No longer a new government, the NDP is set to open its third session of the legislature.
The throne speech starting the 29th Legislative Assembly will be delivered by Lieutenant Governor Lois E. Mitchell at 3 p.m. Thursday.
But not everyone will be on board with the ruling party’s agenda.
Wildrose House Leader Nathan Cooper calls it an interesting time in the province.
“We’ve seen the government really make a significant divergence from co-operation that, from time to time, we saw in the assembly over the last couple of years,” he said, adding that speaks to a larger issue of transparency.
“Last week there was a technical briefing right in this room that they banned me from attending, they wouldn’t let Rick Strankman, the MLA from Drumheller-Stettler, into some coal consultations,” said Cooper.
He believes the government has made significant changes to the fabric of the province, and says it will be interesting to see if the NDP will reset its direction or keep going down the ideological path it’s been on.
Meanwhile, Interim PC Leader Ric McIver has low expectations.
He argues the NDP will continue to drive up debt to $60-billion by the next election, with $2-billion a year in interest payments.
“We’re afraid that they’ll make more negative changes,” he said. “I understand that they’ve got plans to make more changes to the Municipal Government Act and some labour legislation.”
McIver adds the NDP’s goal is to wipe away 44 years of prosperity, high employment and common sense government.
There is still talk about a merger between the PCs and Wildrose, but he says they won’t let that distract from the job as opposition.
“We will be carefully evaluating and commenting on the government’s legislation, we will support those things if the government does anything right and we will aggressively oppose those things that are taking Alberta backwards,” he explained.
“We’ll even work with the NDP if they do the right thing, that hasn’t been the case up until now except in rare occasions, but we’re looking for those good examples of the NDP by luck or by circumstance doing the right thing.”
He says NDP action to this point has spurred what he calls ‘angry support’ for opposition parties and Albertans are already shopping for another government.
McIver adds the NDP has been bribing Albertans with their own money, from the carbon tax to energy efficiency initiatives, but he says Albertans are too smart to be fooled anymore.
