FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: February 1, 2000
Premier Continues to Mislead Public on Health Care Privatization Plan, Says AFL Premier Klein’s televised address last night was a continuation of his intentional misleading of the public over his privatization experiment, says Audrey Cormack, President of the Alberta Federation of Labour (AFL). It offers nothing to make life better for working people in the province. "He had nothing to offer working people," notes Cormack. "His attention is saved for corporations and the extremely wealthy." Cormack notes that the government’s key economic plank is the flat tax, which will disproportionately benefit the very wealthy. The only content in the speech, says Cormack, was Klein’s continued misinformation about his health privatization plan. "He insists on abusing his access to the airwaves to tell half-truths and cloud his real intentions with Medicare." "He knows as well as we do that Albertans are saying they don’t want taxpayer dollars padding the pockets of for-profit hospitals," states Cormack. "His plan – as he well knows – does exactly that." "He has promised to put $1 billion into health care over the next three years, but how much of that will go to services, and how much into the profit margins of private clinics?" asks Cormack. Cormack observes Klein is still not hearing Albertans. "Albertans are saying to the government we don’t want his privatization plan. What can be so hard about that?" Cormack scoffed at the appointment of Don Mazankowski to chair a new Premier’s Advisory Council on Health. "Klein has appointed Mulroney’s hatchet man to advise on the future of health care." Cormack points out that Mazankowski started the cutbacks to health care transfer payments in the 1980s as a Minister, including a period as Finance Minister, under the Mulroney and Campbell governments. "Nothing for working families, tax breaks and privatized health care for the wealthy. Sounds like the same old Tory government to me," concludes Cormack.
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