The former Alberta Health Services Board, fired yesterday by Health Minister Fred Horne, as seen by the 99 top executives of the provincial health care agency. Actual AHS board members may not appear exactly as portrayed by the health minister. Below: Former AHS CEO Stephen Duckett, former AHS board chair
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Alberta Diary: AHS Chair Stephen Lockwood to Health Minister Horne on executive bonuses: ‘Drop dead, Fred!’
Alberta Health Minister Fred Horne: it’s hard to imagine how he can come out of this fight with Alberta Health Services Chair Stephen Lockwood not looking foolish or weak. Below: Mr. Lockwood in a screen grab from his first news conference as AHS chair. Whatever happens next, it seems certain
Continue readingdaveberta.ca - Alberta politics: The confusing reinvention of Alberta’s Natural Governing Party.
TweetSuccess comes with challenges, and for Alberta’s Progressive Conservatives, forty-two years of electoral success has come with its own unique set of challenges. One of the PC Party’s biggest successes has been its ability to reinvent itself over its more than four decades in power. It is sometimes difficult to
Continue readingAlberta Diary: All lawbreakers will be punished … unless they happen to be Alberta Conservatives
“’Ave you got a leesence for your minkey?” An investigator for Elections Alberta pauses momentarily in his probe of political donations made to the Progressive Conservative Party by seeing-eye monkeys. If you don’t get it, I can’t help you. Actual Elections Alberta investigators by now have likely been transferred back
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Mysterious 2011 review of Alberta Labour Code explained – corporate influence, of course!
Alberta Federation of Labour President Gil McGowan, right, speaks to yesterday’s AFL news conference at the Edmonton’s Shaw Conference Centre. Your faithful blogger can be glimpsed at the far right. Beside him, the CBC’s Charles Rusnell. Below: Rusnell, Alberta NDP Leader Brian Mason. Back in the summer of 2011, as
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Redford Government just can’t seem to stop fumbling health care expenses frenzy
Alberta Health Minister Fred Horne, right, helps Premier Alison Redford get ready to face Opposition questions about Alberta Health Services expense accounts. Alberta politicians may not appear exactly as illustrated. Below: Health executives Michele Lahey, Sheila Weatherill, Alison Tonge. The clueless ineptitude of the Redford Government dealing with Alberta’s continuing
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Blame Ralph Klein for Redford Government’s messy regional planning crisis
Representatives of Edmonton region municipalities discuss regional planning issues at a recent meeting. Actual municipal reps may not appear exactly as illustrated. Below: Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths; Ralph Klein with Steve West. The foundations of the regional planning crisis that prompted a frustrated Alberta Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths
Continue readingdaveberta.ca - Alberta politics: Funding Edmonton’s Downtown Arena, the strange comedy of errors continues.
TweetThe strange comedy of errors that has become Edmonton’s Downtown Arena project continued this week as City Council scrambled to fill a $100 million gap in a funding plan they approved months ago. Despite repeated claims by Mayor Stephen Mandel that provincial government money would fill the $100 million gap, anyone
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Education minister’s bluff called by apoplectic schoolteachers! Now what?
The trading pit: Is this what Alberta Education Minister Jeff Johnson sees when he thinks of the Alberta Teachers Association? Actual Alberta schoolteachers may not be exactly as illustrated. Then again, these days … Below: Mr. Johnson and ATA President Carol Henderson. OK, Alberta Education Minister Jeff Johnson’s bizarre attempt
Continue readingAlberta Diary: One single Alberta government bargaining agency is likely to end badly for Redford PCs
Premier Alison Redford, in lab coat, centre, and her Progressive Conservative cabinet get ready to bring Consolidated Bargaining to life. Actual Alberta politicians may not be exactly as illustrated. Below: Albert Einstein, the well-known genius, and Charles Darwin, who gave us the idea for the Political Darwin Awards. Chances are
Continue readingAlberta Diary: ‘Freddy Lee’ Morton, the journalistic sequel: We’ve already seen this horror movie, thanks!
