According to Wikipedia Vancouver is the fifth busiest port in North Ameica and first in Canada...
People in Vancouver might hate that for some reason, but the fact is since Prince Rupert and Kitimat seem to not care about being any kind of export facility the entire country needs ships/tankers running out of there. Its the whole reason that city exists in the first place.
This came up in the Alberta Oil thread but honest question: what the heck is going on with this? Is it normal operating procedure? Do Oilsands/Energy company CEO's regularly meet with and complained directly to Premier's office about public sector wage negotiations?
(Yeah, yeah jokes aside about Notley being literally in bed with the Unions - her husband is the spokesman for CUPE.)
What the flying frack does the Alberta Federation of Labour/Union bosses have anything to do with the oil and gas royalty review? Why is he even commenting?
Other than the obvious cash grab for the union, where the hell is the indignation from? And what is this supposed to mean?
“I have reasonably regular meetings with people in the premier’s office. This will be a subject for discussion at the next meeting.”
Wouldn't it be absolutely ridiculous to have executives at CAPP, Encana, Cenovus, or any oil and gas CEO's publicly upset at union negotiations and raises? Do they regularly meet with governments to object at public sector wage talks? Have I not noticed this in the past, what am I missing?
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Originally Posted by heep223
All this union talk scares me. Notley is a labour lawyer after all, she is probably extremely sympathetic to unions. It's her background.
I still can't believe she got elected in AB wow.
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Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch
To me the Unions are no better then the Lobby Groups out there on the other side of the coin. And we know that governments are unduley influenced by Lobby.
The fact that he's talking about discussing Royalties with the government is disturbing as it has nothing to do with the mandate of the union.
Notley is going to have to find the stones to stand up to the Union during the 170 different contract negotiations that are due up during her term in government.
I think that he let slip something that's pretty significant in terms of the unions being in bed with the government.
I think that she needs to let the public know what's being discussed in these meetings, or at the very least have the minutes from the meeting publicly available. Conversely I think it should be the same with lobby groups.
But this sounds suspiciously like over influence by a special interest group (AFL)
Unions aren just a friendly face or lobby group for the NDP, they are one and the same.
There was a kerfuffle when the federal leadership didn't give them a distinct vote as part of selecting Mulcair. i remember drama from the other leading candidate that the unions are part of their DNA and what a terrible thing. That guy, Brian Topp, runs our government now. Hooray.
To select Notley as leader, 80% of the votes came from party members. 20% were specifically given to unions as an entity. Or something like that.
And I don't buy the idea that union strategists were actually offside on the royalty outcome. McGowan might be blowing smoke because he's generally a loon who loves his own press, but i suspect his comments are pretty contrived to either reinforce the pragmatic headlines for the ndp, or maybe to trial balloon the idea of raising rates at higher prices if and when we get there. Probably just the former.
Not sure what to make of this. It's an interesting idea to trade future royalties for today's investments, though timing is odd. Applications have to be made in the next 2-3 months. So who's ready for that? And if they're that far along in planning what are we really incenting that a low dollar and commodity prices aren't already enough for?
My guess is there are a few projects already earmarked for this. Maybe the incentive is a trade off for the higher taxes and other costs the govt brought in?
Alberta’s NDP have plummeted to third place and Premier Rachel Notley’s personal approval rating has plunged just nine months after sweeping the Progressive Conservative Party from power, according to a new poll.
A Mainstreet Research/Postmedia poll of more than 3,000 Albertans this week shows the NDP have just 27 per cent popular support among decided voters — trailing the Wildrose at 33 per cent and the PCs at 31 per cent.
The survey suggests that while the NDP is still strong in the provincial capital, with 48 per cent support, it has only half that in Calgary and even less support — 22 per cent — in the rest of Alberta.
Not really too relevant to the Alberta election but Global ran a story on payments to politicians when they leave. In particular they were reporting on Len Webber who stepped down from his position as an MLA to run for the federal conservatives. When he left he accepted over $300,000 as a transition allowance based on his 10 years of service.
