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Alberta

Alberta 2023 budget plows ahead with twinning highway 11 from Sylvan Lake to Rocky Mountain House

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Building Alberta’s economic corridor network

Budget 2023 includes strategic investments in Alberta’s highway network to build economic corridors, creating jobs, improving safety and supporting economic development.

Budget 2023 includes $8 billion for the Ministry of Transportation and Economic Corridors’ three-year capital plan, a $718-million increase compared with Budget 2022.

“Budget 2023 is focused on securing Alberta’s future by growing the economy. Our investments will enhance economic corridors that provide vital links to markets in and out of Alberta, helping our industries expand and succeed. These projects will increase the safety and efficiency of our provincial highway network, improving travel for Albertans and commercial carriers in key industries.”

Devin Dreeshen, Minister of Transportation and Economic Corridors

The total capital investment is $2 billion for planning, design and construction of major highway and bridge projects. This work focuses on improving traffic flow and supporting investments in the province’s major trade corridors. Examples of projects across the province that are receiving funding include the Calgary and Edmonton ring roads, Highway 3 twinning, Highway 11 twinning, and replacing the Highway 2 and Highway 556 interchange at Balzac. This capital investment funding also includes $75.5 million over three years for 23 engineering or planning projects to address known future needs.

“Budget 2023 is investing in Alberta drivers through improvements to Highway 60 through Acheson. These improvements will help families save time on their commute while improving the efficient movement of goods across the province. Budget 2023 also responds to safety concerns from the community with a new intersection at Highway 16A and Range Road 20 in Parkland County. The new intersection will not only help area residents get to and from home safely but will also improve traffic flow along this major economic corridor.”

Shane Getson, parliamentary secretary for Economic Corridors and MLA for Lac Ste. Anne-Parkland

“Highway 63, north of Fort McMurray, is a critical link in northern Alberta for oversize and overweight vehicles transporting goods for the energy sector. Twinning this highway will improve efficiency and safety for both commercial drivers and commuters. It also enables oilsands workers to more easily commute from Fort McMurray, which we know provides a healthier lifestyle for them and their families as opposed to flying from out of province and living in a camp. The workers who decide to make this move will see the benefits of living in such an amazing province like Alberta.”

Tany Yao, parliamentary secretary for Rural Health and MLA for Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo

“Alberta’s Industrial Heartland Association is pleased that the 55-year-old Vinca Bridge replacement is included in the Government of Alberta’s 2023 budget. As a vital component of Alberta’s high-load corridor and a strategic connector in Alberta’s Industrial Heartland, the bridge services a thriving industrial zone with over $45 billion in total capital investment and billions more expected in the coming years. Replacing Vinca Bridge will shorten travel times, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and enhance the competitiveness of both the Industrial Heartland and the manufacturing supply chain that contributes to its success.”

Mark Plamondon, executive director, Alberta’s Industrial Heartland Association

“We have been advocating hard for twinning and rail grade separation for Highway 60, and we are pleased to see this commitment from the Government of Alberta. Acheson is not only the beating, industrial heart of Parkland County, it is one of the largest industrial areas in Western Canada. Completing this work in a timely matter will improve access and movement along Highway 60 and allow for further development in Acheson, which will contribute to economic growth and job creation throughout Parkland County and the Edmonton region.”

Allan Gamble, mayor, Parkland County

“Representing hundreds of businesses in the Acheson area, the Acheson Business Association is thrilled with and would like to thank the Government of Alberta for this latest announcement for the twinning and rail grade separation for Highway 60. Highway 60 is an important connector of arterial highways, allowing products to move all directions through the metro Edmonton area, and the twinning and overpass will create a safer route for employees, travellers and business owners who are passing through this stretch of road every day. This will also enable the region to continue to attract more investors and businesses by reducing delays and eliminating congestion along this major trade corridor.”

