Western Standard - UCP AGM： Bearpit Session with Premier Smith and Cabinet

00:00:00.000 Thank you.

00:00:30.000 We'll be right back.

00:01:00.000 I've been working nothing all day, and I've been taking care of business, every day, taking care of business, every week, I've been taking care of business, it's all right, taking care of business, and working overtime, we're out.

00:01:18.000 All right, all right, whoo, Rob Smith, he chose all the music, so we're gonna be rocking

00:01:36.500 it all weekend long.

00:01:38.240 Thank you so much for everything that you do, Mr. President and team.

00:01:41.640 You've put together an incredible event for everyone.

00:01:44.000 Give them a round of applause for all the incredible hard work they've done.

00:01:47.500 And I hope you're convinced to go on down and do some door knocking in Lethbridge West

00:01:56.480 with our incredible new candidate down there, John Middleton-Hope, who I know will be MLA

00:02:01.160 number 50 for our caucus.

00:02:03.120 Give him a round of applause.

00:02:06.120 Now, I know that you've got a lot of questions for this team, so I would say if you want

00:02:12.820 to start lining up, we'll get right to it.

00:02:15.060 But I should just tell you that this is truly extraordinary, what you have done.

00:02:19.960 Coming together, I think I see 4,000 people in this room.

00:02:24.320 And they've got 2,000 people in the overflow area.

00:02:27.940 I don't think that there has ever been a gathering like this in all of Canada.

00:02:31.180 So congratulate yourselves for coming on out here.

00:02:37.980 You know, I like to listen to inspirational speakers.

00:02:40.600 And I was listening to a little bit of LeBron James earlier today.

00:02:43.740 And one of the things that he talked about as a leader is how he, it's part of his job is to lift his team up.

00:02:50.160 But he says that what happens in return is his team lifts him up.

00:02:54.440 And that's exactly how I feel about this incredible team of cabinet ministers you have on the stage here.

00:03:00.160 You have put them on the field to play the game on your behalf and to get the policies implemented.

00:03:06.900 And I want to give them a little bit of time to brag about the incredible work that they're doing.

00:03:11.240 If they miss something, I'll brag on their behalf.

00:03:13.180 But that's how we'll start this off. I get to go back into radio host mode.

00:03:18.060 That makes the media excited and makes my staff really nervous when I get into that mode.

00:03:23.500 But I'm going to make them do all of the work this evening.

00:03:26.460 And then we'll do it just like question period as well, where they only have 35 seconds to answer

00:03:32.220 so that we can get to more of your questions. So it'll feel a little bit like speed dating.

00:03:36.460 So why don't we get started with our Finance Minister and President of Treasury Board.

00:03:41.020 We're going to ask each of them the same question.

00:03:43.440 You've got 35 seconds to tell us.

00:03:44.960 What are you working on that you feel the most proud of since we got elected?

00:03:49.040 See if this works.

00:03:50.300 It does.

00:03:51.580 Very great to be with you today.

00:03:53.960 I guess LeBron tells the Premier, you've got to lift your team up.

00:03:58.180 Sometimes I'm the guy that has to say no.

00:04:00.260 So I'm the yin to the yang sometimes.

00:04:03.120 Right now we're starting to work on the budget,

00:04:06.880 all of the great things that this team of ministers has been working on we're

00:04:11.620 trying to lay that over you know what Alberta looks like right now major 1.00

00:04:15.700 population surge and and seeing what that means in all of these important

00:04:21.320 ministries including health care education social services and still

00:04:25.480 trying to make sure the world knows that we're maybe one of the last places left

00:04:29.560 that are open for business and we continue to see people vote with their

00:04:33.160 feet and choose to make Alberta home. Right on. And remember, there's a finance minister who's

00:04:39.220 balanced the three, the budget for the third time. Now we're going to grow that heritage fund to $250

00:04:43.740 billion. And he does oversee every single dollar that gets spent at Treasury Board. So he is that

00:04:50.140 minister knows sometimes. Let's go on to our next minister, my deputy premier, Mike Gellis, who is

00:04:54.620 also the minister of public safety and emergency services. What are you most proud of? You know

00:04:58.620 what? It's about keeping Alberta safe, premier and everybody in the audience. As you have said,

00:05:03.080 As I have said, we're going to do whatever it takes to keep Albertan safe.

00:05:06.000 That's why we put 50 new police officers in Calgary, 50 in Edmonton.

00:05:08.960 This is why I announced even today another new SCAN team.

00:05:11.760 That's the Safe Communities and Neighbourhoods team right here in the Red Deer area.

00:05:14.820 That's why we have the Fugitive Apprehension team.

00:05:17.100 That's why we have surveillance teams.

00:05:19.280 This is why we're augmenting and supporting all police services around this province.

00:05:23.720 We know the disaster that is Bill C-75, which has made us less safe, not just here in Alberta, but right throughout Canada.

00:05:30.400 And we're going to do whatever it takes to keep Albertan safe.

00:05:33.080 Thanks so much for that, Mike. Mike also leads our emergency effort whenever we have emergencies, and he's had to do double duty on that the last two fire seasons. So thanks so much for your incredible work, Mike. We've got Minister Rebecca Schultz, who is, of course, our Minister of Environment, Protected Areas, and Managing Stephen Guibault. Tell us what you're up to, Minister Schultz.

00:05:54.020 Well, I would say that is one of the big things, is being able to support our fearless Premier Danielle Smith in defending Alberta against the constant constitutional overreach by this federal government, whether it be on the plastics ban, on the no more pipelines laws, on the oil and gas emissions cap, which I think is coming on Monday, on their methane regulations, on their plans for our power grid, which would leave Albertans and Canadians in the dark with more expensive bills.

00:06:24.020 So that is one of the things that I am very honored to be in this role and advocate for

00:06:28.660 all Albertans and Canadians on, but then also fixing things in our own house. Water approval

00:06:33.540 is one great example. If the news release didn't go out last week, I'm scooping myself. But we've

00:06:38.340 sped up approval times by 57%, 25% in the last year. It's pretty amazing what we can do when

00:06:44.820 it comes to just, as Minister Horner said, being open for business and working at the speed of all

00:06:50.100 of you thanks so much for that minister she didn't tell you that she stays up at night wondering how

00:06:55.700 we're going to preserve caribou and keep that from keeping gil gibo from shutting our province down 1.00

00:07:00.180 she's doing an incredible job finding ways to build more water reservoirs as well which is going to be 0.98

00:07:04.740 really important work so thank you for that minister we got minister brian gene our minister

00:07:09.140 of energy and minerals minister minister go ahead what are you most proud of it's no secret that i

00:07:15.300 I believe in the power of people and building communities and building families and building

00:07:20.940 a future.

00:07:21.940 So what I'm proud of is the fact that I get to build our energy sector and make it the

00:07:26.100 best energy sector in the world, whether it's oil and gas, whether it's lithium or titanium

00:07:30.720 or vanadium or so many other things, folks.

00:07:33.520 We have so many gifts here.

00:07:35.260 It's an incredible thing and to be part of that, to be part of the great opportunity

00:07:39.940 we have moving forward and to make sure that Albertans actually are the owners of this

00:07:44.120 resource that they own moving forward that's what i like to do 100 and the minister is also on the

00:07:50.840 front line of fighting against ottawa because you know we're not reducing emission we're not

00:07:55.720 reducing production we'll be reducing emissions and in fact we're going to be doubling our oil

00:07:59.480 and gas production and he's going to be responsible for that so thank you so much minister gene

00:08:06.040 all right minister amory sometimes i feel like he's the busiest minister we got i think i think

00:08:10.200 he's got somewhere around 15 to 20 files that he's fighting against ottawa i'll let him tell

00:08:15.160 you about it he's our minister of justice minister well thank you very much premier and uh wonderful

00:08:20.200 to be here with 6 000 of our friends and family and this wonderful and remarkable team behind me

00:08:25.720 we're working on a number of different things we just announced the professional regulatory

00:08:29.960 body's review no professional should ever be silenced in exercising hers or her free speech

00:08:41.880 we've launched a judicial review application and we're going to take the federal government

00:08:46.120 to task on that when it comes to carbon tax litigation c69 and the emergencies

00:08:52.360 act ladies and gentlemen we won before we're going to win again

00:08:55.400 one of the last things i'm very proud of as well our firearms litigation files we know that law

00:09:05.960 abiding gun owners are not the problem in this country the toronto police association knows the

00:09:11.560 same exact thing why don't the federal government know that yet we're going to go to court and we're

00:09:15.960 going to show them that gun ownership law-abiding gun owners are not the problem in this province

00:09:20.760 and they're not the problem in this country add one more we did come through with the direction

00:09:30.760 we got from members last year with a bill of rights amendment that's going to entrench rights

00:09:35.640 for firearms owners make sure that we're giving compensation just compensation for violations of

00:09:41.800 property rights and making sure that you never ever ever get forced to take a vaccine now i do know

00:09:47.840 Yeah, absolutely.

00:09:51.600 And I know we've got a robust debate happening tomorrow

00:09:54.580 to see if there are other things that we might have missed,

00:09:56.820 and that's why we kept the bill open.

00:09:58.340 We're going to continue to listen to what you have to say during that debate.

00:10:01.540 We've got the bill available to do some amendments once we get back after the AGM,

00:10:05.540 but do know that we're listening and we're all here to hear what you have to say.

00:10:09.180 Thanks for your work, Minister Amory.

