 the capacity to do so until they get to be a certain age the other is that we know that we're

00:31:50.160 going to want to order people into care uh with our compassionate intervention act and uh those

00:31:55.680 are when you talk to anyone who's recovering they will tell you that when they are in the throes of

00:32:01.840 addiction all they are thinking about is where to get their next hit they are not thinking about

00:32:06.800 what how to how to take the pathways and steps out of that so that's the intention of what we

00:32:12.000 put forward is that if you are of sound mind and capacity you have the right to accept or deny any

00:32:17.520 medical procedure that you want to and it's just in those couple of cases that we think we may have

00:32:22.880 to pass legislation to order people into into medical treatment for addiction so that they do

00:32:30.560 not cause any more harm to themselves or others so i wanted to give a little bit of context to that

00:32:34.960 but the intent of what you've given us there it's in the bill of rights premier do you mind if i

00:32:39.360 just speak and supplement you a little bit about this i do speak across canada on this particular

00:32:43.440 issue as i was the former minister of mental health and addictions and one of the architects

00:32:46.880 behind the recovery-oriented system of care.

00:32:49.120 I want everybody to understand that addiction itself

00:32:51.460 is a neurobiological illness that requires medical attention.

00:32:55.580 And that is kind of the genesis behind the Compassionate Care Act

00:33:01.400 that we're going to be eventually putting forward.

00:33:03.700 And to understand that when somebody's overdosing four or five times a day,

00:33:08.820 there's an argument to be made that they're opposing a danger to themselves

00:33:12.200 and that we need to intervene as a compassionate society

00:33:15.440 to get them the help that they need.

00:33:16.880 When somebody is having a bad reaction to crystal meth, as an example, which is, you know, to the person who doesn't really totally understand addiction, that's the person who becomes very violent or is posing a danger to themselves or potentially other people.

00:33:31.320 And we have to compassionately get the medical treatment in order to stop the cycle of abuse.

00:33:35.840 So this is a multi-pronged approach in dealing with a lot of the social and civil disorder that, quite frankly, has been caused by, I can be very partisan here, by the federal government and in some of the decisions that they have made.

00:33:47.840 Thanks for that, Mike. I think we can go on to Resolution 5.

00:33:51.380 Number five. All right. Calgary Lougheed, our good friends there. United Conservative Party believes that the government of Alberta should protect Alberta's right to have access to goods and services using cash and the option to bank with the provincially regulated institutions that supply cash instead of digital currency.

00:34:08.960 Look, guys, you won. You won this one. In September, the Bank of Canada said they would not be introducing a digital currency because there's no public support for it. So bravo to you. Yeah. And look, we'll continue to monitor this. If that ever changes, then we'll have to revisit this. But at the moment, I think you managed to make your views heard loud and clear.

00:34:33.080 all right number six from innisfil sylvan lake the united conservative party believes that the

00:34:39.080 government of alberta should ban post-secondary institutions from the use of race as a factor in

00:34:45.080 any admissions programs or procedure look i have uh minister rajansani looking at this and and we

00:34:55.480 we do have partnerships with the federal government to ensure that there are programs

00:35:00.200 available to first nations individuals and so we don't we wouldn't want to to compromise those

00:35:05.320 programs so that's one aspect that we're looking at but i think what i'm hearing here and i think

00:35:09.560 there's another resolution on it it's this buzzword diversity equity inclusion that i think has become

00:35:16.840 used as a bit of a bludgeon and a hammer i i think we believe that every individual should be able

00:35:23.480 to be assessed on merit um in in being able to uh get into programs yeah

00:35:31.000 and so the first step in trying to understand just how much official diversity equity and

00:35:38.200 inclusion programming there is was bill 18. now you probably heard that uh the municipalities

00:35:44.920 didn't like that much and the the post-secondary institutions didn't like that much but but one of

00:35:49.400 things that it does is it says that anyone who is giving money to an institute that we fund

00:35:56.600 all or most of they have to disclose what that federal programming is because what we suspect is

00:36:02.600 happening is that the federal government is funding fifty thousand dollar dei grants all over

00:36:07.400 the place and that is what is creating some of the concerns that you have so the first step

00:36:12.680 is trying to get some clarity on what is actually occurring there and then if we start seeing that

00:36:18.920 there's a an additional problem that's the lever that we brought through with bill 18 to be able

00:36:23.320 to say you know what if you want money from us you can't take it from the federal government

00:36:27.000 for this purpose so we've got stage one in place and we're and there's there's much more to come

