Ed Stelmach

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The Honourable  Edward Michael Stelmach  MLA
At the Calgary Stampede
13th Premier of Alberta
Incumbent
Assumed office  December 14, 2006
Lieutenant Governor	Norman Kwong
Preceded by	Ralph Klein
Member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta for Fort Saskatchewan-Vegreville
Incumbent
Assumed office  November 22, 2004
Preceded by	New district
Member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta for Vegreville-Viking
In office June 15, 1993 – November 22, 2004
Preceded by	New district
Succeeded by	District abolished
Alberta Minister of Intergovernmental Relations
In office November 25, 2004 – March 23, 2006
Preceded by	Halvar Jonson
Succeeded by	Gary Mar
Alberta Minister of Transportation
In office March 16, 2001 – November 25, 2004
Preceded by	New portfolio[1]
Succeeded by	Lyle Oberg
Alberta Minister of Infrastructure
In office May 26, 1999 – March 16, 2001
Preceded by	New portfolio
Succeeded by	Ty Lund[2]
Alberta Minister of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Development
In office March 29, 1997 – May 26, 1999
Preceded by	Walter Paszkowski
Succeeded by	Ty Lund
Born	May 11, 1951 (1951-05-11) (age 57) Lamont, Alberta
Political party	Progressive Conservative
Spouse	Marie Stelmach (née Warshawski)
Religion	Ukrainian Greek Catholic

Edward Michael Stelmach MLA, (born May 11, 1951 in Lamont, Alberta) is the current Premier of Alberta, Canada. He was elected Leader of the Progressive Conservative Association of Alberta on December 3, 2006. He sits in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta as the Progressive Conservative Member of the Legislative Assembly for Fort Saskatchewan-Vegreville (previously Vegreville-Viking). Stelmach served in the Cabinets of Ralph Klein, at various times holding the portfolios of Intergovernmental Relations, Transportation, Infrastructure, and Agriculture, Food, and Rural Development.^[3]

Contents 1 Background 2 MLA and minister 3 2006 leadership contest 3.1 Financing 4 Premier 4.1 Energy and environmental policy 4.1.1 Energy and Utilities Board affair 4.2 Health policy 4.3 Democratic reform 4.4 Teachers pension liability 4.5 Relationship with Calgary 4.6 Domain name controversy 4.7 Pay increases 5 2008 election 6 References 7 Further reading

[edit] Background

Ed Stelmach (pronounced /ˈstɛlmæk/) was born May 11, 1951, and was raised near Lamont, Alberta, as the youngest of five children.^[4] His great-grandfather Mykola Stelmach (Ukrainian: Микола Стельмах) with his great grandmother Theodora Kuchera (Ukrainian: Теодора Кучера) in 1898 immigrated to Canada from Radekhiv of modern Ukraine. Stelmach family first settled in Vegreville, Alberta.

He intended to pursue a career in law, and studied for a time at the University of Alberta before returning with his wife, Marie, to his family farm.^[4] He entered politics in 1987 with his election to the council of Lamont County; one year later, he was appointed county reeve, a position he held until his entry into provincial politics in 1993.

[edit] MLA and minister

Stelmach ran for the Legislative Assembly of Alberta as a Progressive Conservative in the 1993 provincial election, defeating incumbent New Democrat Derek Fox in the riding of Vegreville-Viking. During his first term, Stelmach served as Deputy Whip and, later, Chief Government Whip for the P.C. caucus. He also sat on the caucus's standing policy committees on Community Services and Health Restructuring. During subsequent terms, he would serve on the standing policy committee on Agriculture and Rural Development and on the cabinet's Agenda and Priorities Committee.

Stelmach was re-elected by an increased margin during the 1997 election, and entered Premier Ralph Klein's cabinet shortly thereafter as the Minister of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Development.^[3] He held this position until 1999, when he became Minister of Infrastructure. While he held this portfolio, he aroused controversy by suggesting that the slow and fast lanes be reversed on provincial highways to save on maintenance; he quickly abandoned this proposal.^[5] In 2001, he became Minister of Transportation.

