A Warm Welcome from Martha and Henry
Hello. We're Martha and Henry and this is our place.
To find about more about us and how to use this website please go to the link on the right called CLICK HERE TO CHECK US OUT.
Today Premier Klein called an election for Monday November 22, 2004. Here is where you will have a chance to speak directly to the Premier before you decide who you are going to vote for in that election. No need to go through that Alberta Connects website that the government set up at a cost of millions annually. Hmmm. I wonder how much of our tax dollars their staff spends a year on takeout. Click here.
There is a difference between the questions that the government asks us through Alberta Connects and the questions that we are going to ask the government here at our place. For example Alberta Connects asks us questions like:
Do you want your government to provide a quality affordable Alberta healthcare system?
or
Do you want your government to provide an outstanding education system?
What kind of response do they expect to questions like this?
Uh - Mr Klein Sir? Uh - Could you please gimme one of those crappy high cost healthcare things and hmmm, let's see, maybe I'll take an underperforming education system to go along with that. If you don't believe me, click here to see the It's Your Future survey.
Here we are going to ask questions like:
Mr Premier. Why did you spend all that moulagh to take a government plane to Ottawa for the Healthcare Conference and then walk out and go play the VLT's over the river Hull? Did you walk out because:
a) You didn't take the time to understand the complex issues facing our healthcare system and didn't want to look stupid in front of the other premiers?
b) You heard that you could actually make money on VLT's in Quebec because the Feds had them rigged so that French people could get rich.
c) The Conference had a NO SMOKING rule in effect.
We're just kidding Mr. Premier. We know you enjoy a little humour from time-to-time.
Mostly we will be asking serious questions to the Premier about all those things the government does that affects our lives. Issues of deregulation, healthcare, education, seniors, homeless people, ethics, government waste; - they will all be covered. Of particular interest is where all that money from our oil resources is going because it sure doesn't seem to be coming to us. The ruling PC party as well as all the opposition parties have been asked to participate in this discussion directly. We sincerely hope they will.
Do us a favour will you? It's lonely out here and sometimes we get on each others nerves. We would love to hear comments back from other Albertans to make our life a bit more exciting. You can click on the comment link after each posting to tell us what you think. You can sign your comments or just make them anon. Or if you have a question that you would like to ask the Premier, e-mail it to us at marthaandhenry@gmail.com.
Hope to hear from you soon.
To find about more about us and how to use this website please go to the link on the right called CLICK HERE TO CHECK US OUT.
Today Premier Klein called an election for Monday November 22, 2004. Here is where you will have a chance to speak directly to the Premier before you decide who you are going to vote for in that election. No need to go through that Alberta Connects website that the government set up at a cost of millions annually. Hmmm. I wonder how much of our tax dollars their staff spends a year on takeout. Click here.
There is a difference between the questions that the government asks us through Alberta Connects and the questions that we are going to ask the government here at our place. For example Alberta Connects asks us questions like:
Do you want your government to provide a quality affordable Alberta healthcare system?
or
Do you want your government to provide an outstanding education system?
What kind of response do they expect to questions like this?
Uh - Mr Klein Sir? Uh - Could you please gimme one of those crappy high cost healthcare things and hmmm, let's see, maybe I'll take an underperforming education system to go along with that. If you don't believe me, click here to see the It's Your Future survey.
Here we are going to ask questions like:
Mr Premier. Why did you spend all that moulagh to take a government plane to Ottawa for the Healthcare Conference and then walk out and go play the VLT's over the river Hull? Did you walk out because:
a) You didn't take the time to understand the complex issues facing our healthcare system and didn't want to look stupid in front of the other premiers?
b) You heard that you could actually make money on VLT's in Quebec because the Feds had them rigged so that French people could get rich.
c) The Conference had a NO SMOKING rule in effect.
We're just kidding Mr. Premier. We know you enjoy a little humour from time-to-time.
Mostly we will be asking serious questions to the Premier about all those things the government does that affects our lives. Issues of deregulation, healthcare, education, seniors, homeless people, ethics, government waste; - they will all be covered. Of particular interest is where all that money from our oil resources is going because it sure doesn't seem to be coming to us. The ruling PC party as well as all the opposition parties have been asked to participate in this discussion directly. We sincerely hope they will.
Do us a favour will you? It's lonely out here and sometimes we get on each others nerves. We would love to hear comments back from other Albertans to make our life a bit more exciting. You can click on the comment link after each posting to tell us what you think. You can sign your comments or just make them anon. Or if you have a question that you would like to ask the Premier, e-mail it to us at marthaandhenry@gmail.com.
Hope to hear from you soon.
posted by Martha & Henry at 1:00 PM
15 Comments:
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The thing I want to know is why do we always get asked our opinions AFTER all the decisions have been made? Can you help?
Bewildered in Edmonton
Mr. Premier: Why don't you come clean with Martha and Henry and tell us, since the people of Alberta aren't demanding privatization, then who is pushing you toward priviatizing health care and why are you so gun-ho for it?
About Health Care, Mr. Premier, since Canadians pay less than half of what Americans do, and since this is our money in Canada's richest province, why are you trying to sell the misleading myth that health care is UN-SUSTAINABLE?