Colin Tooth, member and past chair, Acheson Business Association board of directors

Budget 2023 also includes $1.7 billion over three years for capital maintenance and renewal, which extends the life of the province’s existing road and bridge network and helps industry create and maintain jobs. These investments will allow the province to maintain existing roads and bridges to support safe and efficient travel to benefit Albertans and the economy.

Transportation and Economic Corridors will also be providing $3.9 billion for capital grants to municipalities over the next three years. This includes maintaining the funding commitment to Calgary and Edmonton for their LRT projects and continuing to provide funding for the Strategic Transportation Infrastructure Program to help municipalities improve critical local transportation infrastructure. Ongoing investments in water and wastewater infrastructure programs will also ensure all Albertans have reliable access to clean drinking water and effective wastewater services.

Additionally, Budget 2023 will provide nearly $400 million to support building and repairing water management infrastructure that provides irrigation for the agriculture sector and flood mitigation for Alberta communities such as the Springbank Off-stream Reservoir.

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.

Alberta

Media melts down as Danielle Smith moves to end ‘transitioning’ of children in Alberta

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From LifeSiteNews

By Jonathon Van Maren

After Alberta’s Danielle Smith put forth legislation to protect kids from being gender ‘transitioned,’ the Canadian media went on a predictable melt down, citing ‘experts’ who blatantly lie to advance the LGBT agenda.

A year after announcing her intention to combat transgender ideology and protect children, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has tabled three pieces of UCP (United Conservative Party) government legislation: 

  • The Education Amendment Act 2024 will require parental consent for “socially transitioning” children under the age of 16 (changing a child’s name or “preferred pronouns”). The bill also gives parents an “opt-in” option for any sexual or content at school. Smith has emphasized that the Alberta Teaching Profession Commission has the power to discipline teachers if they decide to break the law. 
  • The Health Statues Amendment Act 2024 will ban the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors, as well as prohibit sex change surgeries on minors. 
  • The Fairness and Safety in Sport Act will ban trans-identifying men from female sports teams.  

Together, these three bills represent the most definitive pushback against gender ideology in Canada by any premier. Smith’s decision to announce her intent to pursue such legislation and then wait has turned out to be politically savvy—it has given the UCP government a good look at the LGBT response, and during that time the U.K.’s Labour government has successfully fought to maintain a similar ban in the courts and publicly rebutted many of the scare tactics used by LGBT activists.

Smith and the UCP are thus walking into this debate with eyes wide open, and are clearly certain that the public is on their side (it is) and that the legislation can survive the court challenges surely coming from LGBT activists. The policies are clearly popular with the UCP party’s base, who handed Smith a staggering 91.5% approval rating in her leadership review at UCP gathering in Red Deer last Saturday.  

The party also passed 35 policy resolutions, including several that indicate the UCP’s willingness to go further in fighting transgender ideology, with resolutions that would restrict “exclusively female spaces” like bathrooms and changerooms to females and designating transgender surgeries as “elective cosmetic procedures” not funded by the taxpayer. The motions received near-unanimous support.  

The Canadian press, unsurprisingly, is working hard to present policies that the vast majority of Canadians support as an attack on fundamental norms (albeit norms that only surfaced in the last few years and were never presented to voters). Global News ran the headline: “Alberta unveils 3 sweeping bills affecting trans and gender-diverse youth.” It is important to note that the press accepts the premises of transgender ideology as the starting point for their reporting, with heavy usage of nonsensical phrases like “gender-diverse youth,” which implies that there are many genders. 

In fact, Global News and other Canadian outlets trotted out talking points that have been definitively rebutted by the U.K.’s Cass Review and multiple medical studies—in fact, even the New York Times has been reporting on the permanent harms of puberty blockers over the past several years. An example from Global News: 

Alberta parents of gender-diverse youth like Haley Wray believe the new laws will give kids less choice — especially when it comes to health-care that is not permanent but instead, gives kids time to work through their identity struggles. 

