How It is Done

[farmers_son]

Calgary showed the rest of the province how to be politically influential. Vote against the government. It is undeniable, Calgary would not have gained these cabinet ministers if they have voted PC in the byelection. Voters in the rural Stettler Drumheller riding who did vote for the government have yet to hear an announcement of anything for their riding or rural Alberta in general. Calgary got three new cabinet ministers plus a new hospital (announced before voting day). You do the math.


http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Alberta/2007/06/22/4282433.html

By CP

Calgary Mayor Dave Bronconnier Jan. 18 offers new Premier Ed Stelmach a traditional Calgary white hat to make him an honorary Calgarian. It's been speculated the Liberals won former premier Ralph Klein’s old riding recently because Calgary voters were frustrated by Stelmach’s rural-heavy cabinet. (Sun file photo)
A popular Calgary politician has been appointed deputy premier as part of a move to add more urban voices to Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach’s cabinet.
Justice Minister Ron Stevens is one of three Calgary members of the legislature added to the cabinet today.

Yvonne Fritz is the new associate minister of affordable housing and urban development, and Cindy Ady was named associate minister of tourism promotion.

The move comes just over a week after the Progressive Conservatives lost a Calgary seat they had held for 36 years.

Some speculated that the Liberals won former premier Ralph Klein’s old riding because city voters were frustrated by Stelmach’s rural-heavy cabinet.

Former education minister Gene Zwozdesky of Edmonton will also join the cabinet as associate minister of capital planning.

[Burbert]

Stelmach appears to be a dud. More of the same, skrimp and save, invest the money in the market. Talk about the Heritage Trust Fund, does it actually exist? Keep telling the people they are in an economic boom, while inflation runs away like crazy. No plans, just plod along, the Progressive, should simply be removed from the C party. Love in the oil and gas industry. Sell the resources, cheap the the Amerikins cause they are our best friends. Yad, yad, yad.

[coppertop]

Which party do you think should run the province ? Judging by the vote counts in Drumheller/Stettler all candidates with the exception of Hayden will lose their deposits, so are you suggesting that the results there aren't in line with the mindset of voters in the rest of rural Alberta?

Remember, Calgary Elbow elected Ralph as their mayor when he was a Liberal, they stuck with him when he did a switch to the PC's, so maybe they have just returned to their Liberal roots ! I think the candidates personalities had a lot to do with the outcome in Calgary Elbow. The new hospital was announced over a year ago, and the funding was announced just prior to the by-election. I wasn't the least bit surprised with the result in Calgary Elbow, but was surprised at the margin Hayden received in Drumheller/Stettler. Judging by the grumbling about the Premier on this site I was sure that Jack was going to have a fight on his hands if the comments here reflected the mindset of rural Alberta !!!

Perhaps you don't travel the same highways that I do in this province but everywhere I travel I see highway construction like we have not seen in the past ten years. Every town and village in the province is upgrading municipal infrastructure, from water treatment plants to curb and gutters, all with provincial grant dollars, so I don't think it is entirely fair to say that the government is doing nothing. The economic boom is slowing down already as is evidenced by layoffs in the petroleum service industry. The local Weyerhaeuser mill packaged out a significant number of people a week ago. Ask the folks that are out of a job if they want to see the economy slow down as Kevin Taft is advocating !

[farmers_son]

I would not say Stelmach is a dud. I still think he was the best choice of the three who where running for the PC leadership. But none of those three was a Peter Lougheed and there does not seem to be a Lougheed anywhere to lead this or any other party.

The point I was trying to make is rural Alberta's vote is taken for granted. The government is already looking to the next general election. The reality is the PCs know they do not have to do address rural Alberta's issues, they have our vote. If the PCs had to work to get our vote things would have to be different. What was the last time a secondary highway was paved in this province, or a hospital built in rural Alberta? Or improved services from Alberta Agriculture, or improvements to CAIS or anything was done in rural Alberta.

Really, we can't blame the PCs. Why should they do anything for us? They already have our vote. The illusion is if you support the party they will look after you, the reality is the government buys votes and we sold out our vote 40 years ago. Calgary made their vote count by forcing the government to pay attention and they have reaped the rewards.

[farmers_son]

Coppertop: I do not believe any secondary highways have been paved since the Getty years although repairs on existing paved roads has been done. The oil patch is pounding our roads real bad. I have not seen any paving done except in the towns and cities but I guess I travel different roads. I live in the country and do not really care if towns are upgrading their infrastructure or not. In our part of rural area we are still facing declining populations, school and hospital closures, reduced services from Alberta Agriculture, increased crop insurance premiums, low Surface Rights payments for wellsites and pipelines.

I was not advocating changing parties, just trying to get this party to pay attention to rural Alberta. The PCs do take our vote for granted. I am suggesting the people in Stettler-Drumheller would have done themselves more good if the vote was a lot closer. I note before the by-election Hayden was touted as cabinet material but all the new cabinet positions went to the Calgary and Edmonton. I think my point is valid, rural Alberta's vote is taken for granted by this government.

