Alberta
New mandatory province-wide measures to battle COVID will affect every business and family
From the Province of Alberta
New mandatory provincewide measures to protect lives
New mandatory health measures go into effect immediately to protect lives.
Expanded health measures will be in effect provincewide. All Albertans, businesses, organizations and service providers must follow all new health measures. These restrictions will be in place for a minimum of four weeks.
“Alberta has sought to protect both lives and livelihoods from the beginning of the pandemic. The recent surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations will threaten our health-care system and the lives of many vulnerable Albertans unless further action is taken now. With the promise of a vaccine early in 2021, we can see the end of this terrible time. But all Albertans must take this more seriously than ever by staying home whenever possible, and following these new measures.”
“Alberta’s case numbers and hospitalizations have reached a point where we must take stricter measures in order to protect capacity in our health system. These mandatory new health measures are some of the strictest we’ve implemented, but they are absolutely critical to the future of our province.”
“These mandatory measures will help us slow the spread of COVID-19. This will require individual sacrifices that are necessary to protect our province. It’s not just about one person, it’s about doing what we can to protect and save our loved ones, colleagues, neighbours, and even strangers. Following these public health measures is how we as Albertans care for and protect each other.”
New expanded mandatory measures come into effect Dec. 8 for social gatherings and mandatory masking. All others come into effect at 12:01 a.m., Dec. 13.
Social gatherings – immediate
- All indoor and outdoor social gatherings – public and private – are prohibited.
- Close contacts are limited to household members only.
- Individuals who live alone will be allowed up to two close contacts for in-person visiting, with those two people remaining the same for the duration of the restriction period.
- Festivals, parades, events, concerts, exhibitions, competitions, sport and performance remain prohibited.
Masking – immediate
- The mandatory indoor public masking requirement will be extended provincewide.
- Public spaces include locations where a business or entity operates and is applicable to employees, visitors and the general public.
- Applies to all indoor workplaces and facilities outside the home.
- Farm operations are excluded.
- Rental accommodations used solely for the purposes of a private residence are excluded.
Places of worship – starting at 12:01 a.m., Dec. 13
- All places of worship will be limited to 15 per cent of fire code occupancy for in-person attendance.
- Virtual or online services are strongly encouraged.
- Drive-in services where individuals do not leave their vehicles and adhere to guidance will be permissible and are not subject to capacity restrictions.
- Mandatory mask mandate, physical distancing and other guidelines remain in place.
Retail – starting at 12:01 a.m., Dec. 13
- Retail services must reduce customer capacity to 15 per cent of fire code occupancy, with a minimum of five customers permitted.
- Curbside pickup, delivery and online services are encouraged.
- Shopping malls will be limited to 15 per cent of fire code occupancy.
Closures – starting at 12:01 a.m., Dec. 13
- Restaurants, pubs, bars, lounges and cafes will be closed to in-person service.
- Only takeout, curbside pickup and delivery services are permitted.
- Casinos, bingo halls, gaming entertainment centres, racing entertainment centres, horse tracks, raceways, bowling alleys, pool halls, legions, and private clubs will be closed.
- Recreational facilities – fitness centres, recreation centres, pools, spas, gyms, studios, day and overnight camps, indoor rinks and arenas – will be closed.
- Outdoor recreation is permitted, but facilities with indoor spaces except for washrooms will be closed.
- Entertainment businesses and entities – libraries, science centres, interpretive centres, museums, galleries, amusement parks and water parks – will be closed.
- Hotels may remain open but must follow restrictions – no spas, pools or in-person dining. Room services only.
- Personal and wellness services, including hair salons, nail salons, massage, tattoos, and piercing, will be closed.
Health services, including physiotherapy or acupuncture, social or protective services, shelters for vulnerable persons, emergency services, child care, and not-for-profit community kitchens or charitable kitchens will remain open for in-person attendance.
Work from home – starting at 12:01 a.m., Dec. 13
- Mandatory work from home measures will be implemented unless the employer determines that work requires a physical presence for operational effectiveness.
Closures – ongoing from Nov. 27
- Entertainment businesses and entities – community halls and centres, indoor children’s play centres and indoor playgrounds, theatres, auditoriums, concert halls, and community theatres, nightclubs, banquet halls and conference centres, indoor and outdoor festivals, concerts with the exception of drive-in events, tradeshows, and sporting events or competitions, remain closed.
Better data, better outcomes for Alberta students |
To help schools address classroom complexity, Alberta’s government will begin collecting annual data on class size and composition.
Over the past three years, Alberta has welcomed more than 80,000 new students. With this unprecedented growth, classroom complexity and class sizes are among the biggest issues facing schools and teachers across the province.
To meet this challenge head on, Alberta’s government will work with school boards to gather yearly data on class sizes and composition. This information will be used to better understand staffing, student needs and classroom complexity. School boards will be required to submit data on Alberta classrooms by Nov. 24, and by January, this data will be made publicly available and will then be released annually.