‘Hormone blockers are a very valuable tool,’ Wray said, explaining they have a very small window of effectiveness to pause, but not prevent, puberty. ‘It is reversible because nothing changes. And what that does is it allows youth and families to have that that pause, that break to explore further, validate, understand what this means and know that permanent changes aren’t happening.’

Wray believes the proposed legislation will make the province a less safe place for tens of thousands of Alberta kids who aren’t straight. It’s why, Wray says, a growing number of families with transgender children are now grappling with whether Alberta is a place they can stay. ‘I know people who have, and I know people who genuinely feel like there is likely nowhere to go,’ she said. 

This is incorrect. Puberty blockers cause permanent damage, and children may be rendered permanently sterile after taking them for a relatively short period of time. Puberty is not something that can be “paused,” and it frequently causes irreversible rather than reversible damage. Smith and her government understand this, which is why they have decided to pass this legislation—not, as nearly every press outlet claimed, to “target trans youth,” but to protect them. 

The CBC chimed in with sentences like this one: 

Terms like ‘biological female’ and ‘biological male’ can be used to imply that transgender people are still their assigned sex at birth, despite their identity. 

To translate: a scientifically accurate and precise statement is now an ideological one, but inherently ideological language invented by the transgender movement over the past decade is, in fact, technically accurate. People can identify as anything they want; it is irrelevant to their biology. The CBC presents pointing this out as some sort of propagandistic attack on vulnerable people. 

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Jonathon’s writings have been translated into more than six languages and in addition to LifeSiteNews, has been published in the National PostNational ReviewFirst Things, The Federalist, The American Conservative, The Stream, the Jewish Independent, the Hamilton SpectatorReformed Perspective Magazine, and LifeNews, among others. He is a contributing editor to The European Conservative.

His insights have been featured on CTV, Global News, and the CBC, as well as over twenty radio stations. He regularly speaks on a variety of social issues at universities, high schools, churches, and other functions in Canada, the United States, and Europe.

He is the author of The Culture WarSeeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of AbortionPatriots: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Pro-Life MovementPrairie Lion: The Life and Times of Ted Byfield, and co-author of A Guide to Discussing Assisted Suicide with Blaise Alleyne.

Jonathon serves as the communications director for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.

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Alberta

Alberta calling for federal election! Premier Smith demands feds scrap dangerous oil and gas production caps

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Premier Danielle Smith, Minister of Environment and Protected Areas Rebecca Schulz and Minister of Energy and Minerals Brian Jean issued the following statement on the proposed federal oil and gas production cap:

“This production cap will hurt families, hurt businesses and hurt Canada’s economy. We will defend our province, our country and our Constitutional rights.

“Make no mistake, this cap violates Canada’s constitution. Section 92A clearly gives provinces exclusive jurisdiction over non-renewable natural resource development yet this cap will require a one million barrel a day production cut by 2030.

“The evidence is overwhelming. Three reports from reputable firms have shown that these regulations will sucker-punch Canada’s economy, a million barrels cut every day according to S&P Global, $28 billion a year in lost GDP according to Deloitte, and up to 150,000 lost jobs according to the Conference Board of Canada.

“The losses to GDP mean billions a year will disappear from the economy. Billions that won’t be going towards new schools, hospitals and roads, all for a reckless ideological scheme that will not reduce global emissions.

“Ultimately, this cap will lead Alberta and our country into economic and societal decline. The average Canadian family would be left with up to $419 less for groceries, mortgage payments and utilities every month. Canadian parents and workers will suffer while Justin Trudeau outsources the duty to provide safe, affordable, reliable and responsibly produced oil and gas to dictators and less clean producers around the world. We could be the solution. Instead, Ottawa would rather sacrifice our ability to lead.

“Tweaks won’t work. This cap must be scrapped. Alberta’s government is actively exploring the use of every legal option, including a constitutional challenge and the use of the Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act. We will not stand idly by while the federal government sacrifices our prosperity, our constitution and our quality of life for its extreme agenda.”

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