Stelmach was re-elected by his largest majority yet during the 2001 election, and retained the Transportation portfolio until 2004, when he was re-assigned to the position of Minister of Intergovernmental Relations. He resigned this position in 2006 in order to contest the P.C. leadership election (Klein had required that ministers intending to campaign to succeed him resign from cabinet).^[6]

[edit] 2006 leadership contest

Main article: Alberta Progressive Conservative leadership election, 2006

Stelmach was the first candidate to declare his intentions, and picked up endorsements from nineteen members of his caucus (including cabinet ministers Pearl Calahasen and Iris Evans). However, former provincial Treasurer Jim Dinning had twice as many caucus endorsements (despite not having held elected office since 1997) and was generally considered the race's front-runner. Stelmach ran a low-profile campaign, touring the province in a custom-painted campaign bus, while most media attention was focussed on the rivalry between Dinning and the more conservative Ted Morton.

According to the race's rules, the three candidates receiving the most votes on the first ballot would move on to a second ballot, which would use a preferential voting system to select a winner. Stelmach finished third on the first ballot with 15.3% of the vote, 3,329 votes ahead of fourth place Lyle Oberg and 10,647 votes behind second place Morton. However, the fourth, fifth, and sixth place candidates (Oberg, Dave Hancock, and Mark Norris) all endorsed Stelmach for the second ballot, one which he finished in first place on the first count (fewer than five hundred votes ahead of Dinning). A majority of Morton's votes went to Stelmach on the second count, and he was elected leader.

[edit] Financing

Stelmach raised more than $1.1 million for his leadership campaign.^[7] After his victory, he revealed the names of the donors of 85% of this money, but declined to release the names of eighty supporters who had donated a total of more than $160,000, citing the donors' requests for privacy.^[7] The Progressive Conservative leadership rules did not require any disclosure, and the disclosures by candidates varied - Norris named all of his donors, while Morton didn't reveal any.^[7] Stelmach's partial disclosure was criticized by opposition leaders and Democracy Watch, whose head suggested that Albertans should assume that Stelmach's anonymous donors placed him in a conflict of interest until he proved otherwise.^[7] Stelmach also acknowledged receiving a $10,000 donation from the Beaver Regional Waste Management Service's Commission, a landfill operator owned by five municipalities in Stelmach's riding.^[8] While asserting that the donation was legal, Stelmach admitted that it was "clearly unethical", blamed overzealous campaign volunteers for soliciting it, and returned it after the end of the campaign.^[8]

Stelmach was criticized again for organizing two $5,000 per plate dinners in January of 2007 to pay for his campaign debts, as well as those of Oberg, Hancock, and Norris.^[9] After critics argued that the dinners organized by "True Blue"^[10] were essentially selling access to the premier and two senior ministers, Stelmach cancelled the dinners.^[11]

[edit] Premier

Ed Stelmach was sworn in as Premier December 14, 2006,^[12] and saw his party re-elected with an increased majority in the 2008 election.^[13] Early in his tenure, he was compared to Harry Strom, the last Social Credit premier of the province, who was regarded as honest but ineffective and who survived only long enough as Premier to lose the 1971 election soundly.^[14][15] These comparisons intensified when Liberal Craig Cheffins was elected in Klein's Calgary Elbow riding in a 2007 by-election; Strom's 1971 defeat had been preceded by a pair of 1969 by-election losses, one of them in Ernest Manning's Strathcona East.^[16] Unlike Strom, however, Stelmach won an increased majority in his first election after becoming premier.^[13]

[edit] Energy and environmental policy

Much of Stelmach's term as Premier has been dominated by questions related to the Athabasca Oil Sands, whose rapid development was fuelling the Alberta economy's strong growth, but which also raised environmental questions. After winning the Premiership, Stelmach emphasized that he had no intention of taking measures that would slow down oilsands development and suggested that the economy would find its own appropriate growth rate.^[17] He aggressively defended Alberta's oil at home, and called the idea that it was extracted at an unacceptably high environmental cost "a myth".^[18][19] When Liberal Party of Canada leader Stéphane Dion proposed a federal carbon tax to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, Stelmach rejected the policy on the basis that it would hurt the economy and would unfairly penalize the western provinces,^[20] although he has championed the development of carbon capture technology.^[21]