00:36:31.960 so thank you thanks for your direction on that yes thank you all right next one for my friends

00:36:36.760 in bonnieville cold lake st paul the united conservative party believes that the government

00:36:41.240 of alberta should protect an individual's right to privacy and confidentiality of their health

00:36:47.000 care information premier all right and that is in progress one of the things that um we discovered

00:36:53.400 much to our surprise is that alberta health services appears to have a monopoly on data and

00:37:02.120 who is able to access that and the number one thing it should be that you own your data you

00:37:07.480 are the ones who should know what your medical record says it should follow you you should be

00:37:15.400 be able to determine who has access to it. And so we have the Minister of Technology and Innovation

00:37:21.520 working on a proposal to amend Alberta's privacy legislation to ensure that penalties for misusing

00:37:27.640 data by Albertans or violating their privacy is the strongest in Canada. So we've got a new

00:37:33.940 ethics and privacy management framework that will talk about how we managed to do that. We believe

00:37:39.220 that because you rely on us as a government to give you your government issue ID, you need it

00:37:44.480 for driver's license you need it to demonstrate when you go voting you need it for health care

00:37:48.840 access we because we provide that to you we're a custodian of it but it's your data and we

00:37:54.100 shouldn't be allowing anybody to have access to that so that is more legislation coming forward

00:37:58.700 in the fall and i i hope to get your feedback on that when it is introduced

00:38:01.900 all right premier the next one comes from edmonton west henday it's a fastball straight down the

00:38:08.980 middle you can knock this out of the park the united conservative party believes the government

00:38:12.620 Alberta should require teachers schools and school boards to obtain the written consent of a parent

00:38:19.580 guardian of a student under the age of 16 prior to changing the name and or pronouns used by that

00:38:25.500 student done that's what one of the bills was that we introduced two days ago so thanks for

00:38:33.900 your guidance on that all right uh our friends in Banff Kenanaskis you know it's great the we'll

00:38:41.740 get that one back to you the united conservative party believes that the government of alberta

00:38:45.980 should ensure the post-secondary institutions shall be places of free thought and learning of

00:38:51.980 employable skills by eliminating all diversity equity and inclusion offices at all public

00:38:57.420 universities colleges technical institutes and trade schools and all adult education institutions

00:39:03.580 they are not places for indoctrination of identity politics reverse racism or radicalization any

00:39:10.380 post-secondary institution that maintains a dei office policy or equivalent shall lose government

00:39:16.940 funding of financial supports there you are yes so that's what i that's what i think the

00:39:23.260 intent of one of the earlier ones was is that we want to make sure that people are being assessed

00:39:27.260 on merit to to enter into these programs and we don't want people being indoctrinated through

00:39:31.980 different means we believe in an environment of free speech free expression and so that's what

00:39:36.540 But we are our first step, as I mentioned, let's get some transparency about how much of this is occurring.

00:39:43.040 And if the federal government is leading it, let's let's make sure that that gets exposed.

00:39:46.700 So Bill 18 was the first step and there will be more.

00:39:49.020 You know, I think in the past, you know, previous governments going back years and years and years, they would just hand out grants and there was no level of accountability.

00:39:57.280 So when I'm when I'm observing here is, you know, you know, we're sitting up here and the premier is doing a great job, you know, being accountable to you.

00:40:04.140 but just so you're aware we're holding all these other institutions accountable that we give money

00:40:09.100 to as far as the government that's right so it really truly is you and the grassroots that is

00:40:14.060 holding all of these folks accountable so thank you your comments mike and premier uh next one

00:40:19.740 innisville sylvan lake the united conservative party believes that the government of alberta

00:40:24.060 should oppose the federal expansion of medical assisted in assistance in dying qualifying

00:40:29.660 criteria to include those suffering solely from mental illness and oppose the further legalization

00:40:36.220 of MAID as a care option for minor children. Establish protocols for provincial implementation

00:40:44.300 of the federally legalized MAID program wherein healthcare workers in any facility

00:40:49.580 shall not be allowed to present or promote MAID to a patient as a care option. The procedure

00:40:55.980 must be considered a tragic last resort and only be discussed with a patient of legal age upon

00:41:03.020 request by said patient or their proxy individual health care workers and private hospice facilities

00:41:10.140 must have their rights or rather their rights to freedom of conscience honored when deciding to

00:41:16.220 participate in administering MAID yeah this is all very very sound policy and i would say a couple

00:41:22.700 things one of one of the approaches that we took in our province which i think is the right one

00:41:27.500 is that any doctor uh who wants to perform or be available to perform this service is registered