Freddy Lee Morton, in happier times, with your blogger. Below: Firewaller Tom Flanagan; the entire separatist 2001 Firewall team (grabbed from the National Post). Freddy Lee “Ted” Morton, the worst premier Alberta never had, was back in the pages of the Calgary Herald the other day, bloviating at length about
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Welcome to Wildrose Alberta! What do you mean they didn’t win?
OK, the National Post got a little overheated with this election-day photo of Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith. But, really, what’s the difference? Below: Premier Ernest Manning and Premier Alison Redford, bookends in Alberta’s endless conservative governing dynasty. In April 2012, spooked by the dangers posed by a far-right Wildrose government,
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Edmonton’s homeless shelters home to body lice, ‘refugee-camp-like conditions’
Alberta’s perpetually mismanaged boom-and-bust economy makes homelessness worse, as hopeful immigrants flock here in hopes of a better life, and find nowhere to live. At least this guy has warm boots. Below: Dr. Stan Houston and Dr. Mat Rose. Welcome to Alberta, the Richest Place on Earth, where body lice
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Four-day school scheme shows Tories view Fort McMurray as not much more than a work camp
Public School District students await dismissal for the week on a Thursday afternoon in Fort McMurray. Actual students may not be exactly as illustrated. Below: Edmonton-Calder NDP MLA David Eggen; former Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo MLA Guy Boutilier. And where, the good people of Fort McMurray should be asking themselves today
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Summit call for ATB Financial privatization sets stage for rural Alberta banking battle
The Alberta Treasury Branch agency brings rural financial services to Czar, Alberta. You’ve got to know offices like this are doomed if ATB Financial is privatized. Below: William Aberhart in 1937, the year before he founded Alberta Treasury Branches; banker George Gosbee, in his role as Doogie Howser, CEO. Assuming
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Redford to docs: There’s no raise, and you’re not getting it!
The Alberta Progressive Conservative position on negotiations with the doctors explained. Yes, we’re just as confused as you are. Below: AMA President Michael Giuffre. Premier Alison Redford. Every day, it just gets weirder and weirder. The day before yesterday, we’re told, Alberta Premier Alison Redford waded into her health minister’s
Continue readingdaveberta.ca - Alberta politics: Two rookies turfed from Tory cabinet.
TweetIn an unexpected move, Premier Alison Redford shuffled two rookie cabinet ministers out of her cabinet yesterday morning. Advanced Education & Enterprise Minister Stephen Khan (MLA St. Albert) and Tourism Minister Christine Cusanelli (MLA Calgary-Currie) were both appointed to cabinet in May 2012. Mr. Khan’s time in cabinet was largely seen
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Is Premier Alison Redford’s bitter fight with the docs about money, or control?
Who’s in change here? Progressive Conservative MLAs get ready to supervise the work of an Alberta Health Services medical team while Alberta voters look on. Health officials, physicians and electors may not be exactly as illustrated. Below: AMA President Dr. Michael Giuffre; a space invader Is the increasingly bitter fight
Continue readingdaveberta.ca - Alberta politics: Alberta Economic Summit to be held in ten days.
TweetBitumen bubbles and the unpredictable price of oil mentioned in last week’s televised address have led Premier Alison Redford‘s Tory government to hastily called a one-day “Alberta Economic Summit” to continue a “conservation” about our province’s current fiscal woes and potential fiscal future. The summit will bring together ‘leading thinkers,
Continue readingAlberta Diary: Premier’s fireside chat: No fire, few facts, and no there there
Alberta Premier Alison Redford earnestly explains the “Bitumen Bubble” to TV viewers last night. Is that really a radio on the credenza? Below: Ms. Redford fades to Tory blue. When Alberta Premier Alison Redford’s $55,000 fireside chat wrapped up after eight thoroughly unsatisfactory minutes last night, Albertans didn’t know anything
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