Data collected on classroom complexity will help the province understand and address issues in schools, including class sizes, and support strategic investments in classrooms. Over the next three years, school boards will be provided with funding to hire 3,000 teachers and 1,500 new education assistants to support students with complex needs.
“We are ready to work with school boards and teachers to address classroom complexity and class sizes. We have heard them loud and clear and we are taking bold action to address these issues.”
Alberta’s government is establishing a Class Size and Complexity Task Force to begin work immediately on identifying solutions to the challenges facing Alberta classrooms. Alongside new annual data collection, the task force will ensure every student gets the attention and support they need to succeed. Details about the task force will be shared in the coming weeks.
“This data will provide essential insight into classroom realities, guiding evidence-based decisions and advocating for sustainable funding to address complexity, ensuring every student and educator in Alberta has the support to thrive.”
Quick facts
To inform decisions on addressing classroom complexity, data will be collected on total numbers of:
- all staff, per school, including roles
- substitute teachers
- district staff, listed by job title
- students, per classroom, per school
- severe, mild/moderate, and gifted/talented students, per classroom, per school
- English as an additional language (EAL) students, per classroom, per school
- refugee students, per classroom, per school
- First Nations, Métis and Inuit students, per classroom, per school
- Individualized Program Plans, per classroom, per school
- students waitlisted for assessment, per classroom, per school
- incidents of aggression and violence
- $55 million was provided in Budget 2025 to address classroom complexity.
- 8.6 billion is being invested to build and renovate more than 130 schools across the province.
- Budget 2025 is investing $1.6 billion in learning support funding to help meet students’ specialized learning needs.
- Budget 2025 is investing $1.1 billion to hire more than 4,000 teachers and educational staff.
Alberta
How one major media torqued its coverage – in the take no prisoners words of a former Alberta premier
(Editor’s note: I was going to write on the media’s handling of the Alberta government’s decision to order striking teachers back to work and invoke Section 33 of the Charter in doing so. But former Alberta premier Jason Kenney provided such a fulsome dissection of an absence of balance and its consequences in terms of public trust on X that I asked him if The Rewrite could publish it. He said yes and here it is – Peter Menzies.)
By Jason Kenney
This
”story” is an object lesson for why trust in legacy media has plummeted, and alt right media audiences have grown.
Here CTV “digital news producer” @AngeMAmato (she/her) writes a story about “experts” calling the use of Sec. 33 “a threat to democracy.”
Who are the experts?
A left wing academic, and a left wing activist. The latter, Howard Sapers, is a former Liberal MLA (which the article does not mention) for a party that is so marginal, it has not elected an MLA in over a decade.
For good measure CTV goes on to quote two left wing union bosses, who of course are predictably outraged.
A more accurate headline would be “Four people on the left angry about use of Notwithstanding Clause.” Which is the opposite of news. It’s the ultimate “Dog Bites Man” non-story.
Did the CTV producer make any effort to post a balanced story by asking for comment from academics / lawyers / think tanks who support use of Sec. 33? Did she call the @CDNConstFound or the @MLInstitute’s Judicial Power Project? Did she attempt to reach any of these four scholars, who just published their views in a @nationalpost op-ed last week?
Did she have an editor who asked why her story lacked any attempt at balance?
And did anyone at CTV pause for a moment to ponder how tendentious it is to accuse a democratically elected legislature of acting “undemocratically” by invoking a power whose entire purpose is to ensure democratic accountability?
She provides some historical context about prior use of Sec. 33. Why does that context not include the fact that most democratically elected provincial governments (including Alberta under Premier Lougheed, and Saskatchewan under NDP Premier Blakeney) agreed to adopt the Charter *only if* it included the Notwithstanding Clause to allow democratically elected Legislatures to ensure a democratic check and balance against the abuse of undemocratic, unaccountable judicial power?
Why does she not mention that for the first 33 years of the Charter era, the Canadian Courts ruled that there was no constitutionally protected right to strike?
Why doesn’t she quote an expert pointing out that Allan Blakeney defended the Saskatchewan Legislature’s 1986 use of Sec. 33 to end a strike as “a legitimate use of the Clause?” Or refer to Peter Lougheed’s 1987 commitment to use Sec. 33 if the courts invented a right to strike?
Many thoughtful criticisms can be levelled against Section 33. Being undemocratic is not one of them.
So why do we see so much agitprop like this masquerading as news from so many legacy media outlets?
IMO, there are two possible answers:
1) They are blind to their own biases; and / or
2) People like @AngeMAmato believe that they have a moral imperative to be “progressive journalists” which trumps the boringly old fashioned professional imperative to be objective and balanced.
Whatever the reason, “journalists” like this have no one to blame but themselves for growing distrust of legacy media, and the consequent emergence of non traditional media platforms.
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