Though Stelmach pledged not to do anything to curb the development of the oilsands, he did promise to review royalty rates - the rates paid by oil companies for the privilege of extracting Alberta's oil - and to reduce the proportion of bitumen that left Alberta to be upgraded out of province, likening the export of bitumen to "scraping off the top soil" from farmland.^[17] Soon after becoming Premier, he commissioned the Alberta Royalty Review panel to make recommendations on the province's royalty regime; opposition politicians had accused the government of undercharging substantially. Stelmach rejected many of the panel's recommendations, but did increase royalty rates by approximately 20% (25% less than recommended by the panel).^[22] Just after the 2008 election, Stelmach's government announced a five year royalty break worth $237 million per year to encourage development that it feared would have become uneconomical under the new plan.^[23] He was less decisive in increasing in-province bitumen upgrading, and conceded in 2008 that Alberta would continue upgrading between sixty and sixty-five percent of the bitumen it produced for the foreseeable future, rather than the seventy-two percent target he had previously announced for 2016.^[24] This admission came in the wake of his government's approval of three new pipelines designed to export bitumen.^[24]

In January 2008, Stelmach unveiled the province's "made in Alberta" plan to cut carbon emissions in order to fight global warming. The plan called for reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 14% (from 2007 levels) by 2050.^[25] Environmental groups and opposition parties suggested that this was insufficient in light of British Columbia's plan to to cut emissions by 80% (from 2007 levels) during the same period, but Stelmach argued that Alberta's position as a supplier of oil to the rest of the country justified relatively higher emissions.^[26] This was followed in June by the unveiling of the government's campaign to ask Albertans to make "one simple act" - such as composting, using reusable shopping bags, and replacing incandescent light bulbs with the more efficient fluorescent bulbs.^[27] Critics argued that the emphasis on personal responsibility by individuals did nothing to address the greater environmental damage caused by the development of the Athabasca Oil Sands.^[28]

[edit] Energy and Utilities Board affair

In June 2007, the Alberta Energy and Utilities Board, the government-mandated and appointed body responsible for regulating energy resource development, pipelines, transmission lines, and investor-owned electric, water, and natural gas utilities, as well as certain municipality-owned utilities, admitted that it had hired private investigators to spy on landowners who opposed the construction of a major power line in the Rimbey area.^[29] Stelmach initially downplayed the incident, but ordered a judicial investigation once the province's Information and Privacy Commissioner initiated an investigation of his own.^[30] This investigation found that the EUB had violated provincial law and infringed on the landowners' privacy, while the judicial investigation criticized the EUB's tactics as "repulsive". The opposition parties called for the dismissal of the entire EUB and Energy Minister Mel Knight; Stelmach instead opted to appoint a new EUB chair.^[31]

Stelmach's government also responded with legislation entitled the Alberta Utilities Commission Act (Bill 46), which would split the EUB into two parts, the Alberta Utilities Commission (responsible for regulating utilities) and the Energy Resources Conservation Board (responsible for regulating oil and gas). The legislation was controversial, as elements of the EUB's governing legislation that provided for public notice and consultation in the event of energy construction projects; opposition parties and advocacy groups charged that this was an assault on both landowners' rights and the environment.^[32] The legislation ultimately passed, and took effect at the beginning of 2008.^[33]

[edit] Health policy

Ed Stelmach's policy on health care has been highlighted by his removal of the $44 per person per month health care premiums effective the end of 2008.^[34] Critics had denounced the premiums as being regressive, both because they were the same amount regardless of the payer's income and because people with better-paying jobs often had their premiums covered by their employer, and the opposition Liberal and New Democrats had long called for their removal.^[35] This elimination was announced in a throne speech immediately before the dissolution of the legislature for the 2008 election, although it was initially promised to take effect by 2012.^[35] During this campaign, Stelmach promised to increase the capacity of Alberta universities to train doctors and nurses over four years, eventually resulting in the graduation of 225 more doctors, 350 more registered nurses, and 220 licensed practical nurses.^[36] After the registrar of the Alberta College of Physicians and Surgeons called the plan unfeasible, Health Minister Dave Hancock clarified that most of the increase would in fact come from the immigration of foreign doctors to Alberta, rather than from in-province training.^[37]