One example...Thousands of cattle producers in this province are facing further debt because of CAIS claw-backs of advances made in 2004. How can it be that a cattle producer in this province who came through the drought of 2002 and BSE has to pay back money to CAIS? However where is the political pressure to do anything about it? We give away our vote.

[coppertop]

People voted the way they saw it both in Calgary Elbow and Drummheller/Stettler. Obviously they knew Jack and also knew what he has given to his community and province over most of his adult life. That, in my view, is why you vote for someone. I would assume that many of the people who supported Jack are cattle producers so obviously they really didn't feel there was another choice on their ballot.
I am sure there will be a cabinet shuffle before the next election and it was pretty difficult for him to be appointed to cabinet yesterday when he hasn't been sworn in as an MLA yet !!!
Perhaps we do give our vote away but what other alternatives are there ? The NDP would have the province broke providing a nanny state and the liberals really don't know what they want. As far as the Alliance goes, I checked their website several times to look at their policies and they don't have any but they are working on them, so its difficult to know what the are offering in the way of government.

If you travel to Edmonton or Calgary you see highway construction, and there is a lot of it going on in the Peace Region as well as many other places across the province.

The Peace Region is pleased with the Stelmach government, they are getting a new hosplital in Grande Prairie and a interchange on the highway there as well as the twinning of highway 43 is continuing. Most communities have had grants to enhance existing seniors housing facilities or build new ones, many communities are receiving ongoing funding from the province for recreational facilities etc.

If Ralph would have remained as Premier I doubt we would have seen the injection of money into infrastructure, nor would we have seen all party committies etc. And you can be damn sure we would not have seen smoking legislation !!! I think if people look at the number of bills passed and introduced during the session of the legislature, even those who don't like Ed as premier will have to admit that his new government has done a lot.

The province has put millions into new school construction, and yet we hear advertisements in the media about how horrible our schools are, no money for computers etc. and incidentally it is the Alberta Teachers Association that is paying for the ads. They are gearing up for a big battle with the province over MONEY, so their concern really isn't what the schools are like at all !

[farmers_son]

My kids have to ride 3 hours per day to get to school. When I was their age we had grade 12 five minutes away. That was before the Conservatives. When I started farming we had 3 DAs in the district who knew us and knew our farm and provided an invaluable service. Today we phone a toll free number and talk to someone, if we are lucky enough to get someone, who does not know us or our farm or where we live. That was the direct result of Shirley McClellan even though I thought she was pretty good. Yes there are hospitals being built, all in the cities. Our nearest remaining rural hospital cannot do operations anymore, one was closed, another turned into a care facility for old people. I was in a city hospital recently, there is no comparison between the service available next door that the city dweller receives and the service available in rural Alberta. We are second rate.

In Stettler Drumheller Jack Hayden was the best candidate. But why can't rural Albertans vote strategically and make the PCs work a little harder, OK a lot harder, for our vote. We have been way too forgiving of a host of problems with the PCs.

I tend to think anyone could run a government with the money Alberta has. Not to mention the billions in oil sand royalties that we don't even bother trying to collect. The Conservatives are not doing a really great job given the wealth they have to work with and rural Alberta has been way to easy going with the result that most of the money, goods and services go to the cities. Calgary has shown us how it is done. We can either wake up and smell the coffee or sit back and watch rural Alberta continue to take a back seat.

Could it be we need to revive the United Farmers of Alberta party? Whether that happened or not, the suggestion that it might happen would help motivate the PCs to pay attention to rural Alberta.

[cropduster]

So F_S let me know the outcome at Red Deer today.It`s not all done by voting!

[coppertop]

FS, there are new hospitals being built in rural Alberta, one in fact, is being built in Rimbey which is a very small town in rural AB, as I am sure you know. In the Lougheed era hospitals were built every five miles and was that a good thing ? I fully support some of them being turned into care centres for our elderly.

The declining population is the reason your kids and many others need to travel so far to school. Rural Albertans chose to move in to or closer to larger urban centres, many of them leaving the farm to seek employment on one of the provinces industries. Many larger farm operations have added to their land holdings by buying land from people who are leaving their communities. On one hand farmers get larger, and on the other schools close because there aren't enough students to keep them going.

I agree that local hospitals are a better 'fit' for rural Albertans, but they cannot provide the diagnostic technology found in major hositals in large urban centres. Most people who are hospitalized in large urban hospitals are there for major surgery, cancer treatments and difficult births etc. I am sure that any parent whose child needed the expertise of the Stollery Childrens Hospital would not complain because it was located in Edmonton and not in some small rural village.
Doctors do not want to relocate to rural Alberta, so having numerous acute care beds open isn't any good without doctors willing to retain their hospital privileges.
In my community only one doctor in the largest clinic has retained hospital privileges, so anyone requiring hospitalization either has to hope he isn't away on vacation or be willing to accept a doctor from another clinic. One doctor in his 70's has come out of retirement to work part time in a local clinic just because there is such a shortage of doctors.

