EDMONTON - Following his government’s second quarterly fiscal update, in which the UCP insulted public-sector workers, Premier Kenney downloaded all of the responsibility of stopping the spread of COVID-19 onto everyday Albertans.
“The premier can give as many pats on the back to small business owners, restaurant workers, salon staff and others who were forced to work through the most dangerous part of the pandemic as he wants,” says Guy Smith, President of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE), which represents around 90,000 Albertans. “Hollow gestures are nothing compared to real financial support and improved access to long-term protections, like unions, fairer labour laws and a strong, publicly-funded and delivered healthcare system.”
He adds that the premier always had the power to protect both lives and livelihoods, he just didn’t use it, and instead made Albertans pick between the two.
“Earning enough to keep a roof over your head should never come at the cost of contracting a deadly virus. Saving a restaurant or a local hardware store from closing shop doesn’t require a collapsed healthcare system,” Smith says.
Yesterday’s disturbing fiscal update and weak pandemic restriction update, which focuses on social-gathering protocols and provides limited direction for workplaces, are proof the premier would rather offload “the burden of leadership” onto workers.
The fiscal report shows that outside of temporary COVID recovery supports, the government has cut $156 million in funding from Budget 2020 for the crucial public services all Albertans rely on. The document also says, “the public sector…does not create jobs or generate wealth.”
Smith says the government’s comments are insulting: “Essential public-sector workers, like AUPE members, create economic activity through their work that has been keeping mom-and-pop shops open and local economies alive, especially in hard-hit rural communities.”
Members also generate safe, healthy, strong, protected and supported communities – something Albertans value more than big returns for the rich.
“Workers are the economy,” he adds. “When the government lays off hundreds of front-liners in post-secondary education and direct government services and plans to privatize thousands of healthcare jobs, it’s hurting the economy.”
Smith says temporary recovery funding is not an adequate substitute for real, permanent public-service funding and pales in comparison to the billions Kenney handed out to job-killing corporations that have thrown working people into COVID fires with few protections, paying them nothing for their service.
“From the moment he came into power, the premier has been manufacturing an economic disaster, so he can swoop in with his sham 'solutions,' like privatization, to play the hero for his corporate pals,” he adds.
“Now he’s using COVID as cover to speed up the destruction–pushing our public services, especially healthcare, to the brink of collapse so corporations can cash in on the chaos and drive down wages and workplace protections. He’s also trying to win back the affections of private-sector workers who have suffered immensely at the hands of the UCP’s incompetence, but Albertans are smarter than that, and they know who has their back. It's not corporate COVID-Kenney. It's people just like them—us.”
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For more information: Celia Shea, Communications 780-720-8122