Notley says Albertans must stay the course to reap benefits of her government’s policies

Still a few months from the mid-point of her term, Premier Rachel Notley says her government still has momentum but wants delegates to keep their gaze forward.

“Almost 18 months,” Notley said during one of her few departures from a scripted speech given at the NDP provincial council Saturday, “not old yet.”

Addressing a room of NDP faithful, she said her party needs to hold strong to the policies it has created if the province is to avoid slipping back into old ways that led to problems of today.

Referring to Wildrose rhetoric as the “anger machine” she pointed to goals including economic diversification, education, climate change and on breaking the “landlock” to bring oil to tidewater as keys to their success in the fewer than 1,000 days until the next election.

“We won’t respond to job losses by creating more job losses,” she said.

For those suffering job losses, staying the course might be less welcome a strategy. Notley said what would be worse is extending cuts to social services that she said have only just rebounded from past cuts.

“When we talk about stability, what we’re really talking about is those important public services, ensuring that they’re not subjected to a whole bunch of experimentation, a whole bunch of re-organization, a whole bunch of chaos, a whole bunch of Draconian cuts,” she said.

“There are fundamental, important public services that are helping Canada families through these tough times and they need to know that they’re there for them when they need them.”

Additionally, she said tuition freezes will allow people looking to re-train to do so without facing increased costs and investment in infrastructure will put some people to work in the meantime.

When it came to climate change, she demonstrated the very stability she called for from Canadans, walking the line between federal and provincial policies she has in past.

“Carbon production must be reduced and the best way to reduce it is to put a price on it,” she said, adding she wants the federal government to meet her halfway by finding ways to get oil to tidewater.The provincial council began Saturday morning and concludes Sunday.

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