The provincial government now holds unprecedented power in its hands as a result of four bills now being contemplated by the legislature, lawyer Keith Wilson told a packed crowd at the Torrington Community Centre last Wednesday night.Wilson, who has been touring Alberta for the past several months, told the group that Bill 19, the Land Assembly Property Act, gives the government the option to take land without giving proper compensation to landowners by wording the act in such a way that the government isn't expropriating land, and therefore doesn't have to give compensation for it.The act also freezes landowners' rights to do as they wish with their land. All of these powers rest solely with the provincial cabinet, which can make decisions about land as they see fit, Wilson said.ìThe bottom line is that Bill 19 makes it easy for the government to get around the expropriation act. This piece of legislation is fundamentally unfair,î he told the audience.Bill 50, the Electricity Statutes Act, removed the checks and balances in the system by shifting the decision-making power about the bill from public hearings into whether extra power lines are needed across the province, to the cabinet, which has determined they are needed, Wilson said. He said there are no cost controls on the projects, which have been pegged as high as $16 billion.Wilson told the audience that higher electricity prices are on the way, as the government has authorized AltaLink to bill customers for the upgrades that will be made.Major industry groups, such as the Alberta Food Processors Association and the Alberta Power Consumers Association have come out against the upgrades that they say are excessive. They fear the projects are a massive overbuild and will lead to tripling of costs for manufacturers who use electricity and lead to job losses and a faltering economy as a result, Wilson said.ìYou can see the implications of this on businesses,î he said, noting that the competitiveness of the economy is at stake.Wilson pointed to a Conference Board of Canada study done in April which showed that $35 billion worth of electricity upgrades is planned across the country, with Alberta accounting for $16 billion of that.ì(Overbuilding electricity capacity) is a bad idea. Ask (MLAs) to reinstate a proper needs assessment,î he said.Bill 36, the Alberta Land Stewardship Act, allows the government to make decisions about land use that are normally the purview of municipalities, and gives the cabinet the power to rescind existing development rights, resource extraction, mining rights and grazing leases, among a host of other activities controlled by municipalities on certain types of land, Wilson said.ìWhenever they want, they have the authority to Ö simply tear (an agreement) up. This legislation gives the cabinet absolute power. They've overridden the protections of our system we've had since the Magna Carta,î he said.ìAll these bills need to be appealed,î he told the crowd, urging them to put pressure on their MLAs. ìThey're bad law. This legislation is a game-changer.îIn an interview, Wilson said cabinet has approved ìa massive overbuildî of electricity to benefit AltaLink and Atco.ìIt's indisputably in the economic interests of AltaLink and Atco, the two major transmission line companies, to be able to build as much as they can, because that's how they make their money,î he said, noting that in some cases, MLAs went along with the plan because they didn't understand the far-reaching implications of it and relied on the bureaucracy to feed them unbiased information.