00:10:10.480 we've got minister nixon who is also one of my busiest ministers he's got a huge number of files

00:10:19.040 that he is managing jason nixon's our minister of seniors communities and social services minister

00:10:24.400 well we've got a lot going on premier as you said but some of the things we're most proud of we are

00:10:28.240 working to we are doubling the construction capacity in our province right now not using

00:10:32.880 your money but by reducing red tape making sure that all albertans and everybody coming here has

00:10:36.880 a place to live we're tearing down dangerous encampments and making sure that organized crime

00:10:41.360 is not taking over our cities but instead putting in true compassionate services that are recovery

00:10:46.080 orientated we are rebuilding one of our crown jewels of this great province jasper national park

00:10:51.520 uh to be able to make sure all them who have somewhere to live and most importantly i think

00:10:55.280 we're standing side by side with our minister of health to fix alberta health services and

00:10:59.040 our health care system once and for all by taking over continuing care to make sure that those who 0.99

00:11:03.360 built their province have a place to stay long term and are kept care of well said minister

00:11:10.160 we have minister of advanced education rajan sani rajan tell us what you're working on

00:11:15.680 thank you premier it's so great to be here hello everyone and one of the things that i'm most proud

00:11:21.120 of is the work that we're doing on the trades we are promoting the trade there are ads and videos

00:11:26.400 out there i hope some of you have seen those and the truth is that we can't build our economy if

00:11:32.160 if we don't have enough carpenters, electricians,

00:11:34.960 plumbers, millwrights, you name it.

00:11:37.240 So very, very important to keep investing in this area.

00:11:40.280 And the other thing that I'm incredibly proud of

00:11:42.740 and will make many of you very happy

00:11:44.900 is the investment that we're making

00:11:46.480 in opening up more medical students, pardon me,

00:11:49.120 medical seats for rural students

00:11:51.400 in Grand Prairie and Lethbridge.

00:11:53.600 Very important work.

00:11:55.080 We'll have more than a hundred physicians online

00:11:58.600 working in stream in the next three years.

00:12:01.660 Thank you so much for that, Minister.

00:12:03.360 We've seen a 50% year-over-year increase in enrollment and apprenticeships, and that's

00:12:08.280 incredible, and due to the good work of Minister Sani, as well as the minister sitting next

00:12:14.760 to her, Minister Dimitrios Nikolaitis, who's our Minister of Education.

00:12:18.720 Minister, tell us what you're up to.

00:12:20.880 Well, Premier, I'm going to give a little bit of a political answer.

00:12:24.340 I mean, I am a politician, and I do have a microphone, so there are three things that

00:12:29.820 i think i'm quite excited about first and foremost i'm so excited about the school construction

00:12:35.340 program and the fact that we're going to be building almost a hundred new schools in our

00:12:39.900 communities of greatest need to make sure that kids can go to school right in their backyard

00:12:45.100 i think that's so important i'm also incredibly proud of the fact that we have removed some of

00:12:53.180 the distractions focused back on the basics and gotten cell phones out of our classrooms

00:12:59.580 they don't belong there at all and lastly premier i'm also so proud of the fact that you and our

00:13:08.620 entire government will always defend and always make sure that parents make the final decision

00:13:15.500 when it comes to their child's education some great work happening in the ministry of education

00:13:25.180 also in the Ministry of Health, Minister LaGrange has done an incredible job of taking AHS apart

00:13:31.260 and rebuilding it with a refocus, as we're calling it. I'll turn it over to Minister LaGrange to tell

00:13:36.240 you what she's up to. Well, thank you, Premier. And again, I'm so happy to be here. I'm honoured

00:13:42.500 as a servant leader that was elected to do a job. The job that I've been entrusted with

00:13:48.680 is looking at our health care system. And does anyone think it was working properly?

00:13:56.140 That's what I heard as we went around the province.

00:13:59.640 65 in-person engagements, 18,000 people responded on surveys,

00:14:06.400 and another over 10,000 people were on telephone town halls,

00:14:10.420 and they all said the same thing.

00:14:11.920 Our health care system is not working.

00:14:14.220 We need to put the patient back at the center of the care, not the bureaucracy,

00:14:18.820 and that's what we're doing through our refocusing.

00:14:21.880 And we're going to continue to do it until we get it done.

00:14:24.240 we're gonna make sure that we have our surgery times are done in clinically

00:14:30.120 appropriate times so we're gonna see more surgeries done we're actually

00:14:33.480 seeing an increase we are on track to see more surgeries done than have ever

00:14:38.120 been done before 310,000 this year alone so that is just the start of the

00:14:43.920 pyramid we have got so much work to do and I've got an incredible team helping

00:14:47.820 me so that's what I'm most proud of fantastic thank you so much for that

00:14:52.140 minister and she's also spearheading a bill this week to make sure that we 0.52

00:14:57.360 protect the right of our kids to be able to have kids of their own one day so

00:15:00.520 thank you for the work that you're doing on that as well and we've got Dan

00:15:05.140 Williams who's a companion on health care he's our minister of mental health

00:15:09.300 and addiction minister tell us what you're up to well thank you premier and

00:15:12.360 I'm not saying this just because there's 23 politicians on stage but it does it 0.66

00:15:16.320 smell a little bit like horseshit in here to you guys so I am very very proud 0.63

00:15:21.960 to be working on this file i can tell you under premier's leadership and the work we've done 0.60

00:15:26.760 alberta has rejected the lie that's been presented to canadians and albertans in particular when it

00:15:32.360 comes to addiction we've been told by woke academics and the media that fundamentally we

00:15:37.400 need to make a choice we need to make a choice between caring for those in addiction with

00:15:41.800 compassion or on the other hand having safe communities and that is not true that is a lie

00:15:46.920 and that's why the Alberta recovery model is building out over 10,000 new spaces in the last

00:15:51.640 six years. We have 11 recovery communities that have zero cost to those in addiction because

00:15:55.720 whether it's your family member, friend or a stranger, it is not at all compassionate to

00:16:00.360 leave somebody intermittently cold in a cold red deer or peace country winter who is suffering

00:16:05.320 from addiction and mental health challenges and say that's a lifestyle choice. We're going to

00:16:09.000 return order to our streets and care to those in addiction and that's happening right now with the

00:16:13.640 work we're doing in mental health and addiction right on and so stay tuned we're also going to

00:16:18.920 be bringing in compassionate intervention this uh coming year not this uh session but the following

00:16:24.920 one which is mandatory treatment for those who are danger to themselves or others because of

00:16:29.720 their addiction or substance use and this is going to be the most compassionate approach in canada

00:16:33.960 because we care for our loved ones and our communities and that's no bs right

00:16:38.040 we also have casa mental health classrooms and dan is also building out a mental health network not

00:16:46.180 only for adults but also for our young people so thank you for the work you're doing there we got

00:16:50.020 pete guthrie who is our minister of infrastructure pete tell us what you're up to yeah thanks premier

00:16:55.600 uh so i guess just to let you know i do everything that is uh vertical uh when it comes to

00:17:01.440 Infrastructure, Dreschen, he does horizontal, not that he's horizontal, maybe later, but he does roadways, highways, bridges, dams, that sort of thing.

00:17:19.060 So we're building out hospitals, the recovery centers, but also the $8.6 billion school build-out that Nicolaides is kindly taking all the credit for, I actually have to deliver on.

00:17:35.320 So that's the biggest thing.

00:17:36.720 30 schools a year over the next few years are going to be announced, and we plan and intend on building out those 200,000 school spaces.

00:17:45.480 Thank you so much for that, Minister.

00:17:47.120 minister also discovered when he got into the portfolio that we didn't have a single

00:17:51.760 central real estate repository of all of the things that we own so he's been busily working

00:17:56.080 that together so that we can put those properties to better use so thank you so much for your work

00:18:00.320 on that minister all right uh minister tanya for so is so uh in demand she's actually got

00:18:06.480 four critics on the other side who much dog her portfolio she is our arts and culture critic and

00:18:11.440 she's been doing our minister and she's been doing a ton of work minister for thank you premier and

00:18:16.640 Hello, everyone. So, so much going on. A few things to touch on is I get the honour in this portfolio of celebrating and promoting Alberta's rich cultural heritage, not cancelling it as those on the woke left would like.

00:18:33.980 Let's celebrate our heritage.

00:18:37.420 I also get the opportunity to work closely with Minister Matt Jones, our Jobs Economy and Trade,

00:18:44.920 Minister on Promoting Film and Television in this incredible province,

00:18:48.540 which has contributed over $1.2 billion to our economy.

00:18:53.320 We know we are the best place for film and television production.

00:18:56.760 And finally, I have the community grants programs in my ministry, both our SIP and CFIP program,

00:19:02.640 that provides grants to amazing non-profit and community organizations

00:19:07.780 doing incredible work in all four corners of our province.

00:19:10.960 Thank you.

00:19:11.540 And if you see Minister Furr everywhere, that's the reason why.

00:19:14.120 She's doing some incredible work.

00:19:15.300 We've got Minister Searle Turton.

00:19:16.780 He's our Minister of Children and Family Services.

00:19:19.100 Minister.

00:19:20.280 Yes, thank you very much, Premier.

00:19:22.120 As a compassionate Conservative, I have the absolute privilege

00:19:24.860 of working with some of the most vulnerable and complex children

00:19:27.900 here in our province.

00:19:28.940 As someone that went through the adoption process for my youngest son,

00:19:31.840 And I get the absolute joy of helping kids find forever homes with the adoption process here.

