Last week, Dr. Em Pijl, a researcher at the University of Lethbridge, presented to City Council “Urban Social Issues Study”, a study into the impacts the Lethbridge Supervised Consumption Site has had on the local neighbourhood.
A couple of years ago, the local paper ran a story with the following headline: “Low-income families not using program meant to help save for kids’ education”.
This is the thing that Conservatives and Liberals can’t seem to get through their heads. Poor people can’t afford to save. They can’t afford to spend in order to later receive a tax break. Tax breaks, top ups, matching funds—none of them help poor people because they all require poor people first spending money they don’t have: if you don’t have the money to spend, you can’t benefit from these programmes.
Here’s the problem with focusing on balanced budgets.
Balanced budgets rarely come with increased revenue, which means they must be accomplished with decreased expenses. And decreased expenses always means job losses. Because, as I’ve discussed before, everything the government spends money on creates jobs.
On 2 December 2019, Lethbridge-East MLA Nathan Neudorf spoke to the Alberta legislature, saying the seemingly random rant seen below:
On 20 February 2019, Jason Kenney, then the Official Opposition leader, said in a press conference that if elected, a UCP government would conduct a performance review of Alberta Health Services within 30 days of taking office.
“With the most expensive health system in Canada, I believe we can find some savings to do things more efficiently without affecting front-line services.”
Jason Kenney, as reported by Dustin Cook. “Jason Kenney calls for Alberta Health Services review, says UCP will not make cuts to health care”. Edmonton Journal. 20 February 2019.
He reiterated in the press conference, “If we can find the money, there will be increases in the health budget. There will be no cuts.”
Let’s remember that during the 2015 federal campaign, the NDP were the frontrunners. Right up until about a month before the election. It was about that time that the Liberals started getting worried. Liberals don’t think the NDP are a viable party to govern in Parliament, so they assumed that NDP winning would actually result in a Conservative win. They use this belief to scare left-leaning voters to get behind them, saying that if people vote NDP, they will split the vote.
But it takes two to tango.
If the Conservative Party of Canada wins the federal election later this month, I think we should be careful about interpreting that as meaning that Canadian voters are conservative.
I received this email this afternoon from former mayor, Rajko Dodic. regarding an earlier blog post on Elect Lethbridge:
To: Kim Siever and Elect Lethbridge
Pursuant to section 13 of the Defamation Act of Alberta, I am providing you notice of my intention to bring Action against you for defamation for the article entitled: ‘Ìs there a connection between Bob Ackerman and Dodic’s 2010 mayoral campaign?’ posted by Kim Siever on the Elect Lethbridge Website on September 28, 2013 and, additionally, with respect to any further defamatory writings and comments which may come to my attention.
Rajko Dodic, QC