Another UCP elected representative has joined a chorus of praise for geographic diversity represented in the provincial government’s spending plans.
Grande Prairie-Wapiti MLA Ron Wiebe said late last week that the proposed Alberta budget commits nearly $5-billion to “ensure the north remains strong and competitive and continues to grow.”
Wiebe added: “This is more than just numbers on a page. It’s a direct investment in the people who drive our industries, educate our children and build our communities.”
Wiebe’s comments in the legislature come after a fellow northern MLA’s ousting from the UCP caucus over his views on rural spending. And they continue a theme of UCP faithful underlining the budget’s support for northern, rural and regional economies.
Scott Sinclair on March 1 criticized his party for favouring urban centres over smaller ones in the 2025 budget. Now an Independent MLA, the Lesser Slave Lake representative turned to social media to topple the first public domino leading to the end of his caucus membership.
“I’m furious at the amount of money being funneled into Edmonton and Calgary (as usual) while Northern Alberta and our riding are largely ignored,” his post reads. “The continuous flow of our GDP to urban centers while rural Alberta — the backbone of this province — gets left behind is appalling.”
The post said he found most of the budget “at best, disappointing and, at worst, unacceptable for me, my family and my constituents.”
But Wiebe told a different story.
In his statement to the legislature, he said that — on top of $4.4-billion in north-bound operating dollars — the budget earmarks $470-million in capital investment to support economic growth, infrastructure and essential services. The UCP is putting $9-million into the Northern Regional Economic Development Program and $1.5-million into a bursary to attract skilled professionals to the north, he said.
Five new schools are in planning stages for Cold Lake, Fairview, Grande Prairie and Fort McMurray, Wiebe said. Health care budgeting includes $80-million for the La Crête maternity and community health centre, and $15-million for urgent care planning in Cold Lake and Fort McMurray.
Also, $189-million is slated for replacing a health centre in Beaverlodge “in my beautiful constituency,” Wiebe said.
Sinclair’s post said health care in his riding has “hit rock bottom, and while I hear of positive changes happening elsewhere, they aren’t happening here. How are we to accept multiple emergency department closures when the nearest care is hours away?”
If it’s going to run a deficit — a move Sinclair said he doesn’t normally favour — he wanted the UCP government to stop hospital closures, bring back local maternity services, allow for surgeries closer to home and build a helipad in High Prairie.
Wiebe wasn’t the only UCP member this week to present the other side by talking up regional spending. UCP MLAs and cabinet members mentioned roads and emergency routes, economic and workforce development and the film industry. The restoration of a grant program in place of taxes on provincial buildings will put $17-million into rural municipal coffers in 2025, the legislature heard.
“Alberta’s government is absolutely charging ahead in its unwavering commitment to the growth and prosperity of northern and regional economies,” said Tany Yao, the UCP member for Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo. “Our budget is phenomenal, recognizing the north as the important piece of Alberta’s economy that it truly is.”
Yao held up the Northern and Regional Economic Development Program as “the crown jewel” of smaller centre investments, with $9-million over three years for job creation, business expansion and economic diversification.
“We’re talking about an infusion of resources that will supercharge the local economy,” said Yao, the parliamentary secretary for small business and northern development.
Livingstone-Macleod MLA Chelsae Petrovic emphasized support for industrial diversification as an example of a government dedicated to balancing environmental concerns with the building of economies beyond major centres.
Petrovic called her sprawling southern Alberta riding “a hub of economic opportunity built on sectors that have sustained families and businesses for generations.”
Nolan Dyck, the UCP member for Grande Prairie, said: “Alberta’s rural municipalities are extremely important to our province’s identity and success.”
“From driving Alberta’s agriculture, forestry and energy industries forward to producing good-paying jobs and an affordable cost of living, rural Alberta is the definition of the Alberta advantage and is truly the best place in our province to live, work and raise a family. This makes it incredibly important that we continue supporting our rural municipalities,” Dyck said.
The NDP has supported Sinclair’s right to speak his mind. Sinclair was punished for “simply standing up for his constituents, something every MLA is elected to do,” Jodi Calahoo Stonehouse, the NDP’s shadow cabinet minister for forestry and parks, said March 11.
Calahoo Stonehouse characterized Sinclair’s ousting as a slight against rural Albertans and Indigenous communities.
“Instead of listening to a rural, Indigenous member of their own team, (the UCP) shut him out. Instead of listening to the member for Lesser Slave Lake about his constituents’ concerns for better health care, better infrastructure so rural Albertans can get treatment close to home, or finishing critical roadways like Highway 88 so Albertans can travel safely, they fired him from their own team,” said Calahoo Stonehouse.
Highway 88 is a major north-south connector in the Lesser Slave Lake and Peace River ridings. About 430 km long, it runs between Slave Lake and High Level.
“Rural Albertans and Indigenous communities expect better,” said Calahoo Stonehouse.
Most of Lesser Slave Lake’s commonly identified communities are First Nation reserves, Métis settlements or otherwise largely made up of Indigenous residents.
Sinclair is a fifth-generation Indigenous businessperson. Elected in 2023, he is one of three Indigenous representatives in the legislature. The other two are Brooks Arcand-Paul and Calahoo Stonehouse, both shadow cabinet members for the NDP.
A road that is getting attention in Lesser Slave Lake is Highway 686, an east-west connector. Paving the road between Peerless Lake and Trout Lake is in the budget, and so is the start of design work to extend the highway from Fort McMurray to Peerless Lake.
The finished project will be “a key roadway project to connect the province’s northeast and northwest regions,” the budget says.
Devin Dreeshen, the minister of transportation and corridors, highlighted Highway 686 improvements as “a really unique project” that will eventually see over 200 kilometres of pavement connect Fort McMurray and Grande Prairie. “It’ll really unlock the true value of northern Alberta.”
Alberta Budget 2025 anticipates a $5.2-billion deficit to allow spending of $74.17-billion, as the province braces for economic turmoil stemming from a trade war with the U.S. The provincial deficit is set to drop to $2.4-billion next year and $2-billion in 2027, before provincial legislation requires the government to run a balanced budget.