00:41:35.500 online i think there's 80 doctors who've signed up for it that's the way that we protect the rights

00:41:40.220 of all of our medical professionals is that there is an opt-in if you want to perform the service

00:41:45.420 not an expectation that every medical professional will and we we want to retain that and again you

00:41:51.180 you know bravo to you uh the federal government keeps getting such massive pushback on trying to

00:41:56.340 expand made they keep putting it off and putting it off and putting it off i think that the current

00:42:00.820 plan is to look at implementing further changes in september of 2027 so it's been pushed out into

00:42:08.680 the future we're waiting to see if they act on that i suspect there might be a change of government

00:42:13.240 in the meantime and it will preserve some sensibility around this approach so uh do know

00:42:18.920 we take what you put here seriously. We haven't seen that they have enacted this that causes us

00:42:26.220 to have to create a separate framework yet. But if they do, we certainly will go back to this

00:42:31.300 policy and do the same. Wonderful. Thank you. All right. Next, Calgary Edgemont. The United

00:42:36.880 Conservative Party believes that the government of Alberta should support programs, eliminate red 1.00

00:42:41.240 tape and reduce taxes for the succession of the family farm to the next generation of farmers in

00:42:47.300 our primary agricultural section yeah i uh i think the federal government has gone in the in the wrong

00:42:55.380 direction in making it even more difficult to to pass on on a property with the the changes to the

00:43:02.180 capital gains exemption rate i i haven't uh talked with rj about how that impacts the family farm but

00:43:09.620 if i remember especially because family farms are getting such high value in this province

00:43:15.060 especially being able to have a certain percentage of it or a higher threshold of transfer before

00:43:21.060 those those those taxes apply that was something i used to lobby on when i was at the the canadian

00:43:25.700 federation of independent business because we have our tax code tied to the federal government

00:43:31.140 we we would have to work in tandem with them that's part of our agreement so we're we were

00:43:35.140 looking for ways to be able to to uh to exempt but it doesn't look like we're going to be able to

00:43:40.660 again one more thing that requires i think a change of government and and we'll be uh loudly

00:43:45.940 advocating to go back to the rates that were before and then also addressing this issue of

00:43:50.580 the higher exemption in the meantime we we support the feeder program which will allow people to

00:43:55.300 access lower interest rates for feed for livestock we extended the number of contracts our contacts

00:44:01.780 and increased the individual loan limit we've got eligible corporations that can have the agri-food

00:44:07.460 processing tax credit which as i mentioned was the 12 non-refundable um on at least 10 million

00:44:12.740 dollars in a project to build or expand a value-added food or processing facility in

00:44:16.740 alberta it's going incredibly well we also increased lending for the next generation loan

00:44:21.780 program which then leads to ag success and opens up opportunities for next generations

00:44:26.660 and then we increase the lending limit for agricultural financial services corporation

00:44:30.740 so we're doing what we can within our jurisdiction but we know that if we have a federal government

00:44:35.940 that we can work with will be able to do so much more wonderful resolution 12 comes from innisfil

00:44:44.260 sylvan lake and it reads the united conservative party believes that the government of alberta

00:44:48.500 should prohibit any land use or development planning initiatives that would restrict movement

00:44:54.100 of residents as per section six of the canadian charter of rights and freedoms yeah so so thanks

00:45:01.380 for this one i i'm not aware of any jurisdiction in alberta that is currently doing this that said

00:45:08.260 i know and i've read the stories too of a particular community in the uk that was

00:45:13.700 charging punitive taxes for people leaving their community but this is one of the reasons why we

00:45:19.140 brought in bill 20. now bill 20 allows us to strike down municipal bylaws if we feel they

00:45:26.340 are out of scope or violate rights and freedoms we've had to use it a couple of times we had to

00:45:31.940 use it because the yeah so so we had to use it when uh calgary told us that they couldn't lower

00:45:41.140 their local access fee and they were charging outrageous rates to cal calgary ratepayers so we

00:45:45.700 said sorry uh we're we're gonna strike down your your legislation we're gonna we're gonna impose 0.57

00:45:50.820 upon you a new a new rate and we also used it when edmonton council wanted to maintain

00:45:56.660 all of the health care restrictions after we had left them we struck those down as well and so

00:46:06.020 we also proactively put in place policies that said that they couldn't institute handgun bans

00:46:11.380 at the municipal level and we also put in policies saying that their police services could not be used

00:46:16.660 in the federal gun confiscation scheme so we are prepared if we need to

00:46:24.660 to uh to strike down any legislation that we believe violates the rights we absolutely will