00:19:37.460 I also work with many vulnerable families when it comes to domestic violence and women's shelters and sexual assault centers.

00:19:43.880 I also get to support family resource networks.

00:19:46.220 And I know that there's children and families all over the entire province in each and every one of your communities that is accessing those programs.

00:19:53.260 Because we know if we can support families, it's going to lead to stronger communities and it's going to keep more people out of the justice system.

00:19:59.700 And Minister, thanks Minister. Minister Churton is also working with First Nations to transfer over some of the authority for First Nations for children in care. So that's a lot of hard work and I know he's making some great progress. We've got Minister Devendrishan, who at the moment is upright and we're glad to see it. Tell us about transportation.

00:20:16.880 Well, Premier, I was going to say that you have a very united caucus,

00:20:20.300 but there's some shade thrown down on that side of this.

00:20:23.440 Dan, first, I just washed that mustache, maybe.

00:20:27.140 Might clear up some of that smell.

00:20:30.320 And Pete, we all know you're big Oilers fans,

00:20:34.720 so just read that in the news the other day.

00:20:37.100 But who's Oilers fans in this room?

00:20:41.880 Who's Flames fans in this room?

00:20:43.660 who's connection no i don't care um uh but premier your question what do we care what do

00:20:50.940 what am i really proud of building this province um working with so many municipalities building

00:20:56.700 roads and bridges we have 64 000 lane kilometers we have 5 000 bridges and the billions of dollars

00:21:03.420 of royalties that come into this province come from rural alberta and if we don't have market

00:21:07.660 access roads and bridges to get that product to market, God help us all. So, that's the most

00:21:13.980 proud thing I've done in this ministry. He's also correcting the NENGIE nightmare, 1.00

00:21:17.900 and that is actually going to get that green line in Calgary built as well. So,

00:21:21.340 thank you so much for the work you're doing there, Minister Dreeshan. He may have a T-shirt for sale

00:21:25.980 if you corner him as well. You'll see him wearing that over the course of the weekend. We got Nate

00:21:30.460 Glubish, who is our Minister of Technology and Innovation. Minister, tell us what you're up to.

00:21:35.020 Sure. Well, first, let me just say I love this team. I mean, we're working hard. We've been in the trenches, many of us together for five years, but we also know how to have fun. So thanks to everybody on our team. It's been a pleasure working with you. So a couple of things that I'm really excited about. I get to lead our government's efforts to apply more technology and to be more innovative in how we deliver services because we want to be able to deliver better, faster, smarter services to every single Albertan. And we know that if we do that well, we're going to save the taxpayer a ton of money. So that's part one. But part two is I'm also getting

00:22:05.000 the privilege to lead our efforts to make Alberta the most attractive place for innovators and

00:22:09.320 inventors to invest their energy and their resources to build new technologies and to grow

00:22:13.160 our tech sector and one of the areas that is most exciting is as we are as we all know that

00:22:18.280 artificial intelligence has completely taken off it is touching every aspect of the tech sector and

00:22:23.480 every aspect of every industry and there's going to need to be a ton of infrastructure built to

00:22:27.800 support that technology and these are these are called data centers and so I've been out selling

00:22:32.120 Alberta as the best place in the world to build this infrastructure. And the reason it should

00:22:36.360 matter to all of us, even if we don't care about technology, is that this is a way for us to

00:22:40.920 export our natural gas without it ever leaving the province. Justin Trudeau and Steven Gibault

00:22:46.120 might be able to get in the way of us building pipelines, but they can't stop us from converting

00:22:49.720 our gas to electricity, turning it into artificial intelligence, computational capacity, and exporting

00:22:54.840 that through fiber to the rest of the world. This is going to be a game changer and will help to

00:22:58.040 compliment what Minister Jean is doing to double our oil and gas production. Thank you.

00:23:04.280 You can tell how excited he is about that. He has also pioneered methods for us to do our

00:23:08.840 affordability payments directly to Albertans, our emergency payments directly to Albertans.

00:23:13.480 He's working on land titles to make sure that we're able to get transfers done in a single day

00:23:17.880 and he has got I'm sure the very best cyber security team in the entire country because

00:23:22.200 we're constantly under attack by state actors and he's been able with his department to ward it off.

00:23:27.240 he's doing great work thanks for that group we also have todd lowen who is our minister

00:23:31.400 of forestry and parks and firefighting minister lowen tell us what you've been up to

00:23:36.760 oh thank you very much premier and i just want to say it's great to see so many people out here

00:23:41.240 today um for somebody that has a fear of public speaking this is uh you just made it more

00:23:45.800 intimidating just by all you being here today but but i do appreciate it it's great to see

00:23:51.000 uh when it comes to my department uh obviously wildfire is one of the biggest things that we're

00:23:55.720 we're concerned about working on right now we've made substantial changes since last year to make

00:24:00.520 sure that we serve Albertans better and do a better job at protecting communities we have

00:24:06.280 programs we're working on right now with individual communities to make sure that we add additional

00:24:10.120 protection and we'll see some of that work happening this winter when it comes to parks

00:24:14.760 parks are for people we want to make sure that we have good access for the people of Alberta

00:24:18.440 to access their parks and really truly enjoy them to the fullest amount and I guess part of one of

00:24:25.480 of the things that's I guess near and dear to my heart is the hunting and

00:24:27.940 fishing branch which is part of my department too and for all those people

00:24:31.960 that do hunt and fish you know I think we can appreciate the having a healthy

00:24:37.420 wildlife populations but I also believe I think that that's something that all

00:24:41.140 Albertans can appreciate is having the healthy wildlife populations to be able

00:24:44.380 to see and enjoy the wildlife beautiful wildlife in our province and the

00:24:47.140 beautiful views that we have so that's I guess that's some of the things right

00:24:51.280 off the top. Todd has done an amazing job pioneering a new way to fight fires in

00:24:55.180 our province he's uh he fights hundreds of fires a year and he has done an amazing job these past

00:25:00.520 two seasons thank you for that we also now have minister joseph scout the tallest mla in caucus

00:25:06.060 i know you must have thought it was jason nixon but he's edged him out by an inch and he's doing

00:25:09.840 some amazing things in tourism and sport go ahead minister scout just don't tell nixon i'm taller

00:25:14.920 than he is it's a bit of a thing just kidding uh asking me to pick one of my favorite things that

00:25:21.320 doing is like ask me to pick one of my favorite kids uh but i have three so i'll go with three

00:25:26.040 kids which actually for a mormon guy who represents a lot of mormons in dutch i know those three kids

00:25:30.440 are rookie numbers but but it works for us um the first thing i'm very proud of is the work we're

00:25:37.160 doing to help get to help get jasper back on his feet with the leadership of premier smith and my

00:25:42.200 team here we've all been involved in that and it's been so great as we watch the community rebuild

00:25:46.680 and it's going to come back better and stronger than ever thank you thank you for that thank you

00:25:53.880 thank our premier please second thing is coming up next week we'll be releasing a piece of

00:25:58.920 legislation that will help us explore more of the best that alberta has to offer in our crown land

00:26:03.480 with our four season resorts development because tourism is jobs is to economic diversification

00:26:09.160 and i'm very proud of that and the third thing is something very close to my heart as a father

00:26:13.720 of a daughter who's 10 but i think a very bright athletic future ahead of her yesterday we

00:26:18.360 introduced legislation again with the leadership of our premier that will make sports safe for

00:26:22.840 women and girls and make sure they're not forced to compete it's very important that we make sure

00:26:36.840 that sports is safe for women and girls and that they're not forced to compete against larger

00:26:40.600 stronger more physically capable transgender athletes but also that everybody has a place

00:26:44.760 to play and recreate and you'll see that as we move through the legislative process but i'm very

00:26:49.320 proud of the leadership of our premier and my colleagues up here who have been supportive

00:26:52.680 on that process and thank you thank you thank you for that minister

00:26:58.360 we've also he also has a program called every kid can play as well which allows for young people to

00:27:04.280 get support so that they can be in sports he feels really passionately about it you've just thrown

00:27:08.280 everything into that portfolio thanks for that minister we got minister dale nally who is our

00:27:13.000 minister of service alberta red tape reduction and aglc go ahead minister tell us what you're up to

00:27:20.520 thank you thank you premier after 25 years we are finally updating our foip legislation and one of

00:27:28.120 the best parts about that is we're going to be bringing forward enhanced um proactive disclosures

00:27:34.520 and that's going to promote more openness more transparency and government because i think we

00:27:38.760 can all agree that open transparent governments will always be better governments and this will

00:27:43.640 be one small step in making us the most freedom loving open and transparent jurisdiction in north

00:27:49.560 america as well a major registries update and uh we will get those land titles transferred in one

00:27:58.600 day he's done already amazing job reducing the waiting list of transfers from 110 days down to

00:28:03.560 about five to ten days so thank you for that minister we got minister you seen who is our

00:28:07.800 minister for immigration and multiculturalism minister well thank you very much premier it's

00:28:13.320 such a pleasure for me to be here along with my team of colleagues led by premier daniel smith

00:28:18.520 let's give them a round of applause

00:28:23.400 alberta is land of opportunity land of hope land of prosperity and people come here from around

00:28:30.600 the world and we welcome them and we make sure that there is no issues in credential recognitions

00:28:36.360 or any other barriers that they may face here and we want to make sure that everybody's accepted

00:28:41.720 respected in harmony understanding tolerance acceptance as we move forward and no one is left

00:28:47.640 behind thank you very much awesome thank you minister minister you seen has a an annual event

00:28:54.360 where he gives awards to outstanding immigrants and it's uh remarkable some of the contributions

00:28:59.400 so thank you for your putting your heart into that we've got minister wilson who is our minister of

00:29:04.280 indigenous relations minister wilson thank you premier one of the things i've really been working

00:29:09.000 with is to make our indigenous and metis brothers and sisters partners in prosperity i call it

00:29:13.960 so i call it a hand up not a handout program and we developed what we call the alberta

00:29:18.600 indigenous opportunities corporation this is a backstopping program and one of the big things 1.00

00:29:24.120 we've done we're going to be opening it very soon hopefully get the premier out there cutting the

00:29:27.320 ribbon we developed a power plant out in edison the cascade power plant it's going to provide

00:29:31.960 eight percent of alberta's power we've got six first nations as full partners in it and you know

00:29:37.320 what it uses good clean alberta natural gas and it works even when the sun doesn't shine the wind

00:29:42.600 doesn't blow oh he also has an incredible program the alberta indigenous business fund which funds

00:29:52.360 up to $750,000 for each project, and he has some amazing success stories, so thank you for your

00:29:57.640 incredible work on economic reconciliation, Minister Rick Wilson. We've got Minister RJ

00:30:02.600 Sigurdsson, our Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation. Tell us what you're up to, Minister.

