Alberta NDP Opposition says Albertans need help to pay utility bills

From the Alberta NDP

NDP CALLS FOR UTILITY BILL RELIEF IN RESPONSE TO SHOCKING BILLS DURING PANDEMIC, ECONOMIC DOWNTURN

Alberta’s NDP is calling for major relief for consumers following a sudden surge in constituents coming forward with massive cost increases on their monthly electricity and overall utility bills.

The Office of the Utilities Consumer Advocate (UCA) cites a number of contributing factors to the upswing in prices in Alberta, including increased consumption while people are staying home to observe COVID-19 public health orders, increased use during the winter, increased costs for natural gas and electricity and increased transmission and distribution charges.

“There’s a compounding effect here and it’s hammering household budgets,” said NDP Leader Rachel Notley. “Many Albertans have to use more natural gas and electricity if they work from home or spend more time at home to help protect their communities from the spread of COVID. Couple that with soaring prices for natural gas and electricity and you’re seeing massive bills and no relief for families.”

In 2016, the NDP Government capped electricity prices under the Regulated Rate Option at 6.8 cents per kilowatt hour; however, Jason Kenney and the UCP removed it in late 2019. According to the UCA, average electricity prices have exceeded that previous cap in January, February and March of this year — the highest price was reported in February by EPCOR, which charged an average of 8.95 cents per kilowatt hour.

As well, natural gas prices are at highs not seen in seven years, with prices in March exceeding four cents per gigajoule — the last time prices were this high was in June 2014. For context, rates were just 1.6 cents per gigajoule in March 2020.

In response, the NDP is calling for the following four actions to be taken by the UCP immediately:

Provide direct consumer relief to two-thirds of Albertans (those earning up to $55,000 annually as an individual or $102,500 per couple). Model the relief program after the COVID-19 Energy Assistance Program offered by the Government of Ontario, which provided customers with up to $750 in support both their electricity and natural gas bills. Consumers can apply for relief on both bills separately, providing total potential relief of $1,500.
Reinstate the Regulated Rate Option cap for electricity at 6.8 cents per kilowatt hour.
Reinstate the Utility Payment Deferral Program, which allowed consumers and businesses to defer payment of bills but which ended last June.
Ban all utility shutoffs for Alberta homes until the pandemic ends and public health orders are lifted.

Notley noted that Albertans are already struggling greatly during the pandemic and economic downturn, with tens of thousands of jobs lost in the province and currently the second-highest unemployment rate in Canada. In a recent Angus Reid poll, the percentage of Canadians reporting that they are worse off than they were a year ago is highest in Alberta.

“We need action to help Albertans in this time of great need,” Notley said. “People doing the right thing and staying closer to home during this pandemic should not be penalized for doing so. We need real consumer relief from these glaring utility bills and we need it to last for the duration of the pandemic, no matter when it might end.”

Thousands of Albertans have written or come forward to the NDP Caucus with complaints and concerns about their utility bills. Calgary father Hassan Ali Nakokara lost his job early in the pandemic and has been struggling to pay bills since. In February, his monthly utility bill jumped to $850 from $450 the month prior.

“It’s impossible for me to pay that,” Nakukara said. “I’m out of work, I’m trying to support my kids while I look for work. The last thing I can do is hand over hundreds to heat and power my home. I need help and I’m desperately hoping the government will step up to help me and so many others.”

Fellow Calgarian Carolyn Nystrom said she and her husband have lived in their home since 2012 and paid between $250-300 for utilities per month. Her bill has been increasing rapidly since December – for March, the total reached $576. Nystrom said it appears the greatest increases are being seen on electricity and transmission charges.

“We are in a pandemic,” Nystrom said. “People have lost their jobs. People have spent their savings. My husband and I have both been fortunate to keep our jobs through all of this. Even though we still get a paycheque, a bill doubling in three months is absolutely unaffordable … if companies like Enmax and Direct Energy can charge whatever they want per kilowatt hour or gigajoule, what can stop them? And what can we do? We live in Canada. Being able to turn lights on is not exactly an option here. We have to pay, and companies without regulations and caps know that.”

Correspondence and calls regarding spiking utility bills have come in from all over the province.