Seems really excessive and his decision has pretty poor optics and his stance is basically that he deserves it and doesn't feel his decision to accept the money is wrong in any sense. The report also mentions other politic figures who accepted partial payments or flat out refused to accept a transition payment.
Location: Wondering when # became hashtag and not a number sign.
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Originally Posted by calgarygeologist
Not really too relevant to the Alberta election but Global ran a story on payments to politicians when they leave. In particular they were reporting on Len Webber who stepped down from his position as an MLA to run for the federal conservatives. When he left he accepted over $300,000 as a transition allowance based on his 10 years of service.
Seems really excessive and his decision has pretty poor optics and his stance is basically that he deserves it and doesn't feel his decision to accept the money is wrong in any sense. The report also mentions other politic figures who accepted partial payments or flat out refused to accept a transition payment.
Alberta’s NDP have plummeted to third place and Premier Rachel Notley’s personal approval rating has plunged just nine months after sweeping the Progressive Conservative Party from power, according to a new poll.
A Mainstreet Research/Postmedia poll of more than 3,000 Albertans this week shows the NDP have just 27 per cent popular support among decided voters — trailing the Wildrose at 33 per cent and the PCs at 31 per cent.
The survey suggests that while the NDP is still strong in the provincial capital, with 48 per cent support, it has only half that in Calgary and even less support — 22 per cent — in the rest of Alberta.
At least Nenshi seems to be in the news supporting us these days:
what's nice is that it seems he is respected by the left, so maybe his words will carry farther?
Not really too relevant to the Alberta election but Global ran a story on payments to politicians when they leave. In particular they were reporting on Len Webber who stepped down from his position as an MLA to run for the federal conservatives. When he left he accepted over $300,000 as a transition allowance based on his 10 years of service.
Seems really excessive and his decision has pretty poor optics and his stance is basically that he deserves it and doesn't feel his decision to accept the money is wrong in any sense. The report also mentions other politic figures who accepted partial payments or flat out refused to accept a transition payment.
Those payments are nothing compared to what it was before though. To her credit, Alison Redford put a stop to the ridiculous transition allowances that used to take place. When my MLA quit in 2008 she walked away with over half a million dollars.
Its hard because I do think that they should get something in the sense that they serve for 4 years or more, and in some cases they lose their job rather suddenly. Like if you run for re-election and lose unexpectedly then its not like you could've been out applying for work or anything like that, because you expect to win re-election and have been doing your job as an MLA for the past however many years. So to think that they get something like a years salary is probably fair depending on years of service and things like that. Some of the old guard who retired when transition allowances were still there though made a ridiculous amount in my opinion.
Those payments are nothing compared to what it was before though. To her credit, Alison Redford put a stop to the ridiculous transition allowances that used to take place. When my MLA quit in 2008 she walked away with over half a million dollars.
Its hard because I do think that they should get something in the sense that they serve for 4 years or more, and in some cases they lose their job rather suddenly. Like if you run for re-election and lose unexpectedly then its not like you could've been out applying for work or anything like that, because you expect to win re-election and have been doing your job as an MLA for the past however many years. So to think that they get something like a years salary is probably fair depending on years of service and things like that. Some of the old guard who retired when transition allowances were still there though made a ridiculous amount in my opinion.
That these payments even existed in the first place is outrageous. In the private sector, you don't get a massive bonus for quitting your job or moving on to a new opportunity someplace else.
As for MLA's losing their job by failing to get re-elected I don't see anything wrong with politicians being treated the same as every other working citizen: receive a reasonable severance package and the eligibility to apply for EI.
^ That is in effect what they are though; a severance package. The issue is the size of them was ridiculous, but I know that has changed now. I don't know how they are calculated now, but I know they've been reduced from the former hundreds of thousands.
I was already somewhat aware this had been going on under the PC's but its interesting even the new dynamic of NDP/Wildrose on committees seem to be trying to justify this perk:
That these payments even existed in the first place is outrageous. In the private sector, you don't get a massive bonus for quitting your job or moving on to a new opportunity someplace else.
