UCP government continuing to play the blame game

By Lethbridge Herald on October 6, 2020.

The blame game is always on the lips of those that are currently in power (re: “Throne speech missed the mark: Kenney,” Sept. 25 Herald). This Conservative government has no defence to offer for the mismanagement of the Heritage Fund since the retirement of Premier Lougheed in 1985. Mr. Kenney is very good at passing the buck to the federal government; in my opinion, the buck stops at his desk, with the Conservatives’ poor governance over the last 35 years.
How often do voters have to remind the Alberta government by “letters” of their mismanagement of the fund? In my case this may be the third letter since January 2013.
I will not enumerate again what the Conservatives have done and not done. Alberta, you know it well. I will say this: we have approximately, by the last count in 2019, $18.2 billion in our Heritage Fund started by Premier Lougheed in 1976. He then retired in 1985. There was, in 1987, $12.7 billion. So we have managed to up our fund by about $6 billion in 35 years.
I will say this “again” for all you die-hard Conservatives “at any cost” — Norway’s fund through oil and gas royalties, started in 1990, sits at $1 trillion.
Mr. Kenney, don’t blame the federal government for not helping the oil and gas industry. They are trying their best to help all Canadians through this pandemic.
The Alberta government has the responsibility of their own province’s industries. Booms and busts have always been an occurrence in Alberta. The Conservatives were not ready with a plan nor the money needed.
Josephine Aristone
Lethbridge