00:46:29.780 not allow allow any municipality to prevent you from being able to travel between communities

00:46:35.220 or from one city to another just won't happen hear here

00:46:41.940 all right premier i'm excited about the next one all right the united conservative party

00:46:45.460 believes this is what babcan and ask us uh believes yes our friends of babcan and ask us 0.58

00:46:49.740 prevent concerns about electoral fraud in the alberta's elections by at minimum banning except

00:46:57.440 by plebiscite all use of any and all electronic machines and for tabulations for counting of

00:47:04.000 ballots or any provincial election well we just started on this because as you know in the next

00:47:15.840 municipal elections we ban tabulators we're going back to paper ballot counting at municipal elections

00:47:24.480 we've also eliminated uh the ability to vouch for someone's address you got to show up and

00:47:29.520 you've got to have ID. And we had to get our new electoral officer in place. It took a couple of

00:47:38.480 rounds to do that. I believe it has now been announced. And so we are now going to engage

00:47:43.520 in a process to do the same at the provincial level. I think that we have seen that the vote

00:47:49.480 anywhere machines have not increased the speed with which elections are tabulated. And in fact,

00:47:59.500 if you look at uh saskatchewan saskatchewan didn't have tabulators in that election

00:48:04.700 and though it took a little while to get the votes in from regina and saskatoon i was watching it i

00:48:09.180 think they had everything counted up by about within three hours so and then british columbia

00:48:14.540 i think are we still waiting to figure out who the premier is there

00:48:17.980 how it took a while didn't it so i i think that demonstrates it right there with the two different

00:48:23.020 provinces we're going to go the route of saskatchewan if we get this bill passed in the

00:48:26.700 legislature in the spring okay the next one comes from rimby rocky mountain house sundry

00:48:35.980 and it says the united conservative party believes that the government of alberta should

00:48:42.220 uh support the establishment of a digital bill of rights that outlines the following rights

00:48:48.380 the right to privacy including the protection of personal data and the ability to control its use

00:48:54.300 the right to free expression and access to information without censorship or surveillance

00:48:59.740 the right to security including protection against cyber attacks and breaches the right

00:49:04.700 to transparency including clear and understandable terms and conditions for digital services the

00:49:10.940 right to access and ownership of personal data including the ability to easily transfer between

00:49:17.420 services and the right to due process including fair treatment and legal recourse in the event

00:49:23.580 of digital violations all right now i can't i'm gonna have to get some advice from my house leader

00:49:29.100 because as i mentioned we know that a digital privacy bill of rights is coming forward in the

00:49:34.140 fall i don't know if we've introduced it in the legislature yet house leader no has not been

00:49:38.780 introduced yet well all you can say next week since i can't tell you what is in the content

00:49:42.620 of a bill all i can tell you is that i know that minister nate lubish had a very close look at all

00:49:49.500 of these provisions in drafting the data privacy law and you will be able to see what it looks like

00:49:54.300 in uh before the end of this session remember we end somewhere around the last week of november or

00:49:59.020 the first week of december and so you'll be able to see that in the coming weeks but uh all of

00:50:03.420 these principles are ones that we want to build into our our new approach for protecting your

00:50:07.580 privacy we have a big week two slate yeah we sure do all right the next one is from the premier's

00:50:14.060 constituency brooks medicine hat how about we can we pop hold on this is a long one very long one

00:50:19.820 and i i know that you are going to be debating it right after we're done here so i don't want

00:50:24.940 so let me let me pause we'll skip over this one because i i think i would say i just want to hear

00:50:30.460 a little bit more about the debate as you know we brought forward that last year there was a huge

00:50:35.740 number of suggestions that were made about what we need to look at and we have looked at these

00:50:40.380 different suggestions in different ways some of them we're doing through uh through different

00:50:45.340 legislation like the privacy legislation some of it is through the education act some is through

00:50:50.060 the health statute amendment act some of it is through the sporting act some of it's through

00:50:53.500 the bill of rights some of it is going to require other standalone pieces of legislation and so

00:50:58.780 i would just say that not everything needs to be done through one mechanism of statute and but i

00:51:06.220 don't want to prejudge how your uh how your debate is going because i know that there's going to be

00:51:10.780 i think a full half hour devoted to reassessing this motion from last year and then looking at

00:51:18.140 it for this year so why don't we leave it at that and we'll move on to the next one

00:51:23.660 uh what was the next one here from calgary law heat all right so the united conservative party

00:51:28.620 believes that the government of alberta should enshrine the doctor patient relationship by