00:30:07.960 Well, thank you, Premier. I think there's so much to be proud of in agriculture right now,

00:30:12.360 but one of the things I'm most proud of is the fact that Alberta has the best farmers

00:30:17.560 and ranchers in the world and with that i can list a lot of things this government has moved

00:30:23.720 on the feeder association loan guarantee uh we have expanded the next generation uh loans with

00:30:31.080 an afsc to get the next generation into farming uh 67.5 million to graduate twice the amount of vets

00:30:38.520 at ucvm we brought diagnostic service unit back to this province of alberta we've maintained the

00:30:43.880 the lowest tax jurisdiction implemented an agri-processing investments tax credit that

00:30:48.980 has seen a record three billion dollars of investment here in the province this year

00:30:53.120 but the thing i'm most proud of is the fact that within my mandate the premier gave me full carte

00:30:59.580 blanche to push back against any jurisdiction that impedes our farmers and ranchers and i can tell

00:31:04.380 everybody here today that we will not allow ottawa to pass tariffs on evs steel and aluminum

00:31:12.920 that they knew was going to result in a backlash on canola punishing our farmers and ranchers here,

00:31:18.700 and even more so, I refuse to let a Liberal MP pass a law, C-293,

00:31:25.500 based on pandemic response that would give the federal government the authority

00:31:31.960 to regulate our livestock industry here in Alberta.

00:31:35.340 This is a government that will not stand for that.

00:31:42.920 You're going to see a lot more out of RJ because we know that the extreme environmentalists are

00:31:49.420 coming for agriculture next and we're not going to let them tax burping and farting cows like 0.99

00:31:53.940 they do in Denmark. I assure you we're going to fight back against that too. Thank you so much

00:31:57.760 for your work on that RJ. And finally we got our Minister of Affordability and Utilities Nathan

00:32:03.300 Newdorf. He has got a pretty busy portfolio but I can tell you we've already seen some major impact

00:32:08.720 in bringing electricity prices down since he took over the file. Tell us what you're up to Minister.

00:32:12.920 Thank you, Premier. I'll start with what I'm proud of the most is raising five kids in Alberta who will never, ever vote Liberal or NDP.

00:32:24.600 Got to contribute. So I appreciate that. We're working on a lot of things in our file.

00:32:29.260 We're restructuring the electricity market to make sure that we can accommodate all the new technology that's coming about in our province.

00:32:35.400 We are continuing to work on regulations to make sure that agriculture comes first and protect our farmland from resource development and renewables.

00:32:44.760 We're making sure that they fit in their place and their place doesn't destroy agricultural land into the future.

00:32:52.020 Thank you.

00:32:54.320 We're working on, like I said, transmission regulations to make sure we can bring costs down for every single Alberta, no matter where you live.

00:33:01.240 working on distribution policy so those who live in rural and northern alberta don't have to pay

00:33:06.040 five times as much for distribution than everybody else we continue to work on policies for data

00:33:11.320 centers i feel a little bit like minister guthrie towards minister nicolaitis i feel that way with

00:33:15.400 gluba she gets out there and looks good on camera and i got to do all the work to make sure this

00:33:19.800 these things fit in our system uh he's doing a great job which means i got to do a more work

00:33:25.080 as quickly as possible but i appreciate him representing our province we're working on

00:33:30.600 hydrogen policy and something that albertans have been waiting for a very long time

00:33:34.920 very excited for the mandate that you increased for me premier is working on nuclear policy

00:33:40.680 very excited about the future of that for the province of alberta once again a member passed

00:33:44.920 policy giving us direction to explore our nuclear so thank you for the work you're doing that

00:33:48.920 minister rick mckiver had to put on a retirement party for a very dear friend of his that he had

00:33:53.640 promised months ago so i will be taking the municipal questions tonight and why don't we

00:33:58.280 turn it out now over to you uh hopefully we'll be able to i see those very long lineups over there

00:34:03.080 so keep your questions short we'll try to keep our answers short let's see how many we can get

00:34:06.840 through let's start over here premier and caucus ministers you probably all know me that uh i'm

00:34:16.520 the person to complain about something but i tell you what you guys are doing something

00:34:21.160 this government is the voice of reason it's being led by the breast best premier this country has 0.97

00:34:28.520 ever seen i have never i have never seen government move at this pace and i want to acknowledge the

00:34:36.680 work we are doing is making a difference and we see it and we feel it as albertans now this

00:34:44.000 government is filing is firing on all cylinders and the rest of canada is watching the course of

00:34:50.040 democracy is watching us very carefully here in canada now we've seen other jurisdictions experience

00:34:58.600 unfortunately our good friends blaine higgs lost his position out east there was a near miss

00:35:05.000 in saskatchewan last week and eb had a narrow narrow win in bc he's tied to this perfect

00:35:12.200 chinese stuff too oddly enough but uh what i want to ask and honestly dan williams i do get

00:35:19.400 a stench of ndp a little bit in here but i think it's coming from outside um so what i'm asking

00:35:26.040 premier and i'd also hear from one of the ministers is as a province what are we doing

00:35:32.920 to make sure we never see that happen here we endured one ndp government here that's enough

00:35:38.920 and if we haven't learned our lesson from that you guys better look outside this province and

00:35:43.480 see what we're enduring we cannot afford an ndp government and i want to thank you for the hard

00:35:48.360 work how are we going to ensure we never see that thank you very much for all the hard work you do

00:35:53.320 well john williams thank you so much for that one of the things that i think you touched on and

00:35:57.160 maybe one of my ministers will want to talk about what we can do to to be able to ward off the ndp 1.00

00:36:01.560 but you mentioned something really important about the issue of chinese interference in elections

00:36:08.360 which we know is happening and what we're working on is the ability for us to have more integrity

00:36:13.800 in our elections, more trust in our elections. It's part of the reason why we've ended tabulators

00:36:19.300 for municipal elections, member pass policy. And we're working on doing the same when our

00:36:26.680 elections legislation comes forward next year for provincial governments. But maybe I could

00:36:32.020 talk to Minister Nally about what he's doing to improve ID so that we can make sure that we have

00:36:40.680 robust ID when people go to vote in elections. Thank you. Thank you, Premier. One of the things

00:36:46.760 that we're looking at is how we can put citizenship on the driver's license so that

00:36:51.660 when people come to vote, we're going to make sure that they're a Canadian citizen and that

00:36:54.800 they're allowed to vote. Minister Nixon wants to weigh in. Well, and on the question of how we

00:37:02.680 make sure the NDP don't happen again, I can tell you I'm one of the few, there's a handful of us

00:37:06.200 We're here in 2015 and saw what took place in our province, and it breaks your heart, and it can never, ever happen again.

00:37:13.720 And the number one way we can make sure that doesn't happen is we stick with our name, we stay united,

00:37:18.680 we focus on what we have in common, and we make sure we keep defeating the NDP.

00:37:23.180 And most importantly, tomorrow, we go in the box and we vote for the greatest premier in the province,

00:37:28.700 and we make sure we stay united and we move forward.

00:37:33.740 All right.

00:37:34.500 let's go on to thank you for that minister nixon let's go on to our next question

00:37:38.260 say your name so that we know uh where you are and where you're from

00:37:44.420 we commend the government for the excellent work you've done in welcoming the ukrainian refugees

00:37:49.060 from russia's federal war however we are greatly disturbed by the comments the president of the

00:37:55.140 calgary law he ca majored the association's town hall meeting on july 30th when he stated that

00:38:01.780 ukrainian refugees came in with zero screen and now are running around with swastikas 1.00

00:38:07.860 both statements are totally false people and come right out of love and exclusive

00:38:14.660 do you believe that russian propaganda has no place in the utp well look i would urge you to

00:38:20.740 talk to that president here i'm i'm sure he'd tell you what it is he observed and what his

00:38:25.140 perspective was but we know that we have had 65 000 ukrainians who have arrived in alberta

00:38:31.780 the vast vast vast majority of them are working full-time have set up their own businesses i

00:38:36.580 think we only have about 1700 that require some kind of supports they've come here with money

00:38:42.020 they've come here with skills they've come here with a true passion to build our society and i

00:38:46.580 think we embrace them with all of our hearts our communities have done an amazing job welcoming them

00:38:50.980 Let's go to our next question here.

