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Alberta

Province trumpets $105 million in new health spending for Rural Health Facilities Revitalization Program

Published

2 years ago

7 minute read

Strengthening rural health care

Budget 2023 expands rural health supports so Albertans can have additional access to modern health facilities and the care they need where and when they need it.

Alberta’s government is committed to expanding and modernizing rural hospitals and other health facilities across the province to protect quality health care, grow system capacity and support the best front-line health care workers in the world.

Having access to quality health care when and where Albertans need it includes expanding capacity to provide better access for Albertans living in rural and remote areas of the province.

“We are making sure we have the necessary funding in place to build and strengthen health care in our rural communities and address barriers to care for those looking for support and treatment close to home and family. This work includes programs that focus on how to recruit, retain and even train more physicians, nurses and other professionals in areas outside of the cities.”

Jason Copping, Minister of Health

Budget 2023 provides $105 million over three years for the Rural Health Facilities Revitalization Program, including $75 million in additional funding for capital projects in rural Alberta.

The program supports strategic renovations and developments in health facilities throughout the province, with an emphasis on emergency departments, EMS stations, surgical and dialysis clinics, and other clinical services to improve access to health care in rural Alberta.

Expanding capacity in the health care system also means having health care workers to fill those spots. In response, Alberta’s government launched the Health Workforce Strategy to attract and retain the health care workers needed now and create more training opportunities for local students and internationally trained medical graduates.

“All Albertans, no matter where they live, need and deserve access to our health system. Physicians are a critical part of that system, especially in rural areas where we are trusted to support the needs of neighbours, friends and colleagues during all phases of life. It is a special calling to work in rural health care, but it can be tremendously rewarding for those who pursue it.”

Dr. Cheyanne Vetter, facility medical director, Wainwright Health Centre

Rural Albertans are especially affected by the nationwide shortage of health care workers. To address this growing need, the Health Workforce Strategy provides $113 million to add 100 residency training spaces for newly graduated doctors, particularly in rural areas and specialist fields. Creating these new training spaces will provide more opportunities for Alberta students to learn, train and practise in their home communities.

In addition to this investment, a further $1 million will go toward exploring ways that regional post-secondary institutions, such as the University of Lethbridge and Northwestern Polytechnic in Grande Prairie, can help deliver medical education outside of Edmonton and Calgary.

“Whether it’s emergency care or surgeries, primary care or continuing care, Albertans deserve equitable health care services in their communities. I am proud of the investments government is making through Budget 2023, both with infrastructure funding and workforce planning strategies, to help support the future of rural health care in our province.”

 Garth Rowswell, MLA for Vermilion-Lloydminster-Wainwright

This year’s budget also funds the new agreement with the Alberta Medical Association, further stabilizing the health system and focusing on Alberta’s rural communities. Under the agreement, more than $250 million over four years will go to addressing pressures, including recruitment and retention programs so more Albertans can access family doctors, and supporting physicians so their practices remain viable.

Budget 2023 secures Alberta’s future by transforming the health care system to meet people’s needs, supporting Albertans with the high cost of living, keeping our communities safe and driving the economy with more jobs, quality education and continued diversification.

Quick facts

  • The Rural Health Revitalization Program provides capital funding for revitalizing select rural health facilities throughout the province.
    • Budget 2023 invests $105 million over three years for the Rural Health Facilities Revitalization Program. This includes $75 million in additional funding for new capital projects in rural Alberta.
    • To date, about $65 million has been committed to 22 projects across the province, including emergency department renovations, upgrades to EMS stations and new dialysis spaces.
  • An investment of $237 million over three years towards the Alberta Surgical Initiative Capital Program will help reduce surgical wait times and help Albertans receive the surgeries they need.
    • This includes $120 million in new funding for projects in 15 communities across the province to expand and modernize operating rooms in public hospitals.
  • Budget 2023 includes $64 million over three years to continue the La Crete Community Health Centre capital project to provide increased access to maternity health services.
  • $11 million over three years is part of a $23.5-million commitment to expand the renal dialysis program at the Chinook Regional Hospital in Lethbridge.
    • This project will relocate the dialysis unit to provide additional treatment spaces and address patient and staff safety concerns with the current site.
  • $3 million over three years in planning dollars is committed to the North Calgary/Airdrie Regional Health Centre.
  • $3 million over three years in planning dollars is committed to expanding the Strathcona Community Hospital.
  • Planning dollars are also committed for new or upgraded facilities in Bassano, Cardston and Whitecourt.
Related Topics:

This is a news release from the Government of Alberta.

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Is Canada’s Federation Fair?

Published on April 6, 2025

By

The Audit David Clinton

Contrasting the principle of equalization with the execution

Quebec – as an example – happens to be sitting on its own significant untapped oil and gas reserves. Those potential opportunities include the Utica Shale formation, the Anticosti Island basin, and the Gaspé Peninsula (along with some offshore potential in the Gulf of St. Lawrence).

So Quebec is effectively being paid billions of dollars a year to not exploit their natural resources. That places their ostensibly principled stand against energy resource exploitation in a very different light.