00:51:33.980 protecting alberta physicians from undue third-party interference to neither compel physicians to

00:51:39.580 prescribe treatments nor prohibit them from prescribing treatments and to include the right

00:51:44.460 of physicians to prescribe off-label medications using their best discretion with the informed

00:51:50.540 consent of the patient premier sounds like you guys have read dr gary davidson's report to me so

00:52:01.020 these are the kind of things that that he has has counseled if i if you want to talk to him one of

00:52:06.220 the things that he has said is that the normal practice is that when a drug is approved for use

00:52:12.460 by health canada then doctors have the judgment to be able to determine if they want to use it

00:52:19.100 for other treatments and um i think i've been told that as many as 75 percent of approved drugs

00:52:26.140 have been used off label and no one ever used to interfere with that in the past so i've been

00:52:31.180 watching some of the litigation in the us i think it was either nevada or new mexico the attorney

00:52:36.300 general brought this forward and the principle should be that as long as the patient has given

00:52:41.340 informed consent that there's a consideration of whether there may be drug interactions or

00:52:47.100 allergies or side effects and that it is prescribed in a reasonable dosage the doctor should have the

00:52:53.900 latitude to work with the patient to get the kind of medical care that they both jointly decide

00:52:58.860 that's the principle how we put that in uh legislation is something i'm going to work

00:53:05.580 closely with dr gary on but do you know that that is is a lot of the substance of the report

00:53:10.060 that he'll be that that will be releasing in the coming months okay staying with calgary

00:53:15.660 law he the united conservative party believes that the government of alberta should support

00:53:20.620 a comprehensive bill of parental rights which ensures that all legislation will recognize

00:53:26.540 and support parents rights to be informed of and in charge of all decisions to do with all

00:53:33.420 services paid for by the province including education and health care you know and i think

00:53:38.700 this might be like maybe this is a way because i talked to you about some of the complexities

00:53:42.540 that we have around health care and why it's complicated to put that in the bill of rights

00:53:47.340 but this might actually be the way that we could have a comprehensive bill of rights that goes

00:53:52.540 through and states the different circumstances and states where there might be some exceptions

00:53:57.420 so um let's go through the process get the bill of rights affirmed it does have the parental

00:54:02.620 rights education we have the three bills including one that has a lot of of meat around the bones

00:54:09.420 when it comes to a parent's rights to determine the education for their kids but maybe this is

00:54:13.740 the the way that we provide the solution so that we can um affirm those areas of of choice and

00:54:20.860 oversight for parents with without um unduly uh interfering with some of the other bills that

00:54:27.660 we're trying to do which is the the forced care for those who are in addiction as well as making

00:54:34.140 sure that kids are of an inappropriate age before they make decisions to their bodies that are going

00:54:39.100 to be permanent so i'll take it away to see if perhaps maybe the solution on this one

00:54:43.340 is a standalone parental bill of rights so um we haven't we haven't moved on we've moved on it in

00:54:47.660 different pieces we're still sort of trying to sort out how we manage this health care piece but

00:54:53.500 so it's work in process but um we've only got i think a part way to finding the answer to that

00:54:59.420 thanks premier you can applaud the premier this is this is what common sense conservativism is

00:55:05.820 all about right we hear that from pierre polyev and we certainly hear that from from the premier

00:55:10.140 So certainly appreciate those comments.

00:55:11.680 We'll next go to Calvary Edgemont.

00:55:13.780 The United Conservative Party believes that the government of Alberta should encourage increased nitrogen production in our petrochemical sector to reduce the costs and improve the availability of fertilizer for Alberta farmers.

00:55:25.940 100 percent. We are working on this. You bet.

00:55:28.200 And we have a whole strategy around developing ammonia, not only so that it's available for us to use, but then also available for export.

00:55:35.180 japan south korea and india are interested in getting ammonia so that they can do dual fuel

00:55:40.460 combustion in their coal plants to reduce emissions so by uh we'll we'll make sure that

00:55:45.020 that our farmers have what they need here first okay back to kairi law he did a conservative

00:55:50.460 party believes that the government of alberta should ensure that teachers schools school boards

00:55:56.780 and third parties providing services to kindergarten to grade 12 should do not should

00:56:02.940 do not provide access schools rather do not provide access to materials of a sexual racist

00:56:09.820 or abusive nature including but not limited to books handouts online materials and live events

00:56:17.420 that are not part of the alberta program of studies yep and i should say yeah thanks for this

00:56:24.220 i should have mentioned that that is part of the uh the legislation that we brought

