My letter to Premier Jason Kenney - Concerns about Energy and Environment

 September 8, 2020

Dear Premier Jason Kenney. 

Hello. My name is Laura Jean Rutherford and I live in a long term care facility, AgeCare-Skypointe in Calgary, Alberta. I am writing to you as a concerned Alberta citizen of the policies and bills you have pushed through since during the Spring/Summer 2020 sessions. I am concerned as I feel you are truly not thinking of the impact to the Alberta citizens, only looking at how it benefits those who support and lobby for you, as well as benefiting those large corporations who you support and basically doing whatever you wish to do just because you have a massive majority government that the opposition parties can hold you accountable in the changes you have made for Alberta. 

I am originally from Thunder Bay in Northwestern Ontario and I moved to Calgary in March 2005 for a position at Alberta Health Services (formerly Calgary Health Region). I was lured to Calgary because of a career opportunity to advance myself professionally and it had done exactly that for me. Still to this day, best decision I ever made for myself, professionally and personally. In September 2005, I had the privilege of becoming a first time homeowner; something I thought I would not be possible for single person. For me, it helped me begin making roots in Alberta to make it my home. What a beautiful province we live in - the kindness and generosity of Albertans; the opportunities to advance one’s career or to find a new passion to focus on. Of course, the beauty of what Alberta provides us in our own backyard. The Rocky Mountains, waterways for recreation, parks and campgrounds for everyone to enjoy - privilege to have available for Albertans. My concerns I wish to express today have been your decisions on environment, energy, our provincial parks and how I feel you are spending our tax money unwisely. 

On my travels to Italy, Switzerland and France, and when I say I am from Calgary - they say how lucky I am to have the Rocky Mountains, they are so beautiful compared to their Alps. Amazing, wouldn’t you agree? I have travelled to the communities near Calgary such as Lake Louise, Banff, and Canmore, plus other communities like Jasper, Three Hills, Drumheller and Vulcan. We are so fortunate to have such beauty in our province. Premier Kenney, can you please tell me why you want to destroy this land? Making our province’s lands Crown land so you can do whatever you please, like you are doing now. Why do you want to revert our beautiful provincial parks within our Rocky Mountains to become Crown land so you can have an Australian company to come destroy our Rocky Mountains to set up a coal mine. Really? Does the UCP party feel this is the only way to increase our province’s revenue by destroying our once protected natural provincial parks into environmental damage through excess  emissions? There must another way Premier Kenney, this cannot be our only solution. In the time of climate change in the forefront on the global stage, why you bringing a company to increase our province’s carbon footprint, and to destroy forever the beauty of our mountains. From my standpoint, this is a greedy and selfish motive to have yet another large corporation giving you and your UCP members money and forgetting who you were elected to serve - the citizens of Alberta. Do you think of these things in your process's in making decisions for our province?

As I mentioned, I moved to Calgary from Thunder Bay, Ontario in 2005. I lived in Thunder Bay from 1970 to 2005 and I see some similarities between our two areas. In the 70s and 80s, Thunder Bay was a prosper city with grain elevators transporting our country’s grain down the St. Lawrence Seaway; we had multiple pulp and paper mills in Thunder Bay which also supported a large transportation system in NWO transporting lumber and other products; we had manufacturing with Bombardier making subway cars for Toronto’s subway system; and we had mining of minerals like gold in NWO. Life was good. Unfortunately by the 90s, things became to dry up, we faced multiple layoffs at Bombardier and grain elevators as well as pulp mills closing (we had 17 to currently only 3 in the NWO region) and grain cars were going to Churchill, Manitoba instead of Thunder Bay as it was cheaper for transportation costs. Plus we feel at times ignored by Ontario Premiers as they were more focused on the Toronto and area concerns than those Ontario citizens living in the Northwestern Ontario communities. So, I can appreciate what you are facing Premier Kenney, it is not an ease task facing the changes to our oil & gas sector in Alberta; being ignored by Ottawa to support our province like they do to other provinces like Ontario and Quebec whom benefit from the National Equalization payments the most while we receive nothing. Plus having to find a way to recreate revenue responsibly in the energy sector while meeting our commitments to battling climate change goals. This could not be easy for any Premier, plus doing it during an oil crisis, a financial recession and a global pandemic too. I question your plan Premier Kenney, putting $30 million budget per year on a “War Room”? Why? Why are focusing on supporting fossil fuels, which is harming our climate and environment? By scrapping the train contracts that former Premier Notley made to get our crude oil to a port, your increased our provincial deficit by $1.2 billion! Your initialization of this War Room to tackle how to showcase the oil & gas sector to bring investors to our province. Premier Kenney, for transparency, I haven’t heard in the news any accomplishments your War Room has provided our province since it’s beginning. All I see, how your UPC government has thrown away $30 million/year. Added together  - $30 million for 2019 and another $30 million for 2020. Premier Kenney - you waste $60 million of taxpayers money which could have been used in other areas of our province such as healthcare, infrastructure, education, or improvements of services to Albertans. Though we couldn’t have predicted the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, that $60 million could have gone towards providing PPE for healthcare workers or the changes needed to the classrooms in our school to make their environment safe for students and teachers. Something to remember in making future plans for our province - think about your average Albertan citizens first, not what will line the pockets of your rich donors and large corporations.  