You’ll need to search long and hard to find a Canadian unwilling to help those less fortunate. And, so long as we identify as members of one nation¹, that feeling stretches from coast to coast.

So the basic principle of Canada’s equalization payments – where poorer provinces receive billions of dollars in special federal payments – is easy to understand. But as you can imagine, it’s not easy to apply the principle in a way that’s fair, and the current methodology has arguably lead to a very strange set of incentives.

According to Department of Finance Canada, eligibility for payments is determined based on your province’s fiscal capacity. Fiscal capacity is a measure of the taxes (income, business, property, and consumption) that a province could raise (based on national average rates) along with revenues from natural resources. The idea, I suppose, is that you’re creating a realistic proxy for a province’s higher personal earnings and consumption and, with greater natural resources revenues, a reduced need to increase income tax rates.

But the devil is in the details, and I think there are some questions worth asking:

  • Whichever way you measure fiscal capacity there’ll be both winners and losers, so who gets to decide?
  • Should a province that effectively funds more than its “share” get proportionately greater representation for national policy² – or at least not see its policy preferences consistently overruled by its beneficiary provinces?

The problem, of course, is that the decisions that defined equalization were – because of long-standing political conditions – dominated by the region that ended up receiving the most. Had the formula been the best one possible, there would have been little room to complain. But was it?

For example, attaching so much weight to natural resource revenues is just one of many possible approaches – and far from the most obvious. Consider how the profits from natural resources already mostly show up in higher income and corporate tax revenues (including income tax paid by provincial government workers employed by energy-related ministries)?

And who said that such calculations had to be population-based, which clearly benefits Quebec (nine million residents vs around $5 billion in resource income) over Newfoundland (545,000 people vs $1.6 billion) or Alberta (4.2 million people vs $19 billion). While Alberta’s average market income is 20 percent or so higher than Quebec’s, Quebec’s is quite a bit higher than Newfoundland’s. So why should Newfoundland receive only minimal equalization payments?

To illustrate all that, here’s the most recent payment breakdown when measured per-capita:
Equalization 2025-26 – Government of Canada

For clarification, the latest per-capita payments to poorer provinces ranged from $3,936 to PEI, $1,553 to Quebec, and $36 to Ontario. Only Saskatchewan, Alberta, and BC received nothing.

And here’s how the total equalization payments (in millions of dollars) have played out over the past decade:

Is energy wealth the right differentiating factor because it’s there through simple dumb luck, morally compelling the fortunate provinces to share their fortune? That would be a really difficult argument to make. For one thing because Quebec – as an example – happens to be sitting on its own significant untapped oil and gas reserves. Those potential opportunities include the Utica Shale formation, the Anticosti Island basin, and the Gaspé Peninsula (along with some offshore potential in the Gulf of St. Lawrence).

So Quebec is effectively being paid billions of dollars a year to not exploit their natural resources. That places their ostensibly principled stand against energy resource exploitation in a very different light. Perhaps that stand is correct or perhaps it isn’t. But it’s a stand they probably couldn’t have afforded to take had the equalization calculation been different.

Of course, no formula could possibly please everyone, but punishing the losers with ongoing attacks on the very source of their contributions is guaranteed to inspire resentment. And that could lead to very dark places.

Note: I know this post sounds like it came from a grumpy Albertan. But I assure you that I’ve never even visited the province, instead spending most of my life in Ontario.

1

Which has admittedly been challenging since the former primer minister infamously described us as a post-national state without an identity.

2

This isn’t nearly as crazy as it sounds. After all, there are already formal mechanisms through which Indigenous communities get more than a one-person-one-vote voice.

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Alberta

Big win for Alberta and Canada: Statement from Premier Smith

Published on April 2, 2025

By

Premier Danielle Smith issued the following statement on the April 2, 2025 U.S. tariff announcement:

“Today was an important win for Canada and Alberta, as it appears the United States has decided to uphold the majority of the free trade agreement (CUSMA) between our two nations. It also appears this will continue to be the case until after the Canadian federal election has concluded and the newly elected Canadian government is able to renegotiate CUSMA with the U.S. administration.

“This is precisely what I have been advocating for from the U.S. administration for months.

“It means that the majority of goods sold into the United States from Canada will have no tariffs applied to them, including zero per cent tariffs on energy, minerals, agricultural products, uranium, seafood, potash and host of other Canadian goods.

“There is still work to be done, of course. Unfortunately, tariffs previously announced by the United States on Canadian automobiles, steel and aluminum have not been removed. The efforts of premiers and the federal government should therefore shift towards removing or significantly reducing these remaining tariffs as we go forward and ensuring affected workers across Canada are generously supported until the situation is resolved.

“I again call on all involved in our national advocacy efforts to focus on diplomacy and persuasion while avoiding unnecessary escalation. Clearly, this strategy has been the most effective to this point.

“As it appears the worst of this tariff dispute is behind us (though there is still work to be done), it is my sincere hope that we, as Canadians, can abandon the disastrous policies that have made Canada vulnerable to and overly dependent on the United States, fast-track national resource corridors, get out of the way of provincial resource development and turn our country into an independent economic juggernaut and energy superpower.”

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