Interim Liberal Leader John Roggeveen Reacts to Throne Speech

Alberta Interim leader John Roggeveen offers the following response to the Alberta Throne Speech: 

Albertans left out of Danielle Smith’s address last week who were looking for relief in today’s Throne Speech were once again disappointed. 

Rehashing the priorities from her address, Premier Smith doubled down on her disastrous ideas that plummeted the UCP’s popularity with Albertans before her arrival and will make Alberta a pariah among the provinces. 

The fact that Bill 1 of Smith’s first legislative sitting is the Sovereignty Act says it all. Bill 1 will weaken Canada and Alberta’s place within it. Worse yet, by undermining the rule of law it will drive investment and opportunity away from our province when we need it most. 

Instead of meaningfully helping all Albertans through a time of twin healthcare and affordability crises, Smith is playing Scrooge, doling out modest help to only some of the most vulnerable as a smokescreen, while simultaneously pursuing legislation so dangerous and disconnected from reality that even her own caucus spoke out against it. 

Despite paying lip service to the aforementioned crises, Smith’s affordability plan is nothing more than small adjustments and miserly corrections to past UCP mistakes. Meanwhile, her healthcare strategy amounts to identifying problems her government created and blaming them on those dedicated public servants who work anywhere aside from the “front lines”. 

What we saw today was not leadership. It was politics before people from an out-of-touch Premier who has spent too much time on the airwaves coddling conspiracy theorists and not enough time talking with regular Albertans. 

The Alberta Liberals will continue to offer true solutions and a real alternative. We are putting people first.