00:56:29.100 board two days ago is all third party materials have to be assessed by the ministry of education

00:56:34.700 to make sure that they are age appropriate and so that's the the process that we will

00:56:38.460 be going through as we implement that policy all right next up our friends from banff can and ask

00:56:43.900 us again all right united conservative party believes that the government of alberta should

00:56:49.100 not support the establishment of a solar farms in areas of the agricultural canada land inventory

00:56:55.660 classes one two or three soils well we we we took the approach of for both solar farms and wind farms

00:57:05.180 that is agriculture first and agriculture prime agriculture land has to be the principal uh use

00:57:11.100 on those those high value lands there are some exceptions that can be made if there's a way of

00:57:16.620 having them coexist and in some cases that uh that may be the case with agrivoltaics it's sort of a

00:57:22.780 a new emerging area or grazing that can take place along with solar but we we're also working right

00:57:29.420 now on setback areas so especially for wind turbines because we have heard we've already

00:57:35.100 done a setback area 35 kilometers from our pristine mountain view scapes but we also have to develop

00:57:40.460 a reasonable setback area from an individual's private residence so that a person who chooses

00:57:45.660 to have wind turbines on their property does not impact their neighbor's ability to uh to to uh

00:57:51.180 spray or enjoy their property so that's part and parcel of the full review that we did so thanks

00:57:57.020 for your guidance on that we agree it's it's uh we've got to take an agriculture first approach

00:58:01.180 on those installations excellent next one comes from edmonton west henday and it reads the united

00:58:07.420 conservative party believes that the government of alberta should end provincial funding for

00:58:11.900 supervised consumption sites look our approach is recovery first and uh recovery as the as the as

00:58:23.580 the main objective of uh of anyone who's in the throes of addiction that being said there's some

00:58:29.180 things that we need to do we need to finish building out our recovery communities we've

00:58:32.220 got 11 plans there are already three that are up and running i think another two will be open in

00:58:36.940 the next couple of months we've got five that we're doing four on first nations one with the

00:58:41.900 metis communities we also have the compassionate intervention act that we will be doing that

00:58:46.860 requires specialized facilities so that we can um hold individuals for treatment for up to i think

00:58:52.220 90 days is the uh is is what we're consulting on right now and once we have those in place

00:58:58.620 then we'll be able to have this conversation about what do we do with the existing consumption sites

00:59:04.060 in red deer we are the furthest along we have therapeutic living units in the corrections

00:59:08.380 facility we have a recovery community that is up and running with 75 beds and has been for a year

00:59:13.980 we have a supportive council in red deer who said that we want to try a different approach

00:59:18.220 and so dan williams as you heard in the accountability session the bear pit yesterday

00:59:22.780 talked about the alternative more detox beds more mobile paramedic units more access to virtual

00:59:29.180 opioid dependency program we asked calgary to give us the same endorsement they declined

00:59:34.540 but we have a few more pieces that we need to put into place to make sure that there is a seamless

00:59:39.420 pathway uh to to recovery and so uh we're we're prepared to act on this but we want to make sure

00:59:44.940 that we're not uh leaving anybody without the support that they need to to get back into an

00:59:50.460 independent life right thanks premier

00:59:56.300 all right back to our friends in babcan and ask us

00:59:58.620 the united conservative party believes that the government of alberta should

01:00:03.660 work with the provinces of saskatchewan manitoba yukon territories northwest

01:00:07.420 territories and the states of alaska and montana

01:00:10.700 and all associated first one or more transportation utility corridors

01:00:16.860 to the hudson bay the mackenzie delta region and or alaska this resolution amends and replaces

01:00:23.020 the existing uh policy declaration section 404 transportation to infrastructure and uh i'll

01:00:29.580 finish it off here work with the provinces of saskatchewan manitoba to secure transportation

01:00:33.420 utility corridor to the port of churchill to enable expansion to our commodity exports into

01:00:39.100 europe well i think what happened is devon trees should move so quickly on that first one that you

01:00:42.940 needed to give more work to do and so uh loud and clear you've been heard and so he has been working

01:00:48.300 with on the ports to plane as i mentioned i've met with uh alaska governor mike dunleavy to see if

01:00:53.500 there's a way that we could work with uh yukon to be able to have egress out of one of the ports in

01:00:58.460 alaska our friends in northwest territories in nunavut they would like gray's bay to be an export

01:01:03.900 port we also have port of prince rupert which i believe is alberta's port that's going to be

01:01:08.860 an amazing access point to be able to get our products out into the uh uh into the rest of

