Utility rate adjustment amounts to thievery

By Letter to the Editor on August 28, 2021.

Editor:
As socialists-light run this province into a hole and even more rabid hard socialists chomp at the bit to run it into a deeper hole, playing their games, tinkering with democratic processes, tightening their grip on your homes, your life, your bank accounts – Lethbridge city council will debate “at a later council meeting”, “rule 034 from the AUC” authorizing any utility provider to add to all customer’s utility bills in the fall of 2021 a theft disguised as a “Utility Deferral Adjustment”. This theft – this “adjustment” a debit on your bank account, with you having zero say in the matter, will pay for multitudes of delinquent utility non-payers who didn’t meet their repayment commitment and the deadline of June 18, 2021.
So because some didn’t square up with their utility provider, UCP sanctions downloading the debts of delinquent non-payers onto those who did pay.
This is very, very dangerous territory folks – believe it!
The UCP has literally authorized, and unashamedly so, the theft of money directly from your bank account. Make no mistake about it the NDP would act exactly the same, just more cunningly.
This legislation passed May 2020. Did anyone notice? Do you care? Do you realize the Pandora’s Box this represents?
Dale Nally, associate minister of Natural Gas and Electricity, recently stated that “this small temporary rate rider” ensures that delinquent debt will be repaid in “the most transparent and straightforward manner.” I’m damn mad about such ludicrous thuggery, stealing from me.
Looking back, I ponder if the destitute homeless kid in 1967, living in a $50, 15-year-old Chevy, on Woodward’s parking lot in Calgary, struggling 24/7 to stay alive, never stealing, nor taking a nickel from anyone, clawing through unearned tragedies/poverty born into, could have fathomed such malfeasance.
I couldn’t have predicted – nor imagined – such thievery by my government being my reward for years of dedication to community, home, family and country.
Get off your duffs people – scream like hell – tell these thieves you will not be buried by their socialist wealth distribution programs without a fight and a protest!
A.W. Shier
Lethbridge