Airdrie mother Lisa Gilling said her most recent electricity bill shows the price being charged per kilowatt hour jumped from 5 cents to 19 cents per kilowatt hour and her bill for electricity alone totaled over $400.

“A three hundred per cent increase for a product or service is drastic but when it is an essential service, like electricity, it can be catastrophic, especially for a single-income family,” Gilling said. “Do you cut back on groceries in order to have lights and hot water?”

Mickey Moore, a senior living alone in Vermillion said his bill has risen by hundreds of dollars since the beginning of the year to more than $550 in March.

“Without some kind of control on essential service, with no real competition, how can we seniors expect to keep up on our fixed incomes?” Moore said. “Does the government plan to index seniors’ incomes to the rising utility costs? When we had regulated utility oversight there was some control and fairness applied.”

Related Topics:#AlbertaNDP #RachelNotley #UtilityBillRelief

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Alberta

Alberta announces citizens will have to pay for their COVID shots

Published on June 16, 2025

Todayville

From LifeSite News

By Anthony Murdoch

The government said that it has decided to stop ‘waste’ by not making the shots free starting this fall.

Beginning this fall, COVID shots in the province will have to be pre-ordered at the full price, about $110, to receive them. (This will roll out in four ‘phases’. In the first phases COVID shots will still be free for those with pre-existing medical conditions, people on social programs, and seniors.)

The UCP government in a press release late last week noted due to new “federal COVID-19 vaccine procurement” rules, which place provinces and territories as being responsible for purchasing the jabs for residents, it has decided to stop “waste” by not making the jab free anymore.

“Now that Alberta’s government is responsible for procuring vaccines, it’s important to better determine how many vaccines are needed to support efforts to minimize waste and control costs,” the government stated.

“This new approach will ensure Alberta’s government is able to better determine its overall COVID-19 vaccine needs in the coming years, preventing significant waste.”

The New Democratic Party (NDP) took issue with the move to stop giving out the COVID shots for free, claiming it was “cruel” and would place a “financial burden” on people wanting the shots.

NDP health critic Sarah Hoffman claimed the move by the UCP is health “privatization” and the government should promote the abortion-tainted shots instead.

The UCP said that in 2023-2024, about 54 percent of the COVID shots were wasted, with Health Minister Adriana LaGrange saying, “In previous years, we’ve seen significant vaccine wastage.”

“By shifting to a targeted approach and introducing pre-ordering, we aim to better align supply with demand – ensuring we remain fiscally responsible while continuing to protect those at highest risk,” she said.

The jabs will only be available through public health clinics, with pharmacies no longer giving them out.

The UCP also noted that is change in policy comes as a result of the Federal Drug Administration in the United States recommending the jabs be stopped for young children and pregnant women.

The opposite happened in Canada, with the nation’s National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) continuing to say that pregnant women should still regularly get COVID shots as part of their regular vaccine schedule.

The change in COVID jab policy is no surprise given Smith’s opposition to mandatory shots.

As reported by LifeSiteNews, early this year, Smith’s UCP government said it would consider halting COVID vaccines for healthy children.

Smith’s reasoning was in response to the Alberta COVID-19 Pandemic Data Review Task Force’s “COVID Pandemic Response” 269-page final report. The report was commissioned by Smith last year, giving the task force a sweeping mandate to investigate her predecessor’s COVID-era mandates and policies.

The task force’s final report recommended halting “the use of COVID-19 vaccines without full disclosure of their potential risks” as well as outright ending their use “for healthy children and teenagers as other jurisdictions have done,” mentioning countries like “Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, and the U.K.”

The mRNA shots have also been linked to a multitude of negative and often severe side effects in children and all have connections to cell lines derived from aborted babies.

Many Canadian doctors who spoke out against COVID mandates and the experimental mRNA injections were censured by their medical boards.

LifeSiteNews has published an extensive amount of research on the dangers of the experimental COVID mRNA jabs that include heart damage and blood clots.

Alberta

Alberta’s grand bargain with Canada includes a new pipeline to Prince Rupert

Published on June 15, 2025

Todayville

From Resource Now

By Nelson Bennett

Alberta renews call for West Coast oil pipeline amid shifting federal, geopolitical dynamics.