On the topic of energy sector and Climate Change, can you tell me why you were against having a Provincial Carbon Tax? We are in 2020 and you don’t have to be a scientist to know how our climate has changed. Seeing our Alberta glaciers receding over the years since I have arrived in 2005. Plus our wild weather - tremendous damage from the 2013 Calgary flood; 2018 Fort McMurray fire and the June 2020 hailstorm in NE Calgary. Having a carbon tax was inevitable so that money can be available to counterbalance the damage we are doing to the our planet’s atmosphere. I might be naive about how politics work, but when I see a Provincial Carbon Tax vs. a Federal Carbon Tax, it seems self explanatory - in the former the taxes collected would remain within Alberta to assist our climate change goals and the latter our money goes to Ottawa so they will put it towards wherever they want really. Why are you giving our away more money to Ottawa, I would have thought you have liked to keep the money for yourself as you would  like to be more self sufficient from Ottawa? The money could be put towards budgeting Alberta’s infrastructure projects (ie. roads) or assist our oil & gas sector to become more efficient to lessen climate change impacts. Or was the cancellation of the Provincial Carbon Tax, a knee-jerk reaction to change everything that former Premier Notley did during her tenure as Premier or was it a way to get elected as Premier as it will benefit those large corporations which supports the UPC? Did you truly think this through?  Did you know before making your final decision to scrap the provincial carbon tax, you would be forcing  Alberta citizens to pay an additional federal tax?

Looking at Alberta’s past politically, with exception of the 4-year NDP tenure by former Premier Rachel Notley, our province’s leadership has been under Conservative party leadership. The Conservatives were in power for 44 consecutive years before the NDP defeated them in 2016. In 1976, former PC Premier Peter Lougheed and his party created the Alberta Heritage Fund. The goal of the Alberta Heritage Fund was to build a fund for Alberta to use for future endeavours, especially during our rough times like we are facing now. What was to occur is the total revenues from the oil & gas sector were to be deposited into the Alberta’s Heritage Fund to bring prosperity to our province’s future.  Premier Lougheed was looking ahead, planned for the future of our province; knowing we shouldn’t rely on our resources to form our province’s budget. Instead over the decades since the Alberta Heritage Fund was established, less of the revenue was going into this fund but rather the monies collected from the oil & gas sector was used into the general revenue of our budget to cover the costs of the PC’s short term goals, focusing on the “now” instead of our “future”. Why are you not focusing more on the “big picture” when making provincial decisions? Yes, it can address a “now” circumstance, but you need to address the ripple effects it will have for our province’s future. Will our decisions made now still remain prosperous in the future for our province? Will it be worth it to spend millions of dollars of taxpayers money (my money) to make these changes and changes to our financial system? Great example is the creation of your War Room for the energy sector. What I have seen is a disturbing trend with our provincial Conservatives (PC, UPC, Wildrose, Reform and Canadian Alliance) - these members are more concerned about upsetting and what might not benefit the large corporations along their large citizen donors rather the concern and impact decisions the average Albertan citizen. The government decisions should be made to ensure ALL Albertans will share in the benefits, which you have not done Premier Kenney. First, your party decreased corporation taxes, focusing on the oil & gas sector which makes up only about 6% of our provincial budget. You have contributed to our ballooning deficit by decreasing our province’s total revenue which is used to counter our expenses. By decreasing our total revenue and increase our expenses, you don’t have to be an accountant to realize this equals a huge deficit we will have to pay for in the future. You are forgetting, Premier Kenney, your UPC party was voted by Albertans; therefore you were voted in by ALL Albertans just not from large corporations or oil & gas. You said during your campaign, your UPC government will balance the budget, create jobs and make Alberta prosperous like it once was. Your actions since you came into power in 2019, show you haven’t considered this in your decision making. You have not given prosperity to ALL Albertans, yes you have said you have created jobs for your citizens but you have taken more jobs away from your citizens too (nurses, doctors, teachers, and support workers in both healthcare and education sectors). You did tell us during your 2019 campaign, you need to make healthcare cuts to bring our healthcare cost/person lower BUT you would not impact frontline services for Albertans. Premier Kenney, that is contrary to what you have done. For example, your health cuts to AHS have forced them having to make job cuts to their AHS employees - nurses, home care aids, allied health therapists, porters, housekeeping etc. These are the Albertans who provide the healthcare services and if they are less people to provide these services, this will no doubt affect how available the healthcare services you promised us would not be impacted by your cuts to our provincial healthcare budget. Do you not see the consequences of your actions?

