Latest From The Assembly

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21 March 2012

Electricity Prices March 21, 2012

Mr. MacDonald: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A former Conservative Party member who is totally disgusted with this government’s electricity deregulation policy provided to me – and I really appreciate it – the issue brief that the government is planning on using to try to get through this next election, defending their public policy on electricity. One of the responses in this document indicates, and I quote: consumers have options; sometimes consumers in other provinces do not. Given that a member of a rural community . . .

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21 March 2012

School Capital Construction March 21, 2012

Mr. Kang: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. A new P3 school in the westend of Edmonton is already grossly overcrowded, but its contract with its private maintenance company doesn’t allow any new portables. This means students will now have to be bused to other schools. Parents are baffled as to why the school can’t add only four extra portables to an existing school to meet demand. To the Minister of Infrastructure: how can the minister justify entering into a contract with a P3 operator that doesn’t allow extra portables to be added when needed?

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21 March 2012

Residential Construction Standards March 21, 2012

Ms Blakeman: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. We keep hearing that the government will eventually introduce new homeowner protection measures. My questions are to the Minster of Municipal Affairs. Can the minister explain how the set of proposals that he has been going on about forever would have actually helped the owners and renters of Penhorwood building in Fort McMurray, Bella Vista in Calgary, Rossdale Court here in Edmonton, and Bellavera Green building in Leduc?

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21 March 2012

Collection of School Fees March 21, 2012

Mr. Hehr: Mr. Speaker, I was appalled this week to learn that for decades school boards across this province have had the right to send collection agencies after parents for not paying their school fees. To the Minister of Education: why has your department allowed school boards to take this type of action against parents who are just able to keep their heads above water?

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21 March 2012

Home-schooling March 21, 2012

Mr. Hehr: In Alberta we have programs of study guidelines that establish a curriculum that every student, regardless of how they are educated or where they are educated, is required to follow. To the Minister of Education: given that the minister stated that there is nothing more important to him than giving parents choice to teach what they want, when they want, and where they want, is the minister saying that home-schoolers no longer have to follow the curriculum?

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21 March 2012

Physician Services Agreement in Principle March 21, 2012

Dr. Swann: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the minister of health. Today the minister announced an agreement in principle with the troublesome Alberta Medical Association on the eve of an election. After the Premier and minister betrayed all health workers by reversing their decision to hold a public inquiry into intimidation, the minister further insulted physicians by imposing a one-year wage scheme, which has now been withdrawn, now a clear and desperate attempt to buy their silence. To the minister: why was Alberta Health Services not party to this agreement?

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21 March 2012

MLA Remuneration,Long-term Care Serious Incidents March 21, 2012

Dr. Sherman: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yesterday the govern-ment whip announced that PC MLAs on the no-meet committee would pay back $5,000 each, saying it’s the right thing to do. This current government clearly has no sense of right and wrong. It says no to a true public inquiry, no to lower power bills, no to Albertans who are demanding PC MLAs pay back all the money they took for doing nothing. How can the Premier say that her government’s response to yet another scandal is anything more than smoke and mirrors?

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20 March 2012

Water Management March 20, 2012

Mr. Chase: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. For years this sorry government has rejected the scientific, evidence-based, peer-reviewed research of Alberta’s leading water quality expert, Dr. David Schindler. Schindler, who has chastised the province over its water mismanagement from the Athabasca in the north to the Oldman in the south has recently been exonerated and embraced in the hypocritical hope that his credibility would make up for this government’s lack thereof. To the Premier: having finally recognized Schindler’s credentials, why aren’t you immediately implementing his water protection strategies?

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20 March 2012

Trucking Safety Regulations March 20, 2012

Mr. Kang: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Last year Alberta Transportation introduced a commercial driver’s abstract to include information on drivers’ nonmoving safety violations like badly secured loads and mechanical problems. Now I’m hearing complaints from truck drivers that the system is unfair because it punishes the drivers for the owners’ mistakes. To the Minister of Transportation: why do safety violations that are not the drivers’fault, such as broken safety belts, show up on the drivers’ commercial abstracts and not on the company’s record?

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20 March 2012

Caribou Habitat Protection March 20, 2012

Ms Blakeman: Thanks very much, Mr. Speaker. Recently I asked why this government took first place as the single biggest killer of bears in the province. Now I have to ask why it is fighting for the title of the single biggest killer of wolves. Instead of doing what every expert knows needs to be done to save the caribou, which is to protect its habitat, this government employs the antiquated policy of murdering wolves to slow the caribou population decline. To the Minister of SRD: why does the minister consider the slaughter of wolves and bears an acceptable option when it is clear that habitat destruction is the problem?

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