Just six months ago, talk of resurrecting some version of the Northern Gateway pipeline would have been unthinkable. But with the election of Donald Trump in the U.S. and Mark Carney in Canada, it’s now thinkable.

In fact, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith seems to be making Northern Gateway 2.0 a top priority and a condition for Alberta staying within the Canadian confederation and supporting Mark Carney’s vision of making Canada an Energy superpower. Thanks to Donald Trump threatening Canadian sovereignty and its economy, there has been a noticeable zeitgeist shift in Canada. There is growing support for the idea of leveraging Canada’s natural resources and diversifying export markets to make it less vulnerable to an unpredictable southern neighbour.

“I think the world has changed dramatically since Donald Trump got elected in November,” Smith said at a keynote address Wednesday at the Global Energy Show Canada in Calgary. “I think that’s changed the national conversation.” Smith said she has been encouraged by the tack Carney has taken since being elected Prime Minister, and hopes to see real action from Ottawa in the coming months to address what Smith said is serious encumbrances to Alberta’s oil sector, including Bill C-69, an oil and gas emissions cap and a West Coast tanker oil ban. “I’m going to give him some time to work with us and I’m going to be optimistic,” Smith said. Removing the West Coast moratorium on oil tankers would be the first step needed to building a new oil pipeline line from Alberta to Prince Rupert. “We cannot build a pipeline to the west coast if there is a tanker ban,” Smith said. The next step would be getting First Nations on board. “Indigenous peoples have been shut out of the energy economy for generations, and we are now putting them at the heart of it,” Smith said.

Alberta currently produces about 4.3 million barrels of oil per day. Had the Northern Gateway, Keystone XL and Energy East pipelines been built, Alberta could now be producing and exporting an additional 2.5 million barrels of oil per day. The original Northern Gateway Pipeline — killed outright by the Justin Trudeau government — would have terminated in Kitimat. Smith is now talking about a pipeline that would terminate in Prince Rupert. This may obviate some of the concerns that Kitimat posed with oil tankers negotiating Douglas Channel, and their potential impacts on the marine environment.

One of the biggest hurdles to a pipeline to Prince Rupert may be B.C. Premier David Eby. The B.C. NDP government has a history of opposing oil pipelines with tooth and nail. Asked in a fireside chat by Peter Mansbridge how she would get around the B.C. problem, Smith confidently said: “I’ll convince David Eby.”

“I’m sensitive to the issues that were raised before,” she added. One of those concerns was emissions. But the Alberta government and oil industry has struck a grand bargain with Ottawa: pipelines for emissions abatement through carbon capture and storage.

The industry and government propose multi-billion investments in CCUS. The Pathways Alliance project alone represents an investment of $10 to $20 billion. Smith noted that there is no economic value in pumping CO2 underground. It only becomes economically viable if the tradeoff is greater production and export capacity for Alberta oil. “If you couple it with a million-barrel-per-day pipeline, well that allows you $20 billion worth of revenue year after year,” she said. “All of a sudden a $20 billion cost to have to decarbonize, it looks a lot more attractive when you have a new source of revenue.” When asked about the Prince Rupert pipeline proposal, Eby has responded that there is currently no proponent, and that it is therefore a bridge to cross when there is actually a proposal. “I think what I’ve heard Premier Eby say is that there is no project and no proponent,” Smith said. “Well, that’s my job. There will be soon. “We’re working very hard on being able to get industry players to realize this time may be different.” “We’re working on getting a proponent and route.”

At a number of sessions during the conference, Mansbridge has repeatedly asked speakers about the Alberta secession movement, and whether it might scare off investment capital. Alberta has been using the threat of secession as a threat if Ottawa does not address some of the province’s long-standing grievances. Smith said she hopes Carney takes it seriously. “I hope the prime minister doesn’t want to test it,” Smith said during a scrum with reporters. “I take it seriously. I have never seen separatist sentiment be as high as it is now. “I’ve also seen it dissipate when Ottawa addresses the concerns Alberta has.” She added that, if Carney wants a true nation-building project to fast-track, she can’t think of a better one than a new West Coast pipeline. “I can’t imagine that there will be another project on the national list that will generate as much revenue, as much GDP, as many high paying jobs as a bitumen pipeline to the coast.”