01:01:14.140 the world and it's it's already up and running so we're hearing you don't just look at one option

01:01:18.860 and so minister dreeshan is taking that away and we're working on all of them

01:01:27.340 okay the next one comes from calgary buffalo and it reads the united conservative party believes

01:01:31.740 that the government of alberta should divide the roles and responsibilities of the minister

01:01:36.460 of justice position into separate ministries of attorney general and solicitor general yeah we

01:01:42.860 did that uh so mickey is our top lawyer and mike is our top cop so we've we've renamed it we call

01:01:48.780 it public safety and emergency services but that's the role that mike has taken on so everything to

01:01:52.860 do with policing rcmp contract sheriffs building out our municipal forces corrections and emergency

01:01:59.180 services managing our emergency responsibilities under him and then all the litigation um that

01:02:04.460 that we do is uh and managing the courts falls under mickey so done yeah and i would just say

01:02:09.500 that in in in canada with colleagues across canada other provinces are following following suit and

01:02:14.380 taking our lead on this so again thanks to you members thank you calgary edgemonts uh the united

01:02:21.980 conservative party believes that the government of canada or sorry governor of alberta pardon me

01:02:26.300 uh should make alberta human rights tribunal and all other administrative and regulatory body

01:02:31.740 hearings subject to the same rules of evidence and burden of proof as followed by the courts

01:02:37.820 the above resolution proposes to add the bolded text now again i'm not sure i know all of the

01:02:45.420 reasons why this one came forward but i i can tell you we hear the opposite we hear that uh

01:02:50.940 that individuals want us to create specialized tribunals so that we have less administrative

01:02:56.140 burden and that they can work faster in fact we're hearing that right now with the the surface

01:03:00.140 rights for it it was amalgamated and i don't think it's working so well for landowners and

01:03:04.300 being able to get responses when they've got oil companies that are not paying their

01:03:08.060 leases so that's the example of a kind of tribal tribunal that we want to work efficiently and

01:03:13.820 effectively to get a decision so that you can get an answer i don't think we want to bundle that up

01:03:18.380 with a bunch of rules and restrictions that might take three or four or ten years to get a response

01:03:23.020 so we'll i mean i'll take this away to see if there are specific areas where you think that

01:03:27.660 there is um a problem with uh with due process but generally speaking when we set these tribunals up

01:03:33.820 it's because the courts aren't working efficiently as a solution because of all of the additional

01:03:38.940 rules and burden and it creates delay in getting a resolution so we haven't acted on that but you

01:03:44.300 know if anyone wants to come up and tell me where they think we've got big problems i'd be happy to

01:03:48.300 reconsider that okay next one comes from calgary mountain view the united conservative party

01:03:54.620 believes that the government of alberta should support fair efficient open and competitive

01:03:59.740 consumer and industrial electricity markets and conduct a review to determine market competitiveness

01:04:06.780 and whether there is excess market concentration resulting in high capacity high electricity high

01:04:12.220 electricity prices and if so determine methods to correct the excess market concentration yeah

01:04:18.540 done you guys were were onto this what we discovered is there was something called

01:04:22.700 economic withholding and there was reasons for it uh justification for it because what happens is

01:04:27.980 when wind and solar comes on in a flood it drives the price down to zero and we know that there's a

01:04:32.940 bunch of producers who can't produce energy at zero because they'll make no money so they wait

01:04:37.900 until the price rises and then they bid their um their product in so that they can get paid for it

01:04:43.980 but what was happening is they were just holding back a little bit too long so that the prices went

01:04:49.020 much higher than they should have and that's something that nathan newdorf identified right

01:04:53.500 away and put a ban said you can't do economic withholding anymore and he's changing the way

01:04:58.140 in which electricity is sold hopefully through a day ahead market to make sure that doesn't happen

01:05:02.620 again so yes we looked into it and that one checkbox we've already we've already worked on that

01:05:09.820 and newdorf's done some great work on that very complex file absolutely all right calgary buffalo

01:05:15.340 is next united conservative party uh believes that the government of alberta should repeal the

01:05:20.380 no-fault insurance also known as the direct compensation for property damage legislation

01:05:26.140 in alberta and return to the uh torta paste also known as the uh at fault insurance so this

01:05:33.180 particular one direct compensation for property damage um i i know that when it came in it was a

01:05:40.060 jolt to uh to some rate payers and i'll tell you the thinking behind it the thinking behind it is

01:05:47.980 that if you drive a really really expensive car then it's your insurance that will pay to fix it

