Damn Good Throne Speech Ed Stelmach!

As an Albertan Progressive Conservative, I have to say, I am very pleased with the Throne Speech. I have some disappointments and will note them later in this post but by and large it is a very progressive agenda and vision. Congratulations Premier Stelmach.

Premier Stelmach has accomplished more in the past year than was accomplished in the past 7 years put together. Big ticket items like the open process that engaged Albertans as owners in the Royalty Review decision, and kick starting 11,000 affordable housing units, address municipal infrastructure needs with a long view that provides certainty and sustainability communities to planning and deliver. The Premier’s personal efforts to finally resolve the unfunded pension liability for our teachers is commendable. Then he moved to finally provide safer and healthier work and public places with the tobacco control legislation. These are all substantive and an impressive list of Stelmach accomplishments but it is not an exhaustive list by any stretch.

The progressive, integrated and long view nature of the Throne Speech is reassuring that the Stelmach government will be a significant change from the single minded debt and deficit days of yore. There is an expressed recognition that the prosperity from our phenomenal growth has not trickled down to benefit all Albertans. Despite low unemployment and high wages generally, many Albertans are under serious pressures. They need lots of help from child care and out-of-school, to better health care access and education to housing and work – life balance challenges due to demands caused by labour shortages.

There are systemic challenges that are being addressed from aboriginal economic development and employment opportunities so they can “take their rightful place in our society.” The severe shortages of skilled workers in the disability sector who care for our most vulnerable citizens has reached crisis levels. There is a promise of further investments for these contracted agencies that perform these duties on behalf of our government. What is needed is money directed specifically at providing competitive wages and new programs that enable contracted agencies to attract and retain qualifier workers is going to be addressed. I am working with the sector to these ends and am pleased to see this pledge in the Throne Speech.

Long range planning commitments in capital infrastructure, health, education,
housing, and transportation, skills shortages and even demographic planning for an aging population are high on the Stelmach change agenda. Nowhere is this new attitude and perspective more obvious than the commitment to the elimination of health care premiums. These moves are all welcome and needed.

The environment is also being addressed. The speech notes “We place a high value on…pristine open spaces” but there is no parks, conservation or wildlife habitat protection policy commitment in the Throne Speech. There needs to be more attention paid to this vulnerable aspect of life and living things in Alberta. As we anticipate accelerated growth economic activity increases oil and gas, mining, agriculture, forestry and tourism activity. We already have a crisis of fragmentation of our wilderness landscape and there are serious pressures on water sheds that also puts a strain on our wild life. This is especially difficult for migrating animals like grizzly bears and caribou.

Granted there is attention being directed at cumulative effects of development but I would have hoped for a more specific set of directions and destinations focused on conservation, a new and comprehensive parks policy and habitat protection. PersonallyI think it is time to put Conservation back into the Alberta Progressive Conservative Party consciousness.

We know from our Oil Sands Study, which you can read on Policy Channel (www.policychannel.com), that Albertans want their oil sands developed in ways that protects habitat, captures CO2, deals with water usage and focuses on reclamation. This change in focus is not away from royalties, technology, and pace of growth concerns but in addition to those previous focal points. The specific reference for government and industry to work together to capture and store CO2 is a positive move. It will be expensive but for Alberta, a place of 3.4 million souls who benefit the most from the oil sands, this idea should be embraced as our specific ecological challenge as a province.

Another huge change under Stelmach from the Klein regime is around concern and action dealing with surface and groundwater, climate change and greenhouse gases. There was an attitude under Klein, that at one time, even denied the science around climate change. The attitude presumed that economic growth at any pace and any cost, was acceptable, even if it resulted in land, air and water degradation. Not any more. While Stelmach is more incremental than some of us would like on his “Greening our Growth,” at least these big ecological issues and concerns are front and centre on his political agenda.

