Punctuating her remarks with a call for a united house to move the province forward, Lt.-Gov. Lois Mitchell delivered the speech from the throne to open the spring sitting of the Alberta legislature.
“We are Albertans; all of us,” she told a packed chamber in Edmonton on Thursday. “We all want our province to succeed and our citizens to prosper.”
“Let no one in this chamber, this province or this country cheer for Alberta to fail.”
In a preview of what’s to come in the weeks ahead, energy and the economy played a central role in Mitchell’s remarks. With a debate on the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion project the first order of business for the house next week, she reaffirmed the Rachel Notley government’s mission to do “whatever it takes” to get the pipeline built.
“In the past, when workers in our energy industry were attacked and when the resources we owned were threatened, Premier Peter Lougheed took bold action,” Mitchell said. “Your government has been clear. Every option is on the table.”
“We will not hesitate to invoke similar legislation if it becomes necessary owing to extreme and illegal actions on the part of the B.C. government to stop the pipeline.”
READ MORE: Kenney threatens to stop flow of oil to B.C.; Notley sending lawyers to Ottawa
Three bills to be tabled during the session will be aimed at diversifying the economy and will move toward getting off the “resource royalty roller-coaster.” These include moves to allow partial upgrading of bitumen, new tax credits for education and training, capital investment, and digital industries, and legislating a capacity market for electricity.
Mitchell said the provincial budget – set for release on March 22 – will rely less on non-renewable resource revenue than it has in the past, and will move toward being balanced. That path will be paved with reduced costs in the public sector.
“Building on our work to reduce exorbitant salaries in government agencies, boards and commissions … we will now focus on our post-secondary institutions,” Mitchell said.
“We owe it to our students to ensure that funding for education goes where it belongs – the classroom.”
READ MORE: University of Alberta facing financial issues, plans to cut budget by 4% next year
Mitchell said there will be a move to reduce public sector capital spending, but that doesn’t mean projects with shovels already in the ground will be abandoned.
“Unlike previous years where infrastructure announcements were made in front of empty fields that would remain empty indefinitely, the projects your government has already announced will be built.”
On the opioid overdose crisis, Mitchell said the government will move to ensure safety and quality standards at private treatment facilities, and implement more public treatment options, harm reduction, public education and supervised consumption.
READ MORE: New opioid awareness campaign set for Alberta restaurants, bars, trains
Among other priorities for the government in this session of the legislature are reforms to lobbyist laws, a continuation of the post-secondary tuition freeze with a plan to cap tuition increases in legislation, investment in the prevention of rural crime, help for vulnerable children, reducing the number of Indigenous children in government care and improving income support programs.
“To those who would say Alberta’s best days are behind us, we have proven them wrong and will continue to prove them wrong.”
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