00:38:57.980 I'm very glad to hear the government talking about the free speech.

00:39:04.980 That's quite important.

00:39:06.980 However, on September 25th, Mike Ellis came out and sent out a tweet and a press conference

00:39:16.780 that he was supporting the city of Edmonton's new hate crime snitch line.

00:39:25.800 Well, there's no such thing as a hate crime.

00:39:28.880 It's either a crime or it isn't.

00:39:31.280 We do not want government policing our thoughts.

00:39:34.020 the updated bill of rights will affirm our rights to freedom of speech yet the government

00:39:39.200 is trying to strip those rights i'm asking that uh the government clarify that because

00:39:46.220 to me that's absolutely unacceptable thanks shane i'll get uh minister ellis to comment on that

00:39:52.980 sure this was just an initiative by crime stoppers um we put no government money into that they asked

00:39:59.720 me to show up um you know i think we can all agree nobody supports hate in this province

00:40:04.720 and um yeah i mean really we don't support hate but it's it wasn't a government initiative coming

00:40:11.100 from me it was crime stoppers and they're just trying to make awareness that awareness that no

00:40:15.580 no hate is accepted if i may one of the things that we are seeing is that there's vandalism

00:40:20.980 of places of worship whether it's churches being burnt down or whether it's synagogues being

00:40:26.700 defaced or whether it's mosques or temples being destroyed there are people who are being targeted

00:40:31.340 because they wear religious apparel and they get attacked so if there is vandalism that's a crime

00:40:37.500 if there's assault that's a crime and those are the kind of things that that we want to make sure

00:40:41.740 that we're that we're stopping this is a wonderful accepting place and we want to make sure that

00:40:45.660 everyone who comes to alberta become puts out alberta first leaves the hatreds of their home

00:40:51.660 countries behind and uh embraces everything that this community has to offer for them so thanks

00:40:56.700 for your question shane next question over here thank you very much my name is sarah bakes i'm

00:41:04.140 a family physician from calgary i'm also currently the president of the section of family medicine

00:41:09.820 for the alberta medical association and i thought as you came to our assembly a few months back the

00:41:16.460 very least i could do was come to york um i want to honor all the work that minister lagrange has

00:41:23.500 done by putting primary care center and understanding that good primary care for

00:41:29.820 albertans is good for alberta um i look forward to working with the nurse practitioners and with

00:41:37.260 the pharmacists but every day we're losing more family doctors to other provinces to other places

00:41:45.340 in the world and so i'm up here today to ask you please to announce the new compensation program

00:41:53.340 for family physicians so we don't continue to lose our doctors so that community family practices

00:42:01.340 can remain viable thank you for that minister lagrange over to you thank you dr bates and

00:42:06.620 and thank you wonderful to see you here um we have worked extremely hard and i recognize

00:42:14.700 the great work that our family doctors are doing in fact we have seen because of some of the changes

00:42:20.300 that have gone on with the college of physicians and surgeons that now not only AHS can sponsor an

00:42:27.100 international medical graduate we are able to get clinics and municipalities etc and that's

00:42:33.260 already having tangible effects we've had over 500 more doctors coming to the province

00:42:39.340 in just the last year alone when i first started as the minister we had about roughly about 10 600

00:42:45.900 doctors in the province we now have 12 000 registered more coming etc and we've done

00:42:51.900 tremendous work with the alberta medical association on the primary care physician

00:42:56.540 compensation model i know we want to roll that out as quickly as possible there's a few more pieces

00:43:02.700 to get uh right but we are committed to that we are committed to making sure that our doctors

00:43:09.100 have a friendly environment, a sustainable environment, the right compensation model

00:43:14.320 to make them successful in this province.

00:43:16.580 I look forward to more interactions with you, Dr. Bates, in the days to come.

00:43:20.900 Thanks, Doc.

00:43:21.460 What I would also say, we met with the AMA leadership a couple of days ago,

00:43:25.940 and we're working towards, as we'd said before, an implementation of April 1st.

00:43:29.860 That's our new budget year, and we'll hopefully be able to announce it in the coming months.

00:43:34.780 That's what we're going to do to get everybody prepared for it,

00:43:37.140 we're all working towards an april 1st announcement so thanks for your incredible work doc what back

00:43:41.700 over here please go ahead good evening premier smith and kevin um keep up the good work uh i'm

00:43:48.980 pastor coldwell from through school by stony plain i'm in shane jetson's writing and i just want to

00:43:55.220 say 100 support premier smith and i hope every common sense albertian uh conservative this

00:44:01.220 weekend supports premier smith so and just quick thanks and then i'll get to my point i also i

00:44:11.940 chair christian school board and i want to thank this government for giving us bus funding for

00:44:16.100 our students uh thank you god bless you our students no longer have to hitchhike to school

00:44:20.740 anymore thank you very much um so you know i i'm glad to see the legislation in the legislature

00:44:28.180 right now strengthening parental authorities in the schools i could tell you much about that

00:44:32.420 we have a growing waiting list but the real thing i want to talk about tonight is uh commercial

00:44:37.860 off-site levies every school board in the province almost everyone has a growing enrollment and we

00:44:44.580 have a waiting list i had two um a generous businessman donated school portables and we've

00:44:51.940 been waiting over uh eight months to get permits from parkland county they're charging us three

00:44:58.260 hundred and twenty two thousand dollars in commercial off-site levies we are a non-profit

00:45:03.700 registered charity church and christian school board i'm asking you to review the municipal

00:45:08.500 government act and exempted charities churches and independent schools from commercial off-site

00:45:13.700 levies please in jesus name thank you thanks for your comment on that that does sound like a rick

00:45:18.740 McIver question i don't know if anyone else has uh has a comment on it let me let me take that one

00:45:23.460 away to see if there's anything we could do minister Nicolaides do you have any thoughts

00:45:26.660 on what we might be able to do to address that no uh premier we'd have to connect in a little bit

00:45:30.820 more with municipal affairs uh perhaps uh we can connect in and chat more with municipal affairs

00:45:35.620 and see what we can do there for sure rick McIver will be here this weekend so let's see if we can

00:45:39.540 find some time to corner him uh in one of the rooms so we can chat with him about that all right

00:45:43.700 thank you for that another one over here Craig Chandler Calgary Southeast I was

00:45:49.400 hoping to ask the guy with this question but now I have to ask you Danielle so

00:45:52.640 I have to be nicer because I like you so but my whole I'm flustered now so two

00:46:00.680 questions why did Rick McIver not recuse himself in Chestermere when Marshall

00:46:05.840 Chalmers was his brother-in-law and secondly why when we followed the

00:46:12.620 municipal act and the threshold to get 4 000 signatures in cochrane to look at the community

00:46:18.300 and review them and we got the minister of municipal affairs he should resign

00:46:30.460 all right look i i know it's very complicated and upsetting when ministers have to intervene

00:46:37.580 in municipal affairs i think we got a report that was out in chestermere and it turns out like

00:46:43.420 both of the candidates uh ended up being unsuccessful and they they elected brand new

00:46:47.900 people for that council i don't know what is happening in cochrane one of the problems that

00:46:51.980 we're facing now is we're getting so close to the next municipal election that it may be that once

00:46:57.900 we get this close a recall effort is uh just going to result in having a double election and so some

00:47:05.260 of these things might have to be sorted out in the new in the municipal election happening next year

00:47:09.740 but uh why don't craig you and i can talk offline so i can find out what's going on in cochran i

00:47:13.580 didn't realize that there were these kinds of concerns there so i'll look into that for you

00:47:17.020 thanks for your question one more over here daryl prue from peace river uh i wanted to uh

00:47:24.460 thank minister horner we spoke earlier so he's gonna hear this again here but i thought this

00:47:29.100 was important for everybody to hear so we're talking about um a projected deficit for 2025

00:47:36.380 4.8 billion or something like that and we're using the excuse that it's forecasted lower oil prices

00:47:42.460 but what i want to know is where are the meaningful cuts to government spending so

00:47:46.860 that we don't go into a deficit because today's spending deficit is tomorrow's taxes and i've got

00:47:52.620 kids and i'm worried about that so i want to hear what you're going to do about that thanks for that

00:47:57.100 minister horner there's a i think there might be a misunderstanding about the numbers but i'll let

00:48:00.860 minister horner talk about that no the the media and the premier and myself we've we've let um

00:48:07.740 let let caucus know that we're watching the numbers closely as we start to build budget 2025

00:48:14.060 um you know oil oil has been all over the place as you've seen and it takes up about 19 to 20 billion

00:48:20.860 dollars uh on our revenue line the fiscal rules that are in place you know they allow us to deal

00:48:27.660 over the long term uh we're going to do everything we can not to run a deficit fiscal rule number one

00:48:34.460 is you run a balanced budget there are exceptions we still have the most volatile revenue line uh

00:48:41.340 of any of any province but but the what what that allows us to do is it allows us to stick to our

00:48:48.540 spending plan within the year as every minister on the stage will tell you we have a two billion

00:48:53.500 dollar voted contingency every new initiative they want to bring forward throughout the year we weigh

00:48:59.980 it against the cost that we can't avoid in our system health care education social services

00:49:06.700 right now when you're seeing population growth of 4.4 percent this has never been seen before

00:49:13.100 so we're trying to balance all of those things and keep to our core principle of running balanced

00:49:19.240 budgets it's so important that when you have a good year or a great year like we've seen some

00:49:25.560 in the past that you manage the surplus appropriately as well that's why we paid off

00:49:30.700 13.3 billion dollars in 22 23 we didn't jack up spending that's how you follow the roller coaster

00:49:38.320 So you're preaching to the choir, sir, we're with you.

