Murray Wood: Who's hot... and who's not
Every Friday, Murray Wood takes a look at the week's news and decides who's hot... and who's not. This week's list inclu...
Saskatchewan MLAs made their way back to their constituencies on Thursday as the spring sitting finished up.
The proceedings ended with a bang, as the Sask. NDP worked on the government hard for the last week and a half, releasing leaked documents from SaskPower they said showed the government wasn’t being forthright about the cost of refurbishing the province’s coal power plant fleet.
Read more:
- Premier says Sask. ‘welcomes’ new carbon price deal
- National Electricity Strategy doesn’t surprise Sask. Premier, offers some approval
- SaskPower CEO offers explanation for leaked coal power documents
NDP Leader Carla Beck said she’s proud of what her party has accomplished this sitting, but the coal situation had moved to top priority.
“I think this is going to take up a lot of time, because all of those things — health care, what the future of this province looks like — this $26 billion is going to limit our ability to address many of those issues that are facing this province right now,” said Beck.
The NDP introduced a number of private members’ bills this sitting, none of which ended up passing. The party is claiming a couple of wins, though — working with the provincial government to pass changes to regulations around carbon monoxide detectors in multi-unit dwellings, dubbed Henry’s Law.
The Opposition is also taking at least some credit for the increased frequency of reporting on the health authority’s website of health care service closures — though the NDP also said twice a day still wasn’t enough.
The NDP also spent a lot of time talking and trying to get more information about Advanced Education Minister Ken Cheveldayoff’s constituency office lease, convinced that him subletting part of the space was inappropriate.
Premier’s Scott Moe’s brain was also on health care as the sitting ended. He said the Patients First Health Care Plan was the most important initiative his government worked on.
“It is 50 actionable items that are truly going to provide the right care, at the right time, in the right place. And it’s living document, we’re going to continue to bring in those tools and innovations as they become available to ensure that we can continue to improve our health-care initiative,” said Moe.
And he said none of that would be possible without the strength of the province’s economy.
The government passed a number of bills this sitting, including the bill to allow tailgaiting at Roughriders games, and The Compassionate Intervention Act which allows people to be forced into addictions treatment in certain cases.
Government also passed The Building Schools Faster Act, which is meant to streamline the process for finding land for schools, though some school divisions have said there are other challenges that would better speed up the process of they were dealt with.
The Saskatchewan Firearms Amendment Act was passed, utilizing a loophole to hide gun owners in the province from the federal buyback. And The Cyberstalking and Coercive Control Act created new penalties for cyberstalking.
This sitting, the seats also had to be moved around in the Assembly, after Betty Nippi-Albright left the NDP to sit as an Independent. She spoke about frustrations over the NDP’s support of forced addictions treatment, with hints there might be more behind the decision, but hadn’t elaborated on it publicly by the end of sitting.
What else happened this week:
- Former Sask. Party MLA Gord Wyant has been appointed to the Provincial Court Judicial Council as one of two people who represent the community at large. The council recommends candidates for appointment to provincial court, and hears complaints about provincial court judges.
- In their clashes with Minister responsible for SaskPower Jeremy Harrison, the NDP dug deep into their back pockets, mentioning several times the incident where Harrison initially denied and then admitted in 2024 to bringing a gun into the legislative building years earlier. The Opposition threw barbs, wondering if he could be trusted on the coal refurbishment file, if he couldn’t be trusted to remember that he brought a gun into the legislature.
- The Chief of Staff for the Sask. NDP, Jeremy Nolais, who the Sask. Party has accused of spreading hate in a fundraising email and has been calling for him to be fired, will soon help fill in as the Opposition’s Communications Director.
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