Give it Some Thought Premier Designate Redford

First off Premier Designate Redford, a sincere congratulations on your win. Also may I add my deepest condolences on your loss of your mother.

I followed the PC Leadership race with great interest, but in the end could not vote for any of the final three candidates.There was nothing inspiring, new, or a way of thinking that would improve the great province we live in. Throwing the money back at education may have appeared to help in many peoples eyes, but now we have the reality of dealing with the band aid fix plus the burden of coming up with the money when the government is already running in a deficit situation is not exactly a stellar move in my eyes. Our education system overall is fine but we need it to be secular, completely public. Having two boards such as the Catholic board causes duplication and extra financial burden to manage. It is also unfair to the many other religious groups out there that feel the same entitlement. Maybe having one PUBLIC system is a way we can try and help with funding.

The main reason I couldn't place an X beside your name on the ballot is quite simple. You are too close minded at the thought of private health delivery. Yes I know it is a can of worms to open this topic, and it could possibly be political suicide, but are you there to fix things or be a populist? This is a question only you can answer. I am not saying to go to a style of U.S. health, but to give the taxpayers the service we all want and deserve. My significant other has many health issues which I pay for service out of my own pocket right here in Alberta already. I feel that my government has left us behind as far as pro-active care. Here is one example, our public system family Dr. put in an MRI request to look at the tissue damage to get to the bottom of excruciating pain. The first available time we received was 5 MONTHS wait. In the meantime she was put on many expensive prescribed medications. Aside from the money the medications did something else, damaged her liver. Nice now we have another health issue to deal with and more medications. Am I angry, well yes I am and here is why. Upon looking around I found a private wellness clinic called pro-vital. They told me there was nothing they could do to have her in any quicker but mentioned a private MRI place called Mayfair Diagnostics which is a private business offering MRI's. The wait...well 48 hours. Of course I paid the $600 to get it done. Now our family Dr. had the information required to forward her to a needed specialist, funny how that works huh. My question would have to be why my tax dollars paid to your government to support public health care is not looking out for Albertans. If there is such a backlog for these services and there are places available to expedite them, why is our public system not allowed to utilize these private clinics. I pay for the service through my taxes.

Having a closed mind to different ideas doesn't make a leader, it makes a follower. Public delivery of these private services is not wrong. If there is a waiting list of months for people suffering and you can eliminate reactive care, it simply makes sense for government to fund this and get Albertans the care they need, pay for and deserve. By not having an open mind you take away from improving a system and cost more in a long run. BTW you have an extra liver? Point made.