00:49:42.940 Premier, myself, Minister Glubish, we brought every minister before us this summer

00:49:47.540 to go through their budgets to say, are these things still priorities?

00:49:52.060 Can this be done more efficiently?

00:49:54.200 Because that work has to be continuous.

00:49:57.700 But when you have $31 billion of a $73 billion budget, that's just in the public service.

00:50:05.020 25 billion for the public service at large another six and a half for physicians

00:50:10.700 and we're uh bargaining i don't know if you've heard but that we have six six tables open right

00:50:17.580 now so we're trying to weigh all of that with the actual landscape of how the province is changing

00:50:22.520 but we'll do everything we can to run balanced budgets every year you'll see more about that

00:50:27.480 in the february budget we are working really hard to accelerate the tax cut and so we've got a few

00:50:32.460 were a little bit more work that we need to do through treasury board but that's what we do in

00:50:36.140 the spring session we've got another one over here please go ahead sir hi there chris mullen calgary

00:50:41.420 foothills the education amendment act is good legislation that strengthens parental rights

00:50:46.860 over what our kids learn about gender identity sexual orientation and human sexuality

00:50:51.980 however bill 27 includes two exceptions for number one incidental or indirect

00:50:57.500 teachers use these exceptions to get around parental consent by moving the instruction

00:51:05.180 to social studies language arts or math and out of health and wellness and excluding

00:51:10.380 extracurricular activities allows teachers to find other avenues to discuss soji without

00:51:15.420 informing parents policy aids a joint resolution by calgary

00:51:27.500 thanks Chris let me let me put it over to Minister Nicolaides sure very quickly the

00:51:38.060 exception around incidental and indirect references is not new it's always been in

00:51:43.300 the Education Act far before my time I think the reason behind that is so that

00:51:50.020 you know if a student is reading Shakespeare or reading something else

00:51:54.020 and it talks about, I don't know, a sexual interaction between two people that you don't

00:51:58.820 have to get parental consent for that because it's an indirect reference. So that's nothing new that

00:52:03.660 we're bringing in that that's always been there. If that's a challenge, we'd be happy to explore

00:52:08.600 that. And on the other piece, the legislation is clear. Any third party presenter or any other

00:52:16.380 third party group or organization that wants to come into a school and present or discuss or talk

00:52:22.860 about gender identity, human sexuality or sexual orientation

00:52:27.200 must get approval from the Ministry of Education first.

00:52:32.400 We'll let you guys talk offline.

00:52:33.620 We're trying to close every loophole there, Chris.

00:52:36.180 We got a comment over here.

00:52:37.480 Please go ahead.

00:52:38.720 Thank you, Premier and Ministers.

00:52:52.860 I know it's an important issue for so many residents in Calgary and across the province.

00:53:22.160 when we look at the drug consumption sites that are operated.

00:53:25.540 As you know, Red Deer City Council did take up my request,

00:53:29.020 gave us feedback and advice,

00:53:30.920 and now we're moving ahead with an implementation that starts this fall

00:53:34.260 and finishes next spring to transition the drug consumption site in Red Deer

00:53:39.240 into recovery services instead,

00:53:41.820 ones that help and heal people get out of the tragedy of addiction

00:53:45.800 and become family members, brothers and mothers again.

00:53:49.260 And so that's on offer to Calgary,

00:53:50.760 And they chose, as you said, not to participate, to sort of bury their head in the stand instead of giving us feedback.

00:53:57.720 It's important the province asks for feedback on big decisions that have to do with city jurisdiction.

00:54:03.380 That includes public safety.

00:54:05.540 So I'm going to be taking my time to look at their options here.

00:54:09.440 We're going to continue working on Red Deer and we're going to evaluate what we need to do to go forward.

00:54:14.240 And let me just say I put an offer out to all of our friends from those Calgary area ridings that are impacted.

00:54:20.200 I told Dan Williams that I'd be happy to do a town hall so that we could hear directly from you

00:54:24.580 about the impact that the Sheldon Schumer Centre is having.

00:54:27.700 And that would give us the best feedback that we have about whether that site should be closed.

00:54:31.680 So just know that that's going to be something that we're working on.

00:54:34.240 And if you want to go through your riding president to be able to assist us in putting an event together,

00:54:39.160 we're more than happy to get that feedback from you.

00:54:40.940 And you can tell us in the various hospitality suites this evening as well.

00:54:45.200 Anything that you hear on stage that you want to talk more about us,

00:54:48.020 part of the reason we're introducing all the ministers to you tonight so that you know who to

00:54:51.700 who to wrangle in a corner when you when you see them in the hospitality suites but i i think you

00:54:55.700 can tell from our government we believe recovery comes first we just don't give up on people and

00:55:00.340 we want to get people back to being healthy and i think the recovery model is going to do that

00:55:04.420 we've got one over here hi there uh my name is hannah thank you very much for taking my question

00:55:12.340 i serve as the vp outreach uh for calgary varsity um while this isn't the topic of my question i

00:55:19.940 want to thank you for your work on charter schools um i think they're so important to the facet of

00:55:26.500 society in alberta um so thank you so much for that uh my question is applicable to the ministries

00:55:33.780 of transportation municipal affairs and finance so feel free to answer whoever um it has to do

00:55:40.900 with municipal government's overreach in the realm of small business,

00:55:45.880 particularly in the realm of transportation.

00:55:48.980 So as mentioned in a previous session,

00:56:10.900 well let me let me go to Devin first and then I think Brian wants to weigh in Devin go ahead

00:56:32.860 and I think the finance minister might want to fix insurance rates next but no when it comes to

00:56:38.200 To transportation, we have moved the needle a lot when it comes to class one licensing.

00:56:43.440 The melt requirements that really were very burdensome to try to get new drivers on the roads.

00:56:49.760 We've made some changes to make sure that safety is obviously paramount and foremost.

00:56:55.900 And so we have made some changes, but happy to continue to engage with the transportation industry to make sure that we can make additional changes when it comes to licensing, just to get more people engaged.

00:57:05.160 I've actually been working closely with Minister Sawney, trying to get trucking as a registered trade,

00:57:11.740 something as a Red Seal certificate, something that if you can have a chef or a hairdresser,

00:57:15.500 why not have a trucker as that type of profession going forward? 0.57

00:57:19.280 And we're leading that across the country.

00:57:20.580 Thanks for that, Devin. We've got Gene, and then I think Horner wants to weigh in. Gene.

00:57:24.020 I would just say that it's clear that we hear this from a lot of people, a lot of folks across the province.

00:57:30.620 It's not just where you are, it's right across the province that the municipal governments are.

00:57:34.060 in some cases, causing a lot of red tape and a lot of barriers to small businesses.

00:57:39.460 I, myself, am a business owner, as many of us are here,

00:57:42.060 and I've seen that creep towards us quite a bit over the last decade or two,

00:57:47.580 and I would say that we have had that discussion, various MLAs and cabinet ministers,

00:57:53.300 about what we can do and how we can work with our municipalities to make things better

00:57:56.900 and to streamline them, and frankly, I'm surprised Dale Nally's not in here talking about cutting red tape

00:58:01.680 because he cuts everything he possibly can.

00:58:03.940 Dale, what do you say about that?

00:58:06.060 I like it.

00:58:06.720 Okay.

00:58:07.420 We got Horner who will take the insurance piece as well

00:58:10.180 because I think there's probably a few insurance questions in that line.

00:58:13.000 Go ahead.

00:58:13.900 Sure.

00:58:14.240 No, when Premier Smith won the leadership and came in,

00:58:18.580 I know auto insurance reform was something that was near and dear to her.

00:58:22.440 She'd seen what was happening in Alberta and heard the stories.

00:58:26.960 It's a very challenging file, but we regulate it.

00:58:30.080 We force you folks to have insurance, so we're committed to making it more affordable to Albertans.

00:58:36.660 We've been at this for over a year.

00:58:39.080 We've held an insurance summit at the legislature with every aspect of industry,

00:58:45.460 from the companies themselves to the brokers to the medical community to the legal community,

00:58:50.740 to get their insight into how they think we could make it better.

00:58:55.520 We've commissioned two studies looking at alternative models that are used in other jurisdictions.

00:59:01.040 We've overlaid them with our data in Alberta to see what we think would work the best here.

00:59:06.720 And we're very close to coming up with something that we can communicate to the public.

00:59:11.760 But I would say that there's no magic in insurance.

00:59:16.380 It's the aggregated pools of premiums paid, and then it's the claims paid out.

00:59:22.540 And I've seen insurance companies leave in the last few months, many more on the verge.

00:59:28.240 So we have some tough decisions to make.

00:59:30.420 But we're committed to approaching it from the lens of how do we make this more affordable for Albertans.

00:59:35.880 Thanks for that, Horner.

00:59:37.160 We've got another question over here.

00:59:38.420 I must tell you, I think we're only scheduled to go to 530.

00:59:41.080 I'll get some guidance on whether or not we can go a little bit over time.

00:59:45.120 But why don't I just know that because I see the line keep on growing.

00:59:48.460 And I don't want to disappoint everybody because I don't think we'll be able to get to all of them.

00:59:51.660 But let's see how many more we can get to.