It isn't possible or practical to build new facilities for either health care or education in every single community in the province.

I sympathize with the long bus ride your chldren have, but sometimes the lengh of the ride has nothing to do with the distance from school.

I live ten miles from town and my neighbours kids get on the bus at 7:15 every single morning, and are taken halfway around the county before heading into town. That issue is caused by a complete lack of planning on the part of the school division.

One huge reason for school closures has been the decision to allow the funding to follow the student so kids and families pick and choose which school they attend. Years ago only one bus ran past my home now there are four big ones and one small bus, kids are transferred from bus to bus depending on which school they attend. The busses are half full most of the time so nobody can tell me that is a cost saving or makes any sense what so ever.

I have never agreed with the move to Regional Health Authorities, it hasn't saved one penny and the decisions are made away from local communities. I know the government was trying to deal with the huge debt but that is one area where there has been no savings.

[grassfarmer]

Farmers_son, I agree with you that voters need to wake up and smell the coffee in general. Without getting into parties and policies it has amazed me since coming to live in Alberta the naivity of politics and voters here. I don't know if it is because you are a young province compared to old Europe but in general voters have no idea how to make politicians work for them. Alberta history seems to have been shaped by one party being given a huge majority mandate to govern for a 20 or 30 year period before the voters get fed up and change to another party - again elected with a huge majority. Newsflash people - you can have more than 1 strong party running at a time! Nothing like a strong opposition breathing down your neck to keep politicians honest and working hard! Who knows maybe this could even spread to farm politics.

[coppertop]

Agreed,grassfarmer, but unfortunately in both provincial and federal politics the opposition of the day seem intent on wasting time battling over foolish issues and not the ones that cause the most concern to the public. EG: the issue with the Stelmach campaign receiving funds from the Beaver County Waste Authority. The Liberals raised hell about it when, in fact, they had solicited funds from the same agency.Most of what opposition parties do is based on political gain for their own fortunes, not for the good of the citizens of the country.

Every government has room for improvement, and they guage their performance by the climate of the public, not by the ranting of opposition members in the legislature or media.

Apathy is what elects governments from municipal to federal. Those who believe in a certain candidate or party get out and vote and the rest stay home and complain for the entire term of office for their representatives. This holds true for commodity groups within the agriculture industry as well. ABP zone meetings are a prime example.

[grassfarmer]

I would disagree with the last post as it indicates there is only one party that is right in all it's policies and this is why it is so far ahead in the polls. In reality there is very little difference between Liberal and PC, governing is no longer done by politicians anyway it's done by back room boys who don't necessarily change when the party in power does. The best thing for voters in this province would be if the liberals were within 5 points of the conservatives in the polls. It would keep them both honest and working.

Nonsense like this EUB spies scandal at Rimbey would not happen if you had an opposition - Government could not afford to take arrogant, suicidal risks like this if it were a proper working democracy.

[coppertop]

From where I sit watching things unfold with the province, I honestly feel they have more to fear by the AEUB issue than the whining of Calgarians. Rural Alberta is fed to the teeth with the arrogance of the AEUB, and this latest fiasco has just given rise to some major discontent with the organization and a complete lack of trust in their fairness.
Obviously an organization in crisis, without leadership, which to me is much more serious than a few spoiled brats in Calgary.

I don't think I made any statement in my previous post which would allude to the fact there was only one party to choose from. In Alberta at this time, I cannot see the Liberals or NDP having a chance to get elected, in fact I think the Liberals may lose seats in Edmonton next time round. The polls show the PC support up 12% in Edmonton and 2% in rural Alberta, and down 12% in Calgary.

Heck, maybe Calgary will pull a Quebec and want to separate......LOL

[cakadu]

At the risk of sounding ill-informed, or lacking time to listen to the news etc., what happened at Rimbey? Are you referring to the whole thing with AltaLink, or did something else happen?

I agree with you grassfarmer in that the two major parties at the federal level, and to a lesser degree at the Alberta provincial level, are not all that different. Certainly not as different as you find in other countries. Otherwise how could Mr. Harper take old Liberal policies and recycle them as his own?

Incidentally, how do you feel about Mr. Blair stepping down? Don't know too much about the other fellow that has been appointed as his successor.

[grassfarmer]

Cakadu, I was referring to the EUB spying scandal at Rimbey. If you read this from the Edmonton Journal http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/cityplus_alberta/story.html?id=779f2577-d5c1-4121-bc67-02bf23db3fed you will see that Premier Stelmach stands behind the EUB and their right to spy. Well I guess he has to as they are all in it together afterall. And to think redneck Alberta would tolerate such "commie" activities.

As for the UK situation I'm glad to see Blair gone, he is nothing more than a slick dick little conman who has ruled through his use of media management (spin doctors), photo ops and carefully crafted soundbites. His successor, Gordon Brown on the other hand is an able and honest man, a dour Scot though and that isn't going down too well in England - what with Scotland having their own devolved parliament and then the leader of the London parliament also being a Scot. Blair also claimed to be Scottish but with an accent like that I don't think so.