Open House Forum Commences Without Premier in Attendance

No real answers found without both sides of story

Daryl Martin-Breault
Staff Reporter

An open house forum was held at the Social Center on Wednesday, August 25 to discuss the political ramifications of the ATCO transmission line project and Bills 50, 36 and 19.

Organized by the Vegreville Area Landowners Transmission Line Opposition Association (VALTOA), each of the leaders of the four major political parties were invited.  Dr. David Swann came to represent the Liberal Party, Daniele Smith of the Wildrose Alliance and Brian Mason and the NDP.  Conspicuously absent was Premier Ed Stelmach, also the local MLA, or a representative of his office.  Adding fuel to the political fire was word of Stelmach holding private press conferences with select members of the media at the Vegreville Centennial Library shortly before the VALTOA meeting began.

When asked about it, NDP Leader Mason called the private press conferences a “cynical trick to try and draw the media away from this meeting.”

In all, arguably everyone in attendance was disappointed to see the empty chair next to Swann with Stelmach’s name on it.

Stelmach said in the press conference that the VALTOA meeting was a political event designed to debate the merits of the three Bills.  “Those bills had long public consultation,” said Stelmach, “amendments were made to reflect what we heard from the public.”

The meeting was very much a political debate, though without a PC representative, not much of one.  The debate focused on one side of the argument and one side only, the oppositions.

The meeting touched on five main topics: 1)The costs to electricity consumers for transmission upgrades proposed by AESO and those included in Bill 50; 2)The effects of Bill 50 on Albertans rights to transparency and assurance that the public interest is served; 3)Electricity export, who really knows and who’s not telling; 4)Property rights and compensation- Bill 19; and 5)Central Planning: Bill 36;

The framework of the question posed to the party leaders was “If you formed a government tomorrow, what would you do?”

The answers were insightful party policy to say the least, but without Ed Stelmach, provided no real answers, only the opinions of his critics.

Regarding Bill 50- The Electric Statutes Amendment Act, VALTOA says the Act “enables the province to declare an electricity transmission proposal as Critical Transmission Infrastructure”, basically, bypassing the regulatory commissions like the Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO) and the Alberta Utilities Commission (AUC) who would investigate the proposals and force the companies to justify their need for the infrastructure.  As Swann said, “They (the AUC) are the experts, we’re not the experts, we’re politicians!  We shouldn’t be making those decisions.”

Mason very pointedly stated that he wanted to know why Alberta required an 800% increase in the value of the provinces transmission systems.  “Now, that’s not to accommodate growth, because the province has not grown, its economy has not grown by 8 times,” Mason told the audience.

Smith compared the increase to an 800% increase of Highway 16, “If you think about what this might mean were we to apply this to any other type of infrastructure project, like for instance the highway we drove up here from Edmonton on, Highway 16.  If we took that 4 lane highway and did an eight-fold increase to it, we would be looking at having a 32 lane highway going from Edmonton to Vegreville.  Well sure, I suppose if you built a 32-lane highway you’d never have to worry about traffic stops.  But the question is does it makes sense to build a 32-lane highway when a 4-lane highway does the trick?  This is the debate that we’re facing right now.”

The discussion moved to Bill 19, The Land Assembly Project Act.  From outward appearances, without having studied the act in depth, Bill 19 is the Expropriation Act on steroids.  While the Expropriation Act allowed government to purchase the land, Bill 19, according to VALTOA, gives government the right to confiscate the land without invoking the Expropriation Act and makes no provision for compensation other than the value for the land.  Swann called Bills 19, 36 and 50 violations of “fundamental surface rights and human rights” saying the government has “run amok, that has taken into itself the power to dictate, to control, to confiscate at its whim, without right to appeal in most cases and without an appeal to the courts in the case of the Bill 36, the Land Stewardship Act.”

And speaking of Bill 36, all three party leaders wanted to know why Central Planning was centralized.  Said Smith, “We now have 23 cabinet ministers sitting around the table deciding what land uses will be permitted and what land uses will be prohibited, on crown land, on private land, on every acre of land in the province.  Now, this is a central planners dream to have a piece of legislation like this.  I know that many of our MLA’s are quite smart and I know that many of our cabinet ministers are quite smart, but I simply do not believe that from the Legislature in Edmonton, under the dome, that 23 people can make decisions of that magnitude on every acre of land in this province.”

While not exactly a debate per se, Swann called the meeting “a strong demonstration of democracy in action” and stated that Alberta needs more of this democracy.

With no real forthcoming answers from the Progressive Conservative party, maybe one day soon they will step up and face constituents, and explain to everyone the what and why behind their reasoning.

Exclusive Interview with Premier Ed Stelmach

Exclusive Interview with NDP Leader Brian Mason

Exclusive Interview with Liberal Party Leader Dr. David Swann

Exclusive Interview with Wildrose Alliance Leader Danielle Smith

The Roast of Ed Stelmach

Transcript of VALTOA Open House Forum