Much of the past year has seen Stelmach playing catch up to ensure Alberta keeps up to the physical infrastructure pressures caused by our growth. This Throne Speech marks a change in focus where Ed Stelmach can finally get on to his own vision and hos own policy agenda for Alberta. Ed Stelmach can now be Ed Stelmach. With this Throne Speech we get to see the real Ed Stelmach and learn to appreciate what he is all about.

So get ready Alberta. There is an election on. We all have some serious listening to do and some serious questions to ask of all the candidates and all the party leaders. Then we have a decision to make about what kind of Alberta we want and who we think will be best to help us get there. Alberta is relatively assured of our progress with all the blessings we enjoy. What we Albertans need to do now is to elect some socially progressive and fiscally conservative politician like Ed Stelmach to help get us to our preferred future.

Sorry for the long post but it was a damned impressive Throne Speech with lots to talk about. As a citizen, you might be well advised to read the news release, backgrounder and the entire speech yourself, so here is the link.

Wildrose Alliance Party President Quits - On the Eve of an Election!

I know Rob James, not all that well, but I do know he is not a quitter. However, James, the former Wildrose Party founder, and until now, founding President of the Wildrose Alliance of Alberta Party. He just quit as President of the new merged party. Strange!

James quit as President of the WRAP saying the merger of the Wildrose Party and the Alliance Party was “a merger in name only.”

This is pretty tough for this new political group to take as they boldly set out to take down Ed Stelmach. Like so many other examples the far right seems to be most adept at disemboweling themselves as the constantly snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

Lots of old Alliance debt inherited in this “merged party” and not time to get a common platform. It is even tougher to round up serious and respected candidates for an election coming next week. Maybe this political juggernaut is an initiative that is better off having never happened than being late and lame.

Suncor Invests in Alberta While Some Other "Alpha Oil" Types Choose to Intimidate.

There is plenty of business and news coverage of the Suncor decision to spend $20.6B…that is right Billion with a “B” in oil sands operations and expansions. Full disclosure, I hold shares in the company and have done work for Suncor in the past but not presently.

This company continues to show quality leadership and management and a demonstrable commitment to improved corporate social responsibility. They are not perfect but they get it and they work hard on getting it right taking to heart an integrated triple bottom line approach. In addition to this increased investment announcement, I see Suncor has also renegotiated its royalty contract with Alberta. Some business writers and industry commentators said the Alberta government was “tearing up contracts” with Suncor and Syncrude as part of the royalty changes. Not so and never was. This negotiated agreemetn revision proves that such hype was misleading and perhaps even intentionally by some.

Last October and November in response to the “Our Fair Share” Hunter royalty review expert panel recommendations “Big Alpha Oil” used intimidation tactics on workers, suppliers, communities and the Premier. The were saying that recommended royalty increase that merely put Canada and Alberta as the second lowest takers on the planet would devastate the industry and they would be leaving the province.

Well for a few weeks some actually did cut capital and exploration budgets but not nearly as drastically as they threatened and those decisions were made in light of market realities and taken long before the “Our Fair Share” report came out anyway. They moved some activity to Saskatchewan, which a good thing. They seemed to think it was their oil and gas and not Albertan’s oil and gas. That is a big mistake.

Now we see the most aggressive of the ENGO's shifting focus away from forestry and on to big oil, Alberta's oil sands in particular. We knew this was coming as early as the spring of 2005 when we did some work for the Alberta forest industry. The ENGO's we worked with then said that was their new strategy...and it is now happening.

With these announcements, Suncor steps up and shows leadership and wisdom - once again. This is not the first time Rick George has shown competence and class as a major corporate CEO. When the energy and manufacturing industries got twisted out of shape over the potential dire impacts on the economy due to the Kyoto Protocol, Suncor stayed out of the silliness. After a few months however, Suncor’s CEO said that they had calculated the cost impact of Kyoto in its Canadians operations and it was pennies on the barrel. Suncor said it could absorb that level of additional cost. Within days the din of dire consequences from the other aggitators and fearmongers, who were playing politics more than economics, were silenced and they slide quietly into the background and off the radar screen.

