Alberta Minute: Warrantless Searches, Corporate Welfare, and Wasteful Trains

Alberta Minute - Your weekly one-minute summary of Alberta politics.

This Week In Alberta:

• On Wednesday there will be a Standing Committee on Legislative Offices meeting, though there is still no agenda posted yet.
  
  
• On Thursday there will be a meeting of the Standing Committee on the Alberta Heritage Savings Trust Fund where the Heritage Fund's 2nd Quarter Report and the Committee's 2019 Public Meeting will be reviewed.
  
  
• Two important public engagement sessions are happening including the Budget 2020 consultation, which closes this Friday, and the Cut Red Tape consultation, which is ongoing.

Last Week In Alberta:

• A year after the introduction of the Traffic Safety Act, Police Services are starting to supply screening devices to every front-line officer. This is being done to facilitate a new mandatory alcohol screening program that does not require the officer to have any suspicion to make a person give a breath sample - effectively a warrantless, groundless search and seizure. This appears to be clearly unconstitutional and the law is facing court challenges.
  
  
• Despite the province's enormous $70-billion debt, Alberta's Minister of Economic Development and Tourism announced plans for a $90-million tax credit for companies who make their movies here. This is Alberta - surely our unmatched scenery and a fair, low, flat tax system should be enough to compete, without having to hand out big fat checks to billion-dollar companies that, in many cases, are already using Alberta as a film location anyway!
  
  
• Alberta Institute President Peter McCaffrey, was on Danielle Smith's show discussing the City's updated plan for the Green Line LRT. As he explains in the interview, this new plan is just another classic example of City Staff promoting decision-based evidence-making, rather than evidence-based decision-making. The entire project continues to fail even the most generous cost-benefit analysis.

-----

Donate:

The Alberta Institute doesn't accept any government funding and never will. We think you should be free to choose, for yourself, which organizations to support. If you're in a position to contribute financially, you can make a donation here.

-----

Share:

If you're not in a position to donate, we understand, but if you appreciate our work, you can help by spreading our message. Please forward this email to your friends, follow us on Facebook and Twitter, and help make sure every Albertan knows what's going on in our province.