Alberta Premier Alison Redford

So far in her short career as Alberta Premier, Alison Redford seems to have been coated with a layer of Teflon deep enough to have been donated by Ralph Klein!

Surely, one would think, one of these days some of the stuff that has been flying around the rather inept operations of her government these past few weeks would stick to her. So far, virtually none of it has.

Here’s poor Gary Mar, pilloried and now unpaid because the invitations to a fund-raiser to help pay off his quarter-million-dollar-plus Progressive Conservative leadership campaign debt made mention of his current job as Alberta’s chief oilsands pitchman in Asia.

And how, asks a friend of mine who keeps track of such things, is this any different from Redford — who beat Mar on Oct. 2 in the race for Alberta’s top political job — inviting her supporters to her swearing-in ceremony, her office Christmas party or the Speech from the Throne?

Well, presumably there’s a proper way to offer access for cash (by implication) and a way not to (by stating it directly). Obviously, someone associated with Mar wasn’t paying attention and accidentally connected the dots with sufficient clarity to tip off of someone else who complained to the premier. She, in turn, saw political merit in publicly spanking Mar at a time much stinkier issues are swirling around her leadership.

After all, we know it doesn’t take many anonymous complaints to goad Redford into action — leastways, it doesn’t when they’ve been made on behalf of a candidate you want in your cabinet who has just inconveniently lost a nomination vote to someone you don’t.

At any rate, when former Alberta Health Services Chair Ken Hughes fumbled the ball and lost the Calgary West nomination to sometime backbench MLA Shiraz Shariff, it didn’t take Redford very long at all to ensure the vote was “disallowed” for unspecified voting irregularities. When a new vote was held, it conveniently produced the desired result. Hughes will now presumably ascend unhindered to the cabinet as God and the premier intended.

Likewise, when Tory cabinet ministers write letters threatening a school board that it might lose funding for schools if it doesn’t stop complaining about lack of funds, or to oil drilling contractors reaming them out for inviting opposition politicians to a luncheon, well, that’s just situation normal in bullyboy Alberta.

Here’s Dunvegan-Central Peace MLA Hector Goudreau advising a local Catholic school district official to watch her step: “I advise you to be cautious as to how you approach future communications as your comments could be upsetting to some individuals. This could delay the decision on a new school.”

Here’s Finance Minister Ron Liepert chewing out the Canadian Association of Oilwell Drilling Contractors for inviting someone to lunch who wasn’t a PC: “Since this personal invitation is under your signature I would ask if this is a joke or is your political judgment that lacking? Either way I’m not impressed….”

It seems likely CAODC President Don Herring wasn’t impressed either when he received that missive from the seldom questioned and never disciplined Liepert — at least, someone made certain Liepert’s letter found its way to the Wildrose Party.

And here’s Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths setting Alberta Urban Municipalities Association President Linda Sloan straight on what happens when someone has the cheek to suggest that the government hands out municipal grants on the basis of how locals vote.

“Your comments are deliberately inflammatory and erroneous, and are not a sound way to build a strong relationship between governments whose ultimate purpose and focus is to build stronger communities. Please be advised that as a result of your comments in the media, neither I, nor any of my Cabinet or Caucus colleagues, will be attending the AUMA breakfast on Feb. 16, 2012.”

Well, in fairness, that one got smoothed over when the media got wind of it. And when the premier’s then chief of staff, Stephen Carter, undiplomatically Tweeted that Sloan was a liar, and a malicious one at that, he soon had to recant, plus temporarily step aside to run the party’s election campaign.

Finally, of course, there’s the renowned Money for Nothing Scandal, in which 21 MLAs from all parties (including, for a spell, the premier) have been receiving $1,000 a month for literally doing nothing — seeing as the committee hasn’t met for more than three years and nobody thought to mention it.

Tory backbencher Genia Leskiw, even made the eye-popping observation that she’d never so much as noticed she was being paid for being a member of the committee – “to tell you the truth, I don’t even look at my paycheque.”

Can you imagine what would have happened if, instead of being MLAs, the members of this committee had been recipients of Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped overpaid because they’d received other income in addition to their AISH payments?

If you can’t imagine it, I’ll tell you: they’d have been ordered to repay, or face the possibility of fraud charges.

Perhaps the MLAs in question should do the same as an AISH or Employment Insurance recipient who had received an overpayment, and, as Liberal Leader Raj Sherman now promises to do, write a cheque to the Provincial Treasury for the sum of the overpayment.

The good news from the government’s perspective is that none of the Opposition parties are likely to make too much of this one since every one of them has had members on the committee getting money for nothing.

But the great news from Premier Redford’s point of view is that, just as when Klein was premier, nothing seems to stick to her anyway. In that regard, poor old fumbling Ed Stelmach was the anomaly — everything stuck to him, even the stuff he did right.

Let’s be frank, people. The fact that this kind of stuff seems to be Situation Normal in the PC government of Alison Redford and voters apparently aren’t even interested, let alone annoyed, hardly speaks well of the Alberta electorate!

This post also appears on David Climenhaga’s blog, Alberta Diary.

David J. Climenhaga

David J. Climenhaga

David Climenhaga is a journalist and trade union communicator who has worked in senior writing and editing positions with the Globe and Mail and the Calgary Herald. He left journalism after the strike...