There are lots of examples of why big business has trust, respect and credibility issues with the public. But when we see a good example of a corporation and leadership that shows it is worthy of trust and respect, we have to applaud it. Suncor is consistently such an entity and an exemplar for others to emulate. Good on them!

Stelmach is Heading for the Hustings on Monday February 4th

My little birds tell me the Alberta election Writ gets dropped on Monday February 4th after the Throne Speech. Bundle up Alberta because candidates will be knocking on your doors and sticking signs on your lawns in the dead of winter. They will want to talk about the best possible future for the province and why they are the best way to get there.

There will be differences of opinion to understand, choices to be considered and judgements to be made. Citizens will have to be engaged and get self-informed as to who they think will be best to position our province for the challenges ahead.

Today there is a serious disconnect between Alberta’s opinion and thought leaders and our political and powerful economic elites. Our recent oil sands survey results show that disconnect most dramatically. Albertans want a more reasoned, integrated and sustainable approach to our growth, not just growth for its own sake and at any cost. With oil at $100 a barrel, traditional cost controls have not been effective as a market restraint for energy projects. Other factors will have to come into play,

Albertans clearly want growth but they also want a new definition of success that includes a greater focus on ecological integrity. They want attention paid and solutions found to the wide range of serious societal needs that an overheated economy has brought to Alberta. They also want better quality decision making at the political and policy level.

That is the challenge facing political candidates in this election. It is more than winning the election. It is also about proving to citizens through their platforms and proposals for the future that they “get it.” Even after proving that they get it, citizens will be looking at the various leaders and local candidates to judge if they have the personal capacity, ability and energy to be effective and to actually do something about “it.”

In 1993 Albertans “got it” that the province had a serious spending problem that was unsustainable. Laurence Decore, as Leader of the Opposition, stood up in the Legislature with his wallet held high above his head. He declared Alberta did not have a revenue problem, it had a spending problem, and that resonated with the feelings Albertans. The newly selected PC leader and then Premier, Ralph Klein, saw this happening and he jumped in from of that parade. As a result he was perceived as the political guy who best “got it” in those days. The rest, as they say, is history.

Today Albertans are once again way ahead of their politicians. We have yet to see the crystallizing moment for Albertans as we did to spur on the debt and deficit thrust of the 1990’s. It will come. In politics it always does. The moment came close with the release of the Our Fair Share Royalty Review Report. That however was way too complex a set of issues to become the crystallizing moment.

My guess that crystallizing political moment will come during this elections. It will be around ecology, wildlife habitat, climate change and the oil sands. These all relate in some way or other but there will be one shining moment when the emergent becomes both the important and the urgent in the hearts and minds of the voters. At that moment politics, policy and purpose in the role and responsibility of our government will shift dramatically.

As a result politics will become more meaningful again to everyday Albertans. Hopefully politicians will be allowed to be curious, exploratory and to show their humanity in ways that are authentic and genuine - not just media mobilized mush. Democracy will be better and social needs will return to the policy agenda along with the economy and the environment. If the happens we will all be better for it, you, me and our kids, will be the beneficiaries from this renewed and improved sense of purposefully engaged citizenship.

Citizens and Cynicism - Post Redux

I recently revisited some previous posts I have done on this blog. We face an imminent Alberta election and an inevitable Federal election. Under the circumstances I felt this post from August 2006 was worth a revisit and a reflection .

http://ken-chapman.blogspot.com/2006/08/has-citizenship-and-cynicism-become.html

Cynicism is an easy way out. Citizenship is harder to do. We need a more engaged and informed citizenry...especially at election time. I hope Albertans will throw off the cloak of cynicism and take up the challenge of active, engaged and informed citizen. With the Internet, websites and Blogs, it has never been easier.