Following the election, Stelmach's new Minister of Health, Ron Liepert, released the government's new health plan. In it, Liepert refused to characterize the problems in the health care system as being the result of doctor shortages, and instead promised structural reforms - including consolidating health authorities, closing rural hospitals, and de-listing some health services from being covered by the province's public health insurance scheme."Stelmach's Health Plan", Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, April 16, 2008. Retrieved on 2008-06-12. </ref> In May, the government took the first step in implementing these structural reforms by combining the province's nine health authorities into one health "superboard".^[38]

In June of 2008, three senior health officials announced that they would be leaving the province's employment at the expiration of their contracts in August. Liepert blamed their departures on better offers from other employers, although New Democrat leader Brian Mason speculated that the government's health restructuring may have been to blame.^[39] Critics pointed out that the optics of the government allowing the employees to depart for more money elsewhere soon after the government had approved a substantial pay hike for cabinet ministers were not good.^[40]

[edit] Democratic reform

Klein's government had received criticism for reducing the importance of the legislature by sitting it fewer days than any other province's legislature and for directing business through standing policy committees of the Progressive Conservative caucus, which met in private, rather than through the legislature's all-party committees. In April 2007, Stelmach initiated the creation of four new legislative "policy field committees" which would include opposition representation.^[41] The same month, his government introduced new legislation on conflicts of interest, such that former cabinet ministers would have to wait one year before doing business with the government or lobbying it on behalf of third parties (up from six months). It also created a similar cooling off period for senior bureaucrats, which lasted six months.^[42] However, an order in council passed by Stelmach's cabinet hours before he requested the dissolution of the legislature in preparation for the 2008 election delayed the implementation of these rules until one month after the election, meaning that cabinet ministers who retired or lost their bids for re-election would be exempt from the new rules.^[43]

[edit] Teachers pension liability

During his first year in office, Stelmach and his education minister Ron Liepert concluded a deal with the Alberta Teachers Association in which the province agreed to contribute $2.1 billion towards the $6.6 billion unfunded pension liability, which resulted from insufficient contributions to the teachers' pension plan during the period leading up to 1992. In exchange, the ATA agreed to a five year contract extension. The deal was applauded by the opposition Liberals and New Democrats, but was criticized by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, which called for a plebiscite on the issue.^[44]

[edit] Relationship with Calgary

Many Calgarians have been critical of Stelmach, suggesting that, as a farmer from the central part of the province, he is biased against Calgary and urban Alberta in general. They pointed to the fact that the city, which was considered the heartland of Jim Dinning's support during the leadership race, had only three members (Ron Liepert, Ron Stevens, and Greg Melchin) in his first eighteen member cabinet (Stelmach supporters pointed out that Edmonton had only one minister - Dave Hancock).^[45][46] Stelmach also found himself in a feud with Calgary mayor Dave Bronconnier during his first year as premier as Bronconnier accused Stelmach of failing to keep a promise to the city regarding infrastructure spending during his first budget.^[47][48] Several Stelmach supporters suggested that the mayor, a Liberal, might be angling to take over as leader of the official opposition if Kevin Taft fumbled.^[47] During the by-election to fill Ralph Klein's Calgary Elbow seat, P.C. candidate Brian Heninger went to far as to tell a voter he'd like to choke his party's leader (Stelmach told media that this was exactly the sort of enthusiasm he wanted from his M.L.A.s).^[49][50] Heninger was defeated by Liberal Craig Cheffins and, in the 2008 election, Calgary was the only area of the province in which Stelmach lost seats on his way to an increased majority.^[13]

[edit] Domain name controversy

In December 2007, Stelmach threatened legal action against blogger and former Liberal staffer Dave Cournoyer for misappropriating Stelmach's persona by registering the domain name edstelmach.ca; Cournoyer had registered the domain for $14 in April 2007, four months after Stelmach became premier, and had directed it to the Wikipedia article on Harry Strom.^[51][52] After this manoeuvre was met with mixed media and public reaction, Stelmach backed off threats of legal action and turned to negotiation in an effort to acquire the domain name. As of February 2008, no resolution had been reached.

