Alberta Liberals announce new interim leader: John Roggeveen

Calgary lawyer John Roggeveen was appointed the interim leader of the Alberta Liberal Party on Saturday.

“John is the ideal candidate for this position. He brings integrity, skills and insight to this role,” said party president Helen Mcmenamin in a news release.

“He has years of political experience and a deep commitment to building the party and serving Albertans.”

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Roggeveen was raised in Edmonton, graduated from the University of Alberta and is married with three adult daughters, according to the party.

As a past Liberal candidate, Roggeveen has served in various capacities on the Alberta Liberal Party Board, the party said.

Roggeveen called it an honour to serve Albertans and his party, noting that now is the time to grow its membership.

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“Good policies are one of the strengths of our party but good organization will be the foundation for successfully implementing them,” he said.

“My focus will be on creating a stronger organization so that the Alberta Liberals will be a force in the next election.”

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Roggeveen told Global News the UCP government is not doing a good job.

“Right now, we’ve got a government that’s fumbling and bumbling, making mistake after mistake, crisis after crisis,” he said.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Right now, we've got a government that's fumbling and bumbling, making mistake after mistake, crisis after crisis," he said.

“Albertans need a government that’s not going to be doing that for them.”

Voters need more options, he explained.

“It’s a challenge for us because the media quite often likes to make it a two-horse race but we believe that we need to offer an alternative to Albertans somewhere between the two political extremes,” he said.

“We’ve got lots of different policies that I think will be beneficial to the average Albertan.”

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Though the provincial party shares a similar philosophy with the federal Liberals, Roggeveen said this party’s attention will be affixed to Albertans.

“We’re not the same party as the federal party. We focus on Alberta’s issues first,” he said.

“We are not here to fight with the federal government the way the current government seems to be, and we think we could work with the federal government.”