00:59:53.380 Please, go ahead, ma'am. 0.90

00:59:54.640 Thank you, Premier Smith and all ministers for your hard work.

00:59:58.320 So much.

01:00:21.660 but i'd like to go to part one of my question first okay let me answer part two of your question

01:00:48.620 first because i i must tell you i sometimes get people tell me that and i can i can tell you that

01:00:53.820 after releasing our policies yesterday we i've received 11 000 emails into my email inbox alone

01:01:01.500 so i would just say this is the reason why you come to these events it's the reason why

01:01:05.900 we make ourselves available here and we're going to be available all weekend so come and find the

01:01:11.580 minister he's hard he's hard to miss because he's uh the second tallest guy in caucus and make sure

01:01:17.260 that you have a chance to chat with him about your individual issue i know those seniors community and

01:01:20.940 social services files are very very complex so he uh he troubleshoots a an awful lot of issues but

01:01:26.860 use this opportunity here to be able to talk to him about that and rj sigurdsson has just done

01:01:31.820 an amazing job of fighting against that exact bill that you're talking about i'll turn it over

01:01:35.340 to him to tell you a little bit more about what we're doing on it well definitely when i look at

01:01:40.860 at some like c293 it's it's deeply deeply concerning to our entire agricultural industry

01:01:47.420 uh the fact that a and and actually it just proves the ignorance of individuals within the

01:01:53.480 liberal caucus period so i'll say this flat out they have a lack of understanding of what's

01:01:58.020 happening in our agricultural industry we do it in the mo the at the highest quality standards

01:02:03.880 the most sustainable manner with the highest animal health and welfare standards full stop

01:02:09.280 it's true they don't know what's going on when it comes to pushing back against c293 it's tough 0.99

01:02:15.420 we are not the federal government we have to work within that i have met with minister

01:02:23.000 mcculley already i would encourage everybody to write their senators and make sure that they're

01:02:28.300 aware of how we are not going to stand up for this and i'm going to continue to monitor this

01:02:34.080 as it moves forward and i think there is a point in where we're going to have to sit down and have

01:02:38.780 a conversation that if this does get to a point where it passes, I think we have to consider

01:02:45.700 engaging the Sovereignty Act to protect our agricultural industry here in the province.

01:02:51.880 I can't think of any better reason on why the Premier put that in place here in Alberta,

01:02:58.700 and that's why we did exactly that.

01:03:01.500 It's much bigger than agriculture.

01:03:04.240 Could I add to that too? Because I absolutely agree with you. I think it is much bigger.

01:03:08.780 I look at some of the language. It's problematic. It could delve into public health. We saw what happened through the pandemic. It could be even worse the next go around if there was a next go around. So I really am concerned about it as well. It's the reason that I stood up with Minister Secretson and our Premier to fight this. This is overreached by the federal government.

01:03:29.460 I would tell you, I would just say that health is an area of exclusive provincial jurisdiction

01:03:35.380 and agriculture under Section 95 is concurrent jurisdiction.

01:03:39.460 So we've got a lot of power there.

01:03:41.460 This is part of the reason why we did pass the Sovereignty Act.

01:03:44.400 If you look at some of the American jurisdictions in the U.S., whether it was Florida or South Dakota or Texas,

01:03:49.880 they basically just said, no, we're not doing what the rest of the country is doing.

01:03:53.620 And I think Alberta can do the same.

01:03:55.720 So do know we're prepared to do that.

01:03:59.460 You're next

01:04:04.020 I'm also one of the many concerned conference premier

01:04:07.240 What are you doing to deal with the many complaints that are happening across this province for?

01:04:11.860 Municipalities are weaponizing the code of conduct against certain members of their council

01:04:16.220 These municipalities are wasting thousands of taxpayer dollars by continually trying to punish some of us for asking questions

01:04:23.360 Or refusing to disclose what they spend on investigation after investigation

01:04:28.220 I have spoken to the municipal affairs department many times and I'm continually told that what is happening isn't right, but they can't help.

01:04:36.880 If not municipal affairs, who are we supposed to go and ask for help?

01:04:41.120 Thank you for the question.

01:04:43.620 Maybe this is why Rick wasn't here tonight.

01:04:46.120 Boy, look, I'm seeing that as well.

01:04:50.200 And we're very concerned about it because I have to tell you what happens in the provincial legislature.

01:04:55.760 There's a little rough and tumble.

01:04:57.120 somebody gets offended Joseph Scow stands up to defend us and the speaker rules right then and

01:05:02.740 there and there's an apology and it's done and we move on with it that is how it's supposed to work

01:05:06.860 and the municipalities you're absolutely right are weaponizing their code of conduct we had asked

01:05:11.420 them before whether they wanted us to regulate in that area and they said oh no but seeing the

01:05:16.920 disasters that were that are unfolding at a lot of councils I've gone back to Rick and said maybe

01:05:20.780 we need to take that file away from the municipalities create some kind of independent

01:05:26.380 an office out of our own ethics commission. Maybe it's an ethics commissioner responsible

01:05:31.620 for municipalities so that you have a third party that can look at genuine instances of

01:05:36.580 malfeasance. But that is very much on our radar, something that we need to fix because we've been

01:05:42.620 watching it happen at school boards. We've been watching it happen at municipal councils. And

01:05:47.100 that's not an appropriate use of those codes of conduct. So thanks for raising it with us. I

01:05:52.000 appreciate it got another one over here nowadays more people are having less kids here in Alberta

01:06:05.560 our total fertility rates is 1.45 well below replacement level and that's even with the

01:06:13.280 Mormons Indiana Baptist out breathing everyone and I'm just kind of wondering I know that you 0.83

01:06:20.220 have a lot on your plate but do you have any plans in store to address this

01:06:26.220 because there's only so much immigrants that we can take to sustain our 1.00

01:06:30.420 population and if we're going to truly grow and build ourselves as a culture we

01:06:36.060 do need to be able to raise our families and bring about that

01:06:41.700 generational impact you just reminded me that jobs economy minister Matt

01:06:48.120 jones is actually on a trade mission right now but he also is responsible for the daycare file

01:06:52.680 and one of the things that i i think we we should have done and maybe we should consider doing

01:06:57.400 is uh and this was something that travis taves actually campaigned on in the leadership is

01:07:01.560 having some additional tax credit for children so that you have some incentive for those families

01:07:08.520 who choose to have a family member stay at home rather than just having the support on a daycare

01:07:12.440 option. So we have to figure out what that would look like. But I think that's one of the things

01:07:19.640 that is a hardship for families is how do they have those extra dollars to be able to support

01:07:24.600 having more kids. Did you want to comment on that at all? No, I've got three kids and I'm done.

01:07:31.860 Premier, could I comment? I have seven. And so I think I've done my part. But I can tell you in

01:07:37.620 health care that is we actually are seeing more births we have over 90 000 births last year alone

01:07:43.480 we are one of the youngest provinces lots of young families having children because they see

01:07:48.740 alberta as a as a beacon of prosperity and a place where they can raise their children

01:07:54.100 and really the values that we all stand for so we're seeing great things happening there too

01:07:59.840 but look if anyone here has some good policy around that just make a note of that and put

01:08:03.860 it through the policy process next year and we can debate some of your ideas so thanks for raising

01:08:07.540 We have another one over here.

01:08:09.540 On policy, due a budget, the true cost of living per single adult in Saskatchewan, calculated in Saskatchewan and Alberta, is $75,000 per adult and $36,000 per child, including daycare.

01:08:27.540 So we don't tax a business before it's profitable.

01:08:31.540 Why are we taxing our citizens before they're profitable? 0.56

01:08:35.540 It makes zero sense to be taxing our citizens before they can achieve the true cost of living

01:08:41.780 so they can afford true health care so they don't end up in the medical care system.

01:08:49.100 I'll put that over to the Finance Minister.

01:08:52.340 Take your point, sir.

01:08:53.580 We have the highest basic personal exemption in the country, and it's growing.

01:08:56.940 That is expanding over every other province.

01:09:00.680 I'd say the standard of living concerns are real, and they're across this country and across the globe.

01:09:07.840 I think the best thing that we can do is manage our finances appropriately.

01:09:10.940 We have a strong balance sheet as a province, maybe stronger than many Albertans,

01:09:16.180 and that's something that is a consideration for us as we look at policy when it comes to taxes.

