Candidates head into 2nd last weekend before Alberta vote
Posted Apr 24, 2015 3:55 pm.
Last Updated Apr 24, 2015 4:08 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Compliments and pardons on the campaign trail in Calgary and Edmonton Friday have replaced snubs and teasing from Thursday night’s televised debate
Candidates are heading into the second last weekend before Albertans head to the polls, May 5th.
Liberal Leader David Swann spent Friday door knocking in his riding of Calgary Mountain View.
Alberta premier tips hat to NDP Leader Rachel Notley’s debating skills
CALGARY – Alberta Premier Jim Prentice is calling NDP Leader Rachel Notley a skilled debater, but questions how her party could afford its election promises.
The Progressive Conservative leader and Notley went head to head in a televised election debate on Thursday night.
Prentice points to the vast differences in the parties and says Alberta is not an NDP province.
Prentice shrugged off suggestions he was dismissive of Wildrose Leader Brian Jean (GENE) during the debate.
He says he tried to engage Jean early and was looking for an answer on where the Wildrose party would find the money for its fiscal plan.
Prentice says Jean failed to provide any answers, so he concentrated on Notley instead.
(The Canadian Press)
Alberta NDP leader Notley says Prentice, Wildrose leader aren’t that different.
CALGARY – Alberta N-D-P leader Rachel Notley is urging voters not to make the same mistake by giving the Progressive Conservatives another mandate.
Notley told supporters in Calgary that some people might be considering voting Wildrose as an alternative to the PCs.
But she says Wildrose leader Brian Jean and Premier Jim Prentice aren’t that different.
Notley says the two men sat in the same Conservative caucus in Ottawa and voted the same way federally more than 600 times.
She says Jean wants to create a two-tier health system and to subsidize the wealthy so they can fly abroad for private surgeries.
Notley says both Wildrose and the PCs want to give corporations billions in tax giveaways and want to cut health care and education.
(The Canadian Press)
Alberta’s Wildrose party would cover schools fees if elected.
EDMONTON – Alberta Wildrose Leader Brian Jean (GENE) says his party will do away with mandatory school fees if it forms the government after the May 5 election.
Jean says the fees are unfair to families and cost about $100 per student each year.
Jean says a Wildrose government would reimburse schools $100 million a year to make up for the fees.
He says the cost would be covered off through broader cost-saving initiatives such as eliminating 3,200 senior manager jobs.
Premier Jim Prentice and the Progressive Conservatives say the Wildrose math is off.
They note that Alberta Education estimates the fees to cost $193 million a year, and they say the Wildrose must let voters know where the money would come from.
Jean said he has no concerns with the Premier turning his back to him during the election leaders’ T-V debate Thursday night.
(The Canadian Press)
