No one who watched Education Minister Adriana LaGrange’s news conference on the United Conservative Party’s plans for Alberta’s K-12 curriculum yesterday could come away with the impression our province’s education system is in capable hands. Putting aside the government’s intention to send students back to schools ill prepared for COVID-19 next month, Ms. LaGrange’s performance […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Good union jobs! Green jobs! UCP supporters need not panic, they’re not for anyone around here!
Jason Kenney and the United Conservative Party, friends of the union man and woman, not to mention the environment! Who would have seen that coming? Yet there was Energy Minister Sonya Savage, her words in black and white in the text of a government of Alberta news release yesterday, boasting about agreements with four big […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Education minister changes tune on masks when schools reopen, but credits ‘emerging evidence,’ not public pressure
According to Education Minister Adriana LaGrange, it turns out “emerging evidence has made it clear that masks can play an important role limiting the spread of COVID-19 in our schools.” Who knew? Those were pretty much the first words out of Ms. LaGrange’s mouth as yesterday morning’s news conference on revisions to Alberta’s minimalist back-to-school […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Platitudes or new plan? Education minister schedules news conference this morning on back-to-school plan
With the clock ticking down to a “near normal” mid-pandemic school reopening next month for three quarters of a million Alberta students, Education Minister Adriana LaGrange plans to provide an update this morning “on public health measures being taken for a safe return to school.” So, is the Kenney Government — whose back-to-school plan has […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Shocking coffee mug has conservatives clutching their pearls, political Alberta all atwitter
Now that right-wing snowflakes have officially made “cancel culture” a thing, let’s talk about the controversial coffee mug they’d like to cancel that rudely mentions Jason Kenney, shall we? Tout le monde political Alberta was abuzz yesterday, with many conservatives bemoaning the sorry state of political discourse in Wild Rose Country and pleading for a […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Ottawa taps the brakes on huge coal mine expansion near Jasper National Park; Alberta’s UCP stays mum for now
Federal Environment Minister Jonathan Wilkinson tapped the brakes Thursday on the Vista coal mine expansion near Hinton with an announcement Ottawa will take a look at the environmental impact of the project after all. The same afternoon, the Alberta Government led by Premier Jason Kenney, which has never met a fossil fuel extraction plan it […]
Posted inBestsellers
The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue tops Alberta independent bookshops’ fiction bestseller list for week ended July 26
Here are the lists of the top 10 fiction and non-fiction titles sold by independent booksellers in Alberta during the week ended Sunday, July 26, 2020. The lists are compiled by the Book Publishers Association of Alberta, and include sales at Audreys Books in Edmonton and Glass Bookshop in Edmonton. ALBERTA FICTION BESTSELLERS 1. The […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
AHS to Pincher Creek docs: We made a mistake, we gave it to you, now we won’t take it back … and you can’t quit!
Physicians in Pincher Creek who gave three months’ notice they were withdrawing from hospital service in response to Alberta Health Minister Tyler Shandro’s War on Doctors were told they had to show up for August on-call duty anyway in letters Tuesday from a top official of Alberta Health Services’ South Zone. The reason: AHS couldn’t […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Alberta political roundup: The paper-pile premier, furious doctors, rebel ’Roser rumours, Total disaster, and more …
Having rammed through two controversial bills Tuesday night, one opening the door to more health care privatization and the other eliminating workplace fairness and declaring war on unions, the Alberta Legislature wrapped up its business just after 8 o’clock yesterday morning. United Conservative Party social media spent the afternoon bragging about how much legislation the […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Whatever happened to the UCP’s belligerent response to inconvenient European bankers and environmental litigators?
Once upon a time in Alberta if some foreign bank had dared to announce it wasn’t about to put money into any more Alberta oilsands projects there would have been a furious roar from Jason Kenney. There would have been threats to unleash a War Room on the bankers as well as fearsome denunciations of […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Canada, keep your eye on Alberta — it’s not going to be pretty, but it should be instructive
You can just tell it’s likely to be a crazy week in Alberta politics. To understand just how crazy, you have to think about what the Kenney Government is noisily focusing on, and what is actually happening. In the Legislature, Premier Jason Kenney and his United Conservative Party government are busy ramming through a couple […]
Posted inAlberta Politics
Timing is everything: Alberta announces seven charges against Suncor mid-morning on Sunday
Interesting timing. Mid-morning yesterday — Sunday, that is — the press secretary to Environment Minister Jason Nixon published a 79-word press release, 111 words if you count the headline and the sub-head required by the format of the Alberta government’s website. It was about as uninformative as a press release can be and still qualify […]