01:05:55.340 and that's the no-fault aspect of it versus if you like my husband and i drive fully depreciated cars

01:06:03.020 then you do not pay that extra premium and you um you will have more more moderated rates so

01:06:10.300 that's the change that was made again it predated me i don't know if any of my colleagues will be

01:06:15.180 able to talk a little bit more about that it's been in operation now for i think four or five

01:06:19.900 years and i i think there's a lot of complication in trying to switch that back but that's the

01:06:25.980 thinking behind it if you drive a i'm going to show my ignorance here i was going to say like

01:06:31.260 a two hundred thousand dollar lamborghini versus my 2011 ford escape your insurance premiums are

01:06:38.220 going to be a lot more expensive than my insurance premium so that's just to digest that is that is

01:06:43.980 the change that was made a number of years ago we haven't reversed that but i would encourage you to

01:06:49.100 talk to uh to nate horner if you have uh some particularly strong views about that yeah that's

01:06:54.860 the only thing i would supplement nate horner's on this file he's doing a great job i think our

01:06:59.500 objective as a government is uh to lower rates that's not behold we're not beholden to insurance

01:07:05.580 companies we're not beholden to anybody we just want to make sure that we have fair rates for you

01:07:10.460 the consumer and that's what uh nate horner's subjective and he's trying to do yeah completely

01:07:15.340 wonderful okay this one coming from calgary edgemont now the conservative party believes

01:07:19.820 that the government of Alberta should require all regulatory professional associations and trade

01:07:25.500 organizations to limit investigations of their members for complaints regarding professional

01:07:31.580 conduct to their members to instances of activities that occur while on the job and limit the

01:07:37.980 application of any code of conduct to professional activities to exclude personal affairs done yep

01:07:44.220 that's exactly what the professions review is all about we heard you loud and clear

01:07:47.340 All right, next, my friends from Baff, Canaanaskis.

01:07:52.480 The United Conservative Party believes that the government of Alberta should protect inmates who were female at conception

01:07:58.680 and are housed at correctional and remand centres for women operated by Alberta's correctional services

01:08:06.320 by refusing to house any inmate who was male at conception at said correctional and remand centres.

01:08:14.720 Premier.

01:08:14.920 So I'll probably actually get Mike to talk about this because remember what we have authority over versus what the federal government has authority over.

01:08:24.660 And what we have authority over are those corrections institutions where someone is serving for two years less a day.

01:08:32.240 And so we did a review to identify if indeed any of these circumstances exist in our facilities.

01:08:38.740 And I believe that we found that it did not.

01:08:40.840 and so that's this may be something i know some of you probably uh go to conservative party of

01:08:46.680 canada events i think this may be something that is more relevant to the federal penitentiaries

01:08:54.280 because if somebody is staying in jail forever or for 25 years they may have more incentive to try

01:09:01.480 to move over into the alternative facility we're just not seeing it at the provincial level we tend

01:09:06.360 to try to pass policies for things that we know are are occurring and i believe that in our review

01:09:12.200 we're finding this just isn't happening in alberta yeah i i mean the only thing i would supplement

01:09:16.680 to say you're correct premier it is it is not happening here in alberta uh obviously corrections

01:09:21.160 does fall under me we did do an extensive review of this it's not an issue that comes up uh if you

01:09:26.280 are a biological male you are going to a biological male facility if you're a biological female you're 0.95

01:09:31.080 going into a biological female facility and that's just the way it is yeah i think we're on the last 0.56

01:09:37.560 one sorry guys we're uh cutting into your debate but we're only about seven minutes over time last

01:09:42.120 one okay last but not least calgary edgemont and it reads now the conservative party believes the

01:09:46.680 government of alberta should ensure that social assistance support programs such as assured

01:09:52.360 income for the severely handicapped or age seniors benefits and the alberta child and family benefit

01:09:57.880 continue to be indexed to inflation yeah thank you we did we did make that change so that we

01:10:02.760 do have an escalator so that each year those who are most vulnerable are able to see a pay increase

01:10:08.360 as well as our personal income tax system it's also um so that you don't get pushed into a higher

01:10:13.960 tax bracket if your employer is increasing your pay uh to stay up with the with inflation so

01:10:18.760 thanks for the feedback on that and it's a wrap for us i hope that you enjoyed this and we'll uh

01:10:23.080 be back at it again next year have a fantastic afternoon of debate we're looking forward to

01:10:27.720 seeing the results ladies and gentlemen give it up for our accountability session requested

Western Standard - November 03, 2024

UCP AGM： Accountability Session

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