As for MLA's losing their job by failing to get re-elected I don't see anything wrong with politicians being treated the same as every other working citizen: receive a reasonable severance package and the eligibility to apply for EI.
The argument is that it's already difficult to get qualified people to run for office. And by qualified, what's usually meant is professionals with experience managing budgets and large organizations. How do you get seasoned lawyers, or executives in the private sector, or the owners of successful businesses, to quit their jobs, move to Edmonton, and become MLAs? They're quitting a good job already to make less money. Disrupting their lives and their careers.
The answer has been pensions and transition allowances. And yes, they got out of hand (as did private compensation in this province, if we're being honest). But I don't know that we should do away with them altogether.
The other approach is that we should expect just average Albertans to run for office. Looking at the provincial NDPs, and their difficulty in filling cabinet positions with qualified candidates, I'm not sure that's a persuasive argument.
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The argument is that it's already difficult to get qualified people to run for office. And by qualified, what's usually meant is professionals with experience managing budgets and large organizations. How do you get seasoned lawyers, or executives in the private sector, or the owners of successful businesses, to quit their jobs, move to Edmonton, and become MLAs? They're quitting a good job already to make less money. Disrupting their lives and their careers.
The answer has been pensions and transition allowances. And yes, they got out of hand (as did private compensation in this province, if we're being honest). But I don't know that we should do away with them altogether.
The other approach is that we should expect just average Albertans to run for office. Looking at the provincial NDPs, and their difficulty in filling cabinet positions with qualified candidates, I'm not sure that's a persuasive argument.
I don't think we get those people anyways, especially in the upper levels where your more likely getting political appointees, and that's maybe why the system is so badly run, look at the latest auditor generals report.
Right now as it stands we have a civil service that's paying 20% more then the equivalent civil servants elsewhere, the inside workers are bloated and over employed. And we have a unsupportable pension program.
As it stands the answer is one of two things.
You either have to cut the day to day costs of the civil servant
Or you have to make it more efficient and shrink it that way through attrition.
As far as the people running for office, we're not getting qualified people for the most part that are engines of industry for example, and especially with the NDP where we're getting a lot of rubes and inexperienced students and people that really shouldn't be in any position of decision making. Is it time that there is a requirement put on things like Cabinet positions? Like an actual job description with experience and educational requirements.
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At this point the whole blame the PC government thing just sounds like whining and misdirection.
It would gain a lot more traction if the NDP hadn't basically fumbled every file and every decision that they had done since taking power.
To me it just sounds like Notley is a dissapointing wet noodle with no fight in her, she got completely stabbed in the back when she went on the pipeline promotions thing in Ontario and Quebec and promised them that Alberta would be a better environmental citizen, came back and put in her ridiculously badly thought about carbon tax, and then basically had those provincial and municipal leaders nertz her to her face.
We are running on the NDP's budget and implementing their tax and other decisions, the time is past to keep going back to the well about the Conservative government, everyone knows they're bad, what are you doing to fix things now.
Make some more T-Shirts?
As it stands she didn't get any kind of change statement from the Prime Minister except that he's sending a check that was approved by the last federal government, oh and he threw us a quarter on the way out the door with the stabilization fund.
I mentioned before that we need a Premiere that's going to pick a fight and one of the posters here basically asked what that would do.
Well it would probably do more then sitting here listening to her whine about the last government while the BC government, The Prime Minister, the Quebec municipalities slowly shove unmentionable things up our collective butts.
Lougheed was effective against the NDP when he picked a fight with it because he basically used the fight to embarrass the federal government at the time and eventually get some concessions out of them and it eventually lead to the repeal of the program.
It at least showed some leadership and compelled Albertan's to fight through it and against it instead of accepting it.
You can bet if the Federal Government went after BC Industries or stopped Quebec from building more hydro lines to the States and other provinces that there would be a god awful fight from those provinces.
Notley is showing zero leadership, and zero capability to run a government.
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