rdnewsNOW: In conversation with Premier Jason Kenney

3: 2:58 – Ground-penetrating radar at former residential school sites

3. 4:43 – Update on hospital expansion and permanent shelter for Red Deer

4. 5:56 – Asking nurses to take a pay cut

5. 8:27 – Government of Canada’s plan for all zero-emission vehicle sales by 2035, and reducing emissions in Alberta

OPEN FOR SUMMER

Premier Jason Kenney says COVID-19 numbers will fluctuate, but Alberta is open for good. He believes vaccines are the key to accomplishing that.

Speaking to rdnewsNOW, Kenney said Albertans should be commended for their resilience during the COVID-19 pandemic, which has led to a fatality rate lower than most other Canadian provinces, the U.S. and many parts of Europe.

“We did that with less severe restrictions, and I just think that’s (because of) a couple things: Albertans and their ethic of care for others, but also people stepping up to get vaccines. All of that has allowed us to be the first province in Canada to be fully open on Canada Day; I call it Alberta Freedom Day,” said Kenney.

“COVID’s not gone away, but we can move this from a pandemic to an endemic, treating it more like a conventional communicable disease. Now we get to focus back on jobs, the economy, pipelines, (and) fighting for a fair deal for Alberta.”

Asked about concern for a fourth wave, Kenney opined that it will happen, but it won’t be cause for restrictions, hospitalizations and mass fatalities.

“We’ve never been chasing after zero-COVID because you’d have to have a constant shutdown of society, the negative consequences of which on peoples’ mental and emotional wellbeing, and ability to take care of their families would be devastating,” he continued.

“There will be increases in infections, numbers will go up and down, but they will be much less likely to put unacceptable pressure on the hospital system.”

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RADAR AT FORMER RESIDENTIAL SCHOOLS

On ground-penetrating radar being used at former residential and industrial school sites in Alberta, Kenney said this type of work has been going on for many years.

“The Truth and Reconciliation Commission has a whole section on lost graves and missing children, and a great deal of research has already been done. What we are doing is providing $8 million of initial funding to First Nations to address lost graves in a way most appropriate to them,” he noted. “They may want to do the full scientific and archaeological exploration of graves, but in other cases they may just want to leave graves undisturbed and put up markers. We respect the right of those nations to figure out the best way.”

Technically and legally speaking, added Kenney, the province doesn’t have “an obligation” to provide said funding, “but I think morally we all do to walk this path of reconciliation with First Nations, grieve with them, do this research and remember.”

Red Deer Indigenous voices: Kamloops discovery only the first domino

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RED DEER INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS

Red Deerians have been waiting a long time for hospital expansion and for a permanent integrated homeless shelter.

Alberta’s Infrastructure Minister Prasad Panda said in April the hospital remains a priority, but that it’s too early to say when shovels will break ground.

A government spokesperson told rdnewsNOW last December that the final stages of planning were underway and that construction would start in fall 2021.

Mayor Tara Veer told the local Chamber of Commerce in June that her understanding was the project, including a cardiac catheterization lab, was delayed due to COVID, but is back on track.

“We have committed and put in the budget a minimum of $100 million for the first instalment of the expansion and modernization of Red Deer Regional Hospital. They had to do a consult with all local doctors and medical experts, and there are a lot of different views about this,” said the premier. “But also, it’s not a simple thing. If you’re building an addition to a hospital, you have to figure out what current operations does that affect, where do you put those patients and what’s the transition plan. I believe that planning work is pretty much done.”

Kenney added there will be an announcement soon, and that he hopes ground will be broken on both projects in the very near future.

In Feb. 2020, the UCP announced $100 million for the hospital expansion’s first phase.

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NURSES ASKED TO HAVE WAGES SLASHED

The UCP is currently demanding nurses take a pay cut.

Asked how his government can justify this given the evident pressure and environment nurses and other healthcare workers have been working under, Kenney said it is simply a necessary step to address the province’s financial situation.

“Everybody appreciates the incredibly important work our nurses and healthcare professionals do, and we believe they should be not just fairly, but in fact, generously compensated,” said Kenney. “We very much appreciate, particularly in certain medical trades like ICU nurses and respiratory therapists, the great work that many did over the COVID pandemic, especially in big city hospitals.

“At the same time, the province has a $16 billion deficit, the largest in history. We’ve been running massive deficits for a decade now. We’ve gone from being a province with big savings to (one with) a huge and growing debt. We simply cannot continue to spend billions more every year than we bring in.”

Kenney says his government was elected to make tough decisions, this being one of them. He says this pay cut would help healthcare remain sustainable and allow for the province to actually be able to pay for it in the future.

He also noted nurses in Alberta are compensated about six per cent higher than the Canadian average.

According to the current agreement with United Nurses of Alberta (UNA), which expired Jan. 2020, Alberta nurses’ base salaries range from $70,825 to $92,942, non-inclusive of overtime.

“I as premier took a 10 per cent voluntary pay cut on top of an earlier five per cent pay cut. People in the private sector have seen huge wage rollbacks and very high unemployment. People in our government sector, including healthcare, don’t face the same kind of layoffs,” said Kenney.

“Here’s the bottom line: we want to negotiate respectfully…but at the end of the day, what I will not do is raise taxes on everyone to deal with this deficit. That would kill jobs and punish people who’ve already been hurt economically.”

Nurses protest outside Minister Toews’ Town Hall

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ZERO-EMISSIONS AND CARBON CAPTURE

Late last month, the Government of Canada made the groundbreaking announcement that it would strive to require that all new sales of cars and light-duty trucks be zero-emission by 2035.

The purpose of this, according to federal Transport Minister Omar Alghabra, is to help Canada achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.

Alghabra called it ambitious, but “a must.”

Kenney agrees it is certainly aspirational, but added that the idea electric vehicles will make significant change to global oil consumption and carbon emissions is a fallacy.

“There’s no such thing as an electric airplane or an electric ship. Electric vehicles have to be very light which means they have to be made out of various kinds of petroleum products, which come from oil. So there will continue to be very significant global demand for oil and hydrocarbon energy for decades to come,” the premier says.

“I would rather have Alberta be a major supplier of that product than us surrendering global energy markets to some of the world’s worst regimes.”

Electric planes and ships do exist, with the first lithium-ion battery-powered tanker sailing up Japan’s coastline, announced last February. The battery is supplied by Corvus Energy, which has offices in Canada and abroad.

Just this week, United Airlines announced the purchase of 100 electric planes that could take flight by 2026.

“The second point I would make (in terms of) what role can we play in reducing emissions…the single biggest thing we can do is pursue the technology of carbon capture utilization and storage. Alberta has been investing in that for 12 years,” Kenney said.

“We just opened last year the Alberta Carbon Trunk Line which takes sequestered CO2 from refineries east of Edmonton, brings it down a pipeline here into central Alberta, not far from Red Deer, and injects it into our sedimentary basin.”

Kenney said Alberta is pushing the federal government to implement a generous tax incentive that would “hyper boost” existing carbon capture utilization technology.

According to the Alberta Carbon Trunk Line website, the technology can transport up to 14.6 million tonnes of CO2 yearly, equivalent to 20 per cent of all oil sands emissions, or capturing the CO2 from 3 million-plus cars.

It recently delivered its one-millionth tonne to a mature oilfield in Clive for permanent storage.

“We think that could be responsible for about 50 per cent of the emission reductions we need to achieve in the Alberta oil and gas sector, and that’s a much bigger deal than Teslas and electric vehicles.”

by Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

rdnewsNOW: In conversation with Premier Jason Kenney

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