Rakhi Pancholi, MLA Edmonton-Whitemud

Sarah Hoffman, NDP Critic for Education, will be joined by qualified Alberta teachers who want to work but can't find jobs due to the UCP's cuts to education and failure to plan for the COVID-19 pandemic.

Alberta NDP Health Critic David Shepherd & Education Critic Sarah Hoffman will be joined by Dr. Darren Markland and Dr. Joe Vipond to talk about the COVID-19 pandemic, the glaring gaps in the response from Jason Kenney and to take your questions.

The source of 88% of positive cases in Alberta is currently unknown. Schools are overwhelmed with managing cases, isolation of students & staff, and little to no info because AHS is also overwhelmed. But Adriana LaGrange thinks everything is just fine. https://calgaryherald.com//calgary-school-boards-describe-

Right now during the pandemic, more workers than ever across Alberta are working in unsafe conditions. And yet, the UCP are trying to roll-back protections for worker safety through Bill 47 as red tape reduction. It makes me furious. And today in the Assembly, I said so. (Excuse the missed words & improper grammar. I was a little worked up. )

According to an attendee of Jason Nixon’s town hall on parks last night: It was just [UCP MLAs] saying, ‘Everything you’ve heard that you’re concerned about isn’t real.’ But the evidence isn’t there to support that.’ https://edmontonjournal.com//alberta-government-virtual-to

Alberta’s NDP Opposition will demand answers from Jason Kenney and the UCP on their pandemic spending choices during today’s supplementary supply budget debate.

Like most MLAs, I’ve been hearing the same questions from dance studios, hockey parents, fitness studios - why were they closed & where is the support for these small businesses from this government? Here are the steps we believe the UCP should be taking right now to make sure Alberta businesses survive this pandemic - https://www.albertandpcaucus.ca//ndp-joins-small-business-

Want to save small businesses? Wear a mask.

COVID is affecting Albertans in so many devastating ways. I shared a powerful email from one of my constituents whose daughter is positive & it was difficult to read without getting emotional. We need the Premier to take this as seriously as it is hurting us.

Here is my message to Albertans tonight concerning the COVID-19 pandemic and the failure of the Premier to take real action. -- Albertans waited 12 days.... In that time, 94 Albertans died. And more than 13,000 Albertans got sick with COVID-19. Albertans waited 12 whole days expecting to see strong action, but once again, this Premier let them down. Today’s announcement is simply not enough. We don’t know what Dr. Hinshaw recommended to the Cabinet but I don’t for one second think it was this. If the decisions announced today are based on public health advice, then why did the Premier spend several long hours with his UCP Caucus debating amongst themselves. I suspect today’s decisions by this Premier were NOT governed by the advice of the public health officials, but by his own ideology combined with the internal political motivations of the UCP Caucus. Today’s announcement is the product of political bargaining inside the UCP and not the product of a serious engagement with public health advice. Today, what we needed to see was strong action to stop the spread of COVID-19 in its tracks. Instead, we once again saw more half-measures. Overall, with a few exceptions, there were very few new restrictions announced and where action was taken, I didn’t hear any new support for businesses that will suffer. For instance, the 25 per cent fire capacity rule means most retail stores will see no change. When it comes to restaurants and bars, they made no change beyond what was announced 12 days ago. Let’s be clear, in the last 12 days our case count has spiralled out of control. Jason Kenney’s mishandling of this pandemic has already caused far more damage to the economy. Based on today’s announcement, that’s not going to stop anytime soon. These half-measures will mean prolonging the pandemic, prolonging the suffering, and prolonging the economic pain. I am deeply concerned that at a time when we have mass spread of a deadly virus throughout our communities we are more interested in granting exemptions than making rules. On masks: Alberta remains the only place in the country where there is no mask mandate despite having the worst per-capita cases in Canada. This is ridiculous. It is dangerous. And it will only help further the spread. A cowardly decision by this Premier that is catering to the extreme fringes of his party and his caucus at the expense of the health and safety of Albertans. This government has completely abandoned medical science in service of political convenience. I also want to talk specifically about schools. In July , our Caucus proposed a 15-point plan to ensure Alberta had safe schools and smaller class sizes in September. The UCP refused to implement it, claiming schools were safe and not the source of community spread. To date, we’ve seen more than 500 schools with cases of COVID-19. There are thousands of students, teachers and staff in isolation as we speak. In fact, we actually learned today the Government has banked savings in education. Now, their eleventh-hour solution is to rip hundreds of thousands of kids out of school in the middle of their second term. They’re doing this with no plan for the challenges this presents students, especially students with complex needs or those with learning challenges or behavioural challenges or mental health challenges. We’re hearing today that no one talked to school boards yet again. This Government has learned nothing from the chaos they caused in the spring. The Premier slashed supports for these students, and now he’s dumped the consequences of his pandemic response into the laps of their families. I want to be clear the Premier is far too late to act and what he is doing is far too little. Here’s the reality we are all facing. We have the highest number of active cases in Canada and projections show cases will continue to rise. We have more active cases than Ontario, which has more than three times the population. Our contact tracing system is completely overwhelmed and falling further behind each day. We have major outbreaks in our schools our continuing care centres and in every major hospital. Yesterday Dr. Hinshaw made the frightening decision to simply abandon tracing cases that were diagnosed ten days ago or longer. There are so many Albertans being admitted to hospital that we have reached capacity in our ICUs and doctors expect we are two weeks from triage. We have lost more Albertans to COVID-19 so far this month than we have since the pandemic began. Our hearts goes out to all of their families. It should have never gotten to this point. The Premier failed to prepare for this second wave and now it feels a bit like he’s giving up. It is now clear that the official position of the Government of Alberta is to do the very least to stop the spread of COVID-19. Today, Jason Kenney had one last chance to make the hard choice. He failed to do so. And now we all have to live with the consequences.