01:09:21.560 I know there's a tax cut that is promised that we're committed to, that we're going to deliver on,

01:09:26.760 but just for everyone's awareness once again we have a 20 billion dollar tax advantage over the

01:09:33.300 next closest province it completely aligns with non-renewable resource revenues in this province

01:09:39.280 so we have to manage that appropriately for today and into the future and that's what we're going to

01:09:44.700 do and we've got our affordability minister who wants to weigh in yeah thank you i just want to

01:09:48.840 add a little bit from the ministry of affordability where i get a lot of people's bills in the mail

01:09:52.800 i can't pay them nor can the government but we do feel your pain and it is appropriate to point out

01:09:59.220 that the carbon tax the federal carbon tax that's applied to canadians and albertans all across the

01:10:04.640 province layer the tax burden upon layer upon layer upon layer our hospitals pay carbon tax

01:10:11.280 our schools pay carbon tax our seniors supportive centers pay carbon tax your grocery stores pay

01:10:17.040 carbon tax multiple times your farmers pay carbon tax and that is what's really driving

01:10:22.200 inflation that is probably the largest most important fight our government is taking to

01:10:27.400 ottawa because it is destroying the the prosperity of alberta and every canadian that is proud to be 0.99

01:10:33.160 called canadian thanks for that minister we got another one over here um it's a previous gentleman

01:10:44.520 uh sorry but i told my youngest son he's not allowed to have kids

01:10:47.800 sorry uh he's got enough nieces and nephews anyways what i'm here to talk about or ask about

01:10:54.940 is the immigration okay um there's i live in a small 500 person community and we don't have

01:11:03.440 extra housing for anybody trying to find a place to live in there is ridiculous to rent and my son

01:11:11.140 is trying to come out but there's no jobs like we have one grocery store we have one uh pharmacy

01:11:20.020 there's not a whole lot of jobs but what i do see coming in is filipinos immigrants coming in and

01:11:27.940 one of them is my neighbor absolutely wonderful people i love them to death um there was a

01:11:34.020 franchise business in drayton valley that was bought out by some immigrants uh ladies who had 1.00

01:11:40.260 lived who had worked there at that business for 15 years were let go and immigrants were hired

01:11:47.220 now i was told now i don't have any proof of this i didn't look at it but that there's uh

01:11:53.380 they're given 70 percent of their wages if they were to hire an immigrant so that leaves our 0.97

01:12:02.180 like my daughter she doesn't have any skills she can do service work okay she can't find a job so 1.00

01:12:08.740 on teenagers. They can't find a job. I wash dishes. I'm wakers. There are mothers out there 1.00

01:12:17.780 who need to get a job. They can't find a job. So is there anything you can do about that?

01:12:25.860 Look, I mean, one of the things that we've been trying to do is to take, thank you for your

01:12:30.980 question. One of the things we've been trying to do is get a more normal level of immigration from

01:12:37.460 all of the streams going back to the kind of program that we had under stephen harper um

01:12:42.100 under stephen harper's days it was about 400 to 500 000 a year that would come in uh last year

01:12:48.100 the federal government brought in almost two million people and we are generous absolutely

01:12:52.900 we are willing to open our doors and uh to anyone who wants to share our quality of life and

01:12:58.020 contribute to our economy but we are seeing in alberta and across the country that we we simply

01:13:04.180 cannot absorb the volume of people that are coming it's increasing our housing prices our 0.80

01:13:10.020 rent prices we've got people living in campgrounds and going to shelters when they arrive because

01:13:14.500 there isn't a place for them to go we're seeing our employment rates as you described it's over

01:13:19.780 seven percent and it's among our young people it's more than 14 so we've told the the federal

01:13:24.820 government that we want to have a program where we use our ability to have provincial nominees

01:13:31.060 as a pathway to permanent immigration they keep on telling us no and yet they they continue to

01:13:35.940 have an open border policy so minister yasin has been at the sort of the forefront of uh of trying

01:13:41.940 to to argue with the federal government to have a to have some restraint they're starting on that

01:13:46.820 on temporary foreign workers they're starting on it on international students but they have to get

01:13:51.460 a handle on the number of asylum seekers coming through the airports it used to be about four or

01:13:56.500 five thousand a year this year they're on track to have 61 000 people come through the airports

01:14:02.420 as a result because they've removed visa requirements and they removed the requirements

01:14:07.540 to have a return air flight when you go when you board a plane there's very simple things that they

01:14:12.580 can do so we are advocating for that let me turn it over maybe to minister nixon to talk a bit about

01:14:18.420 what we're doing uh to try to get uh more because we're actually doing a pretty good job in our

01:14:23.540 housing sector in being able to to keep up with a lot of this growth and i think that's one of the

01:14:28.340 success stories that we're seeing yeah we are seeing a lot of success when it comes particularly

01:14:33.940 to our big cities and the what the premier and i call the donut cities around edmonton and calgary

01:14:38.900 we've been able to double the capacity of construction residential construction but

01:14:42.900 with the biggest challenge we're not seeing is rural alberta still and this remains a real

01:14:47.620 serious conversation that we're having with the with the federal government the premier and i we

01:14:51.860 We just had to deal with some funding with the feds around encampment money.

01:14:55.760 And I've been in an argument with the federal housing minister for a little bit to make clear that they just want to put the money in Calgary and Edmonton.

01:15:02.280 Our message has been loud and clear that they have to keep care of all of our communities.

01:15:07.000 And the premier passed a piece of legislation, my favorite bill that I've ever seen passed from the Alberta legislature in her capacity as the minister of intergovernment affairs.

01:15:14.460 It's Bill 18, which we modeled off Quebec, which stopped the federal government from being able to come into our province

01:15:22.700 and cherry-pick different municipalities, give them money on things like housing, and forget about the rest of the province.

01:15:29.160 We forced them to come back to us. 0.66

01:15:32.620 And so that legislation is passed through the House, through the Alberta legislature.

01:15:38.440 The regulations, I think, take effect, Premier, January 1st.

01:15:41.460 And that's going to give us a lot more opportunity to stop the games of the federal government sending money just to mayors who may or may not have certain cabinet ministers' phone numbers,

01:15:52.100 and instead making sure that we're fairly distributing money, like housing money, all across the province, including in Drayton Valley.

01:15:57.580 So we'll make sure that we continue that fight.

01:16:00.280 All right. Thank you for that. We'll take another question over here, sir.

01:16:05.760 I want to see you all re-elected.

01:16:11.460 We are a conservative party so why in God's name are we considering no-fault insurance

01:16:31.220 brought by the BC NDP when our brothers and sisters in British Columbia ran on the platform

01:16:37.220 of getting rid of no fault insurance and came within a whisper of dethroning the mvp

01:16:45.060 why are we even considering this when the delegates in this room two years ago voted overwhelmingly

01:16:55.140 at the grassroots level no no to no fault you're taking rights away from albertans that is not

01:17:03.460 that is unconservative that is not what albertans want it's unnecessary please for your sake let's

01:17:10.660 not lose thousands of jobs tens of millions in tax revenue does anybody in this room trust insurance

01:17:18.900 companies thank you we are asked to trust insurance companies who in their own words say

01:17:26.260 with these changes we may save albertans as much as works out to about 20 bucks a month

01:17:32.900 and they've done this at five different election cycles they make promises they reduce rates

01:17:38.740 slowly only to raise them so minister horner i like you i love you i love the premier i love

01:17:45.620 all of you i want to see you re-elected please don't commit political suicide and make this your

01:17:50.820 legacy and have this for a a quick press conference where you're saving albertans 20 a month only for

01:17:58.180 them to raise the rates and that's going to be your legacy protect yourself let's do something

01:18:02.580 conservative not ndp well so so in you may have i mean in conservative saskatchewan they also have

01:18:12.660 a no-fault system and one of the things i would tell you is that when i go to lloyd minster and

01:18:18.100 i talk to the residents there i talk to one yeah there's a few of you here i talked to one in

01:18:22.580 particular and he told me loves everything about living on the alberta side but he gets his

01:18:27.940 insurance in saskatchewan because he pays three thousand dollars a month on this side in this

01:18:32.820 trucking company and only about twelve hundred dollars a month in saskatchewan there's something

01:18:37.860 really broken about our system when you've got uh side by side residents living on one side of the 0.97

01:18:43.780 border versus another and there's that kind of dramatic difference so let me turn it over to

01:18:47.940 horner so he can tell you a bit about the problems that we're facing there well as i said previously

01:18:53.300 you know we were tasked with looking at absolutely everything so these models exist you mentioned bc

01:18:59.180 but also saskatchewan manitoba and quebec we see the we see what albertans are paying for their

01:19:05.200 insurance we compare that to everyone else we're looking at those models i can tell you right now

01:19:10.400 after multiple years of of caps and our attempt to bring affordability to the system in the short

01:19:16.880 term the pressure in the system is real again i can tell you that you know companies have left

01:19:22.640 and more will even with changes more will every time that happens your company leaves you're

01:19:28.580 forced to find another one and you're not protected by the good driver rate cap so we're looking at

01:19:33.580 everything i would i would share with this room when we went uh and and had our insurance you

01:19:39.080 know summit the basic principles the basic principles that we applied to this problem

01:19:45.340 were affordability, stability, simplicity, care-focused, accountability,

01:19:53.340 and we added a sixth principle, and that was availability.

01:19:57.420 Because if we don't have a delivery mechanism,

01:20:00.640 then at some point a government's going to come to me and say,

01:20:04.960 okay, now you're going to have to build it like Saskatchewan.

01:20:07.420 And I know that Crown Corp, through the data we have,

01:20:11.100 would cost us about $3 billion to build and capitalize.

01:20:15.340 So I take your point, sir, but I would also say I've heard a lot about getting reelected and political suicide.

01:20:21.240 The number one thing we can do is good governance, and sometimes it's tough.

01:20:26.700 Look, I know we're now going to have a lot of conversations in our hospitality suites about insurance and everything else that you heard here today.

01:20:34.280 Thank you so much for the robust conversation.

01:20:36.360 Next year, we might have to do this Bear Pit session an hour longer, judging by the lineups.

01:20:41.340 But look, we're going to be around here all weekend.

01:20:43.220 I'm looking forward to seeing as many of you as I can in the hospitality suites

01:20:47.660 I know there's a ton more programming to get to this evening, but thank you so much for your engagement

01:20:52.460 We really really value the debate here. It guides the work that we do

01:20:56.580 So I have a robust debate and make sure that you come and talk to us in the hospitality suites. Thanks everybody

01:21:13.220 You

Western Standard - November 02, 2024

UCP AGM： Bearpit Session with Premier Smith and Cabinet

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