So the AISH review has been announced. Mr. Premier, would you please stop "studying" this issue and do what the Low Income Review already recommended and just INCREASE the welfare rates by tying them to a Measure of the actual cost of living in Alberta? And for anyone that wants to tell Mr. Klein and Mr. Dunford what they think of $855/month for disabled people, please complete this online survey:
http://www3.gov.ab.ca/hre/aishreview/index.asp
A question I would like answered by our government concerns royalty payments paid for new oil sands projects. As an incentive to the companies, the government agreed to take only a 1% royalty on oil sands production until the capital cost of the project was recovered. After this the royalty payment would be 25%. As soon as this agreement was struck, all the oil sands projects started incurring huge multi-billion dollar cost overruns, overruns much higher than had occurred on past projects. These usually competent companies had mysteriously lost their ability to plan, estimate, and build oil sands facilities. My questions for Murray Smith the Minister of Energy are:
1. Has somebody in your department calculated the costs of these overruns to the Alberta taxpayer due to the double whammy of plants coming on stream late plus a much higher capital cost to recover due to company ineptitude. Both factors seriously delay the year when the government may start our royalties at the 25% level. Will you share these costs with Albertans?
2. What safeguards does the government have in place to insure that companies are not performing work on other projects and expensing it to projects which qualify for the royalty holiday. This is an accounting trick which the Hollywood movie industry developed into an art form.
3. Why did the government not insist on equity ownership in projects proportional to our lost revenue due to overruns? This would have provided these companies with an incentive to build projects the old-fashion way where the company took the financial risk instead of the tax payer.
TO Minister Mar and Premier Klein:
I would like to know where I can apply for this great job that Kelly Charlebois has. He is paid over $100,000 a year contract by the Health ministry and does consultant work that appears to require no written contract and no written report. So he provides advice? I have offered my advice to government for years (in the form of letters and petitions). Not once have I earned money from my advice. So where do I apply for that peachy job? What was that Mr. Mar, you say there was no hiring or tendering procedure either. Hmmm.
Is it really true that Premier Klein has appointed Gary Mar as ambassador to Denmark?
Have a look here.
I want only one simple question answered by Premier Klein during this campaign. How he answers it will give me all I need to determine whether or not he gets my vote because it will shed light on his character and honesty.
Here it is.
During a trip to Mexico in September 2002, the Premier and his Economic Development Mark Norris paid $1097.00 in our tax money as a tip to the concierge and maid at the Four Season's Hotel. I want a little more detail on what the maid and the concierge did that occasioned such generosity. If Mr. Klein or Mr. Norris would elaborate I would be eternally greatful.
Click here for background materialA concerned Henry
Klein and Dunford made a very smart move re: the AISH problem! Do a Review which will take till the end of November....no one will expect any action before Christmas, and maybe by February, in all the excitement of a new legislature opening, AISH will get lost in the shuffle once again! After all these are only 33,000 people, and many of them don't vote, maybe because they have been ground down for so long that they have lost the will to fight the system anymore!
Let's not let them forget about us! We are Albertans too and deserve more than the pittance we are given for subsistence. Let's keep the AISH issue on the surface throughout this election. Let's keep asking politicians about it so they know it is important, not just to persons unfortunate enough to be living on AISH, but to all Albertans with a conscience!
Mr. Klein: How about letting Albertans know about your health care plans now, instead of after the election? Allow the people of this province to make up thier own minds and either elect (or dump) you and yours based on the platform you run.
Dear Mr. Klein,
I have degrees from three Universities, all of them with honors, and a gold medal for one. I am not a slow learner, and I know there are many Albertans who are smarter than I am. Would you please give us a chance to see if we can understand what you are planning for Health Care in Alberta before you ask us to blindly vote you back into government? Just a few clues about the major proposals would be helpful. The Opposition Parties are giving us their plans......
Dear Premier Klein:
Were your recent comments that suggested there were some AISH patients who were getting benefits that they didn't deserve a political preemptive strike, intended to divert the public's attention away from Albertans who have been left severely disabled with reduced or without any disability benefits that force them to live off the kindness of family, friends and strangers? Why does Alberta Health and Wellness Minister Gary Mar abandon his responsibilities by refusing to investigate patient complaints made against the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta, in particular when it involves issues of covert rationing and doctors blacklisting patients? Why does the Alberta government turn a blind eye to such practices? Why are doctors allowed to leave patients, with chronic complex medical conditions, severely disabled for years on end, including up to and over a decade (10 years), without providing proper testing and treatment or assisting them to apply for disability benefits that they are entitled to? What government department or agency is investigating these criminal practices and fraud that is being perpetrated by the doctors against innocent and trusting patients? Are physicians receiving some sort of kickback or payoff from the Canadian and/or Alberta government for denying disabled patients the proper testing, treatment, care and assistance that they need? Who is protecting patients from incompetent and malpracticing doctors, especially when patients are too sick or disabled to advocate for themselves? Why isn't there an independent and impartial agency with the mandate to investigate, adjudicate and resolve patient complaints?
Sincerely,
Trudy Newman
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