Premier Kenney, I am disappointed to hear you are quietly making changes to our Protected Provincial Parklands. I have read this decision was made to boost our provincial revenue intake. Heartbreaking. You are willing to destroy our natural beauty that Albertans enjoy all year round, as well as tourists from across Canada and around the world, so you can increase your provincial revenue? I am sorry, doesn’t make sense to me. From my point of view, this action can only be interpreted as selfish and greedy, and not in the best interest of Alberta or Canada for that matter. There has to be other ways to increase our provincial revenues, before destroying our protected lands. I understand that you want to make our province a place to invest, so what you did was decrease the corporation tax. The ripple effects from your actions, Premier Kenney you decreased the amount of revenue the province would receive, which decreases the amount of money has for government expenses. Of course, when our revenue is less than our expenses, equals having a sizeable debt. Unfortunately, last week (Thursday August 27) it was announced by your Honourable Travis Toews, Minister of Finance, Alberta will have the largest deficit as well as he highest deficit of all the Canadian provinces. Imagine, under the late PC Premier Ralph Klein, who gave Albertans zero debt! What has happened that brought our debt load going from $0 to almost $1 Billion in a relatively short time? My first thought, total mismanagement of taxpayers money in projects benefiting only the Conservative party donors and larger corporations. Though the late Premier Klein made drastic cuts especially in the public sector (healthcare and education), he did achieve his goal of becoming a debt-free province. What an accomplishment for this province. Unfortunately, the years afterwards, the PC/UPC parties still haven’t learned the lesson of managing our province’s budget wisely and making financially sound decisions on projects which improves the quality of life for all Albertans.

Premier Kenney could you explain to me, why are you afraid of implementing a provincial sales tax? We are the only province that doesn’t have a sales tax. In past, I could see not having one due to the riches found in the oil & gas sector plus our oil prices per barrel were higher. This is not the case today, we can no longer rely on our resources (this has been obvious for years) as we became land-locked losing the ability to distribute our crude oil and then in 2020 oil prices crashed to negative prices. The Finance Minister over-projected the returns of oil last week by like $20/barrel, which increased the gap between our revenues and expenses leading to a larger debt to pay back. Quebec, Newfoundland and British Columbia, which are rich in natural resources like we are, along with Ontario with manufacturing - they all have provincial sales tax added with their Federal 5% GST. Change is inevitable in our lifetime and it is important to accept one might have no control of what is occurring but knows a change must be made. Premier Lougheed knew one could not rely on our natural resources for yearly government revenue due to the flux of costs per barrel. This was the reason behind the creation of Alberta’s Heritage Fund. Yourself along with the UPC government and all previous PC Premiers have mismanaged our revenues and this has contributed to what we are facing now - a huge deficit in 2020. Yes, the NDP government contributed to increasing the debt load, but Premier Notley was trying to turning things around to improve things for Albertans, and similar to yourself, her government had to face multiple crises - Recession and Economic recovery; Fort McMurray fires and exporting our crude oil from northern Alberta to a market for a reasonable price. This lead to some of the increased to our current debt amount, I agree, but she had 4 years while your party have had 45 years to make positive changes to our oil & gas sector to become profitable and efficient as well as to maintain the economy of Alberta, while not solely relying on revenue from the energy sector for paying for our government expenses. 

Premier Kenney, with your party’s refusal of implementing a provincial sales tax to help our government revenue, giving our federal carbon tax monies to Ottawa instead of keeping it within our coffers and reducing the amount of revenue received by your corporation tax; you have decreased the amount of revenue received to pay for our government expenses. This has lead to the highest debt in Alberta’s history as well as being the largest debt by any province in Canada. Not something you wouldn’t want as front page news. As this would be a new tax, we can start from scratch - have the monies from the provincial sales tax to be earmarked for budgeting expenses for oil & gas or assist in paying for healthcare and education expenses. Something to think about in the future. 

Thank you for listening to my concerns on the issue of the energy sector and our environment, while looking at our bottom line - our provincial budget. If you have any questions or feedback for me, feel free to contact me at laura2travel@yahoo.ca. Looking forward in hearing from you. 

Sincerely yours, 

Laura Jean Rutherford, CHIM

Cc’d:

Honourable Erin O’Toole - Federal leader of Conservatives Party of Canada, Leader of Oppositon

Honourable Rachel Notley - NDP Leader of Alberta, Provincial Leader of the Oppositon

Honourable Chrystia Freeman -  Minister of Finance

Honourable Travis Toews - Alberta’s Minister of Finance & President of Treasury Board

Honourable Doug Schweitzer - Minister of Jobs, Economy and Innovation 

Honourable Jason Nixon - Minister of Environment and Parks, House Leader

Honourable Devon Bilous - NDP Critic for Economic Development, Trade and Tourism 

Honourable Prasad Panda - MLA for Calgary - Skyview 

Ms. Jag Sahota - MP for Calgary - Northeast 

Ms. Shannon Phillips - Alberta’s NDP Critic for Finance

Mr. Irfan Samir - Alberta’s NDP Critic for Energy and Natural Gas

Mr. Marlin Schmidt - Alberta’s NDP Critic for Enviroment 

Mr. Naheed Nenshi, Mayor of Calgary