Alberta
Ottawa will provide “actuarial analysis” of Alberta’s CPP assets
Federal-provincial-territorial meeting on pensions: Minister HornerPresident of Treasury Board and Minister of Finance Nate Horner issued the following statement following the Nov. 3 federal-provincial- territorial (FPT) meeting of finance ministers: “This morning, I was able to participate in a federal-provincial-territorial (FPT) discussion with the country’s finance ministers to discuss pensions. “To be clear, Alberta is committed to making sure that any potential creation of an Alberta Pension Plan will not leave our fellow Canadians without a stable pension and its associated benefits. “For the past several weeks, Alberta has been having an open discussion about the possibility of establishing an Alberta Pension Plan that will benefit our seniors and workers. This will only happen if Albertans vote to do so in a referendum. “To help frame the conversation, we commissioned a report by an independent, expert actuary, Lifeworks (formerly known as Morneau-Shepell). The report provides details as to the asset transfer value that Alberta could expect to receive according to the withdrawal formula that was voluntarily agreed to by all Canadian provinces decades ago when the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) was established, and which was once again updated, with agreement by the provinces, in 1997. “We are encouraged to hear the federal government commit to providing a comprehensive actuarial analysis of the asset transfer value Alberta would be entitled to receive should it withdraw from the CPP. We’ve been asking for this for several weeks. It is critical for the ongoing discussion of an Alberta Pension Plan that we have a firm asset transfer number (and the potential benefit increases to Albertans stemming from that transfer amount) upon which Albertans can make an informed decision. “There are other critical conversations happening across the country, including the federal government’s changes to the carbon tax. We have all heard multiple premiers raise concerns about the federal government’s recent actions on carbon tax carve outs for some provinces, and several finance ministers again raised the urgency of this issue during our call, including me. “Canadians remain in the midst of an affordability crisis and the carbon tax continues to hurt us all. While a number of us had hoped to also address this issue during the call, I am very eager to have a fulsome conversation at our next FPT, scheduled for Dec. 14-15. At that time, I hope we can discuss cutting the carbon tax so Albertans and Canadians will no longer be penalized according to where they live, and which members of Parliament they elect.” |
Alberta
Pharmacist-led clinics improve access to health care: Lessons from Alberta
News release from the Montreal Economic Institute
In Canada, 35 per cent of avoidable emergency room visits could be handled by pharmacists.
Emulating Alberta’s pharmacist-led clinic model could enhance access to primary care and help avoid unnecessary emergency room visits, according to a new study from the Montreal Economic Institute.
“Pharmacists know medication better than anyone else in our health systems,” explains Krystle Wittevrongel, senior public policy analyst and Alberta project lead at the MEI. “By unlocking their full potential in prescribing and substituting medications, Alberta’s pharmacist-led clinics have helped avoid tens of thousands of unnecessary emergency room visits.”
Pharmacists in Alberta have the largest prescribing authority in the country, including the ability to prescribe schedule one drugs with special training.
Unlike in Ontario and Manitoba, Alberta pharmacists are authorized to substitute prescribed medications, which can help address issues such as adverse reactions caused by interaction with other treatments.
The study explains that this can help reduce pressure on hospitals, as prescription-related issues account for more than 10 per cent of emergency room visits.
Alberta’s first pharmacist-led clinic, in Lethbridge, sees between 14,600 and 21,900 patients per year since opening in 2022.
It is expected that there will be 103 such clinics active in the province by the end of 2024.
The researcher also links the success of the pharmacist-led clinic model in Alberta to pharmacists’ expanded scope of practice in the province.
Among other things, Alberta pharmacists are able to order and interpret lab tests, unlike their counterparts in British Columbia, Ontario, and Newfoundland and Labrador.
A 2019 peer-reviewed study found that pharmacists could handle 35 per cent of avoidable emergency room visits in Canada.
“By enabling pharmacists to play a larger role in its health system, Alberta is redirecting minor cases from emergency rooms to more appropriate facilities,” said Wittevrongel. “Just imagine how much faster things could be if pharmacists could take care of 35 per cent of the unnecessary load placed on Canada’s emergency rooms.”
The MEI study is available here.
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The MEI is an independent public policy think tank with offices in Montreal and Calgary. Through its publications, media appearances, and advisory services to policy-makers, the MEI stimulates public policy debate and reforms based on sound economics and entrepreneurship.
Alberta
Fortis et Liber: Albertaās Future in the Canadian Federation
From the C2C Journal
By Barry Cooper, professor of political science, University of Calgary
Canada’s western lands, wrote one prominent academic, became provinces “in the Roman sense” – acquired possessions that, once vanquished, were there to be exploited. Laurentian Canada regarded the hinterlands as existing primarily to serve the interests of the heartland. And the current holders of office in Ottawa often behave as if the Constitution’s federal-provincial distribution of powers is at best advisory, if it needs to be acknowledged at all. Reviewing this history, Barry Cooper places Alberta’s widely criticized Sovereignty Act in the context of the Prairie provinces’ long struggle for due constitutional recognition and the political equality of their citizens. Canada is a federation, notes Cooper. Provinces do have rights. Constitutions do mean something. And when they are no longer working, they can be changed.
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