[edit] Pay increases

Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach and his cabinet approved raises that will translate into severance packages of more than $1 million for both him and the legislature's longtime Speaker, Ken Kowalski. The 23-member cabinet voted June 3, 2008 to boost their pay by about 30 per cent, or $42,000, to $184,000. Stelmach's salary increased by $54,000 to $213,450. The changes will also mean increased severance packages for MLAs when they quit the Alberta legislature or are defeated. In lieu of a pension plan, MLAs earn three months pay for every year they are in office with no limit to how much they can get. Most public- and private-sector jobs pay between two and four weeks salary for each year of employment with a cap on the total. "The severance packages are certainly gold-plated. They are the most generous severance packages in all of Canada for politicians," said Scott Hennig from the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Speaker Ken Kowalski, who was first elected in 1979, would receive $1,345,121 — an increase of $273,681 — if he left elected office in 2012. Based on the same date, Premier Ed Stelmach would walk away with a severance of $1,110,131, an increase of $252,690.^[53]

[edit] 2008 election

Main article: Alberta general election, 2008

On February 4, 2008, after a throne speech that promised the elimination of premiums for Alberta's tax-funded universal public health insurance plan (a promise that both the Alberta Liberal Party and the Alberta New Democratic Party had featured prominently in their last several election campaigns),^[54] Stelmach asked Lieutenant Governor Norman Kwong to dissolve the Legislative Assembly of Alberta and call an election for March 3, 2008.^[55] Shortly before the write was dropped, a group calling itself Albertans for Change began to buy print and television ads criticizing Stelmach for a lack of plan and attacking him as unfit to lead the province.^[56] The group was funded by the Alberta Building Trades Council and the Alberta Federation of Labour, which led to a series of ads purchased by the National Citizens Coalition and Merit Contractors, in which it was criticized for "putting your [union members'] money where [union leadership's] mouths are."^[57]

Despite a campaign that was criticized as being disorganized and uninspired,^[58][59] Stelmach's Progressive Conservatives won 72 seats in the 83 seat Legislative Assembly, an increase from the 62 it had won in the previous election and only two seats short of Ralph Klein's 2001 landslide.^[13]

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

Order of precedence
Preceded by Norman Kwong, Lieutenant-Governor of Alberta	Order of precedence in Alberta as of 2008	Succeeded by Chief Justice of The Court of Appeal of Alberta

v • d • e Premiers of Alberta Rutherford · Sifton · Stewart · Greenfield · Brownlee · Reid · Aberhart · Manning · Strom · Lougheed · Getty · Klein · Stelmach

v • d • e Premiers of Canada Stephen Harper (Prime Minister of Canada) Gordon Campbell (BC) • Ed Stelmach (AB) • Brad Wall (SK) • Gary Doer (MB) • Dalton McGuinty (ON) • Jean Charest (QC) Shawn Graham (NB) • Rodney MacDonald (NS) • Robert Ghiz (PE) • Danny Williams (NL) • Dennis Fentie (YT) • Floyd Roland (NT) • Paul Okalik (NU)

v • d • e Current members of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta 27th Legislative Assembly of Alberta Progressive Conservative Stelmach · Ady · Allred · Amery · Anderson · Benito · Berger · Bhardwaj · Bhullar · Blackett · Boutilier · Brown · Calahasen · Campbell · Cao · Dallas · Danyluk · DeLong · Denis · Doerksen · Drysdale · Elniski · Evans · Fawcett · Forsyth · Fritz · Goudreau · Griffiths · Groeneveld · Hancock · Hayden · Horne · Horner · Jablonski · Jacobs · Johnson · Johnston · Klimchuk · Knight · Kowalski · Leskiw · Liepert · Lindsay · Lukaszuk · Lund · Marz · McFarland · McQueen · Mitzel · Morton · Oberle · Olson · Ouellette · Prins · Quest · Redford · Renner · Rodney · Rogers · Sandhu · Sarich · Sherman · Snelgrove · Stevens · Tarchuk · VanderBurg · Vandermeer · Weadick · Webber · Woo-Paw · Xiao · Zwozdesky Liberal Taft · Blakeman · Chase · Hehr · Kang · MacDonald · Pastoor · Swann · Taylor New Democrat Mason · Notley