Alberta NDPC Party continues to show it's character.. or lack thereof.

The Alberta Teachers' Association:

"We're not quite full yet.. we want more!"

Well.

I go on holidays for two weeks (Hawaii, and yes, it was lovely) and come back to see that not much has happened in my absence.

The Alberta PC Party.. looking more and more everyday like he NDPC Party, continues to display it's complete absence of character, and a willingness to eschew any semblance of "conservative" values.

Today we read in the Calgary Herald that Education Minister Dave Hancock is castigating our Premier for being overly "blunt" when the Premier commented that teachers are responsible for their own layoffs by being overly greedy about their own salaries.

Dave Hancock, good socialist that he is, is clearly a big fan of the ATA and hopes to curry favor with the teacher's union by subtly throwing his Premier under the bus.

Too "blunt" Dave?  Really?  Either you are a complete buffoon, or you are willing to ignore the obvious reality to suck up to teachers who, by and large, have never voted PC anyway, and never prevented the PC Government from rolling up majority after majority after majority.

How 'bout this for "blunt" Dave:  Alberta teachers were already the highest paid educators in North America when, they demanded the government institute more pay raises and a contract which gave them guaranteed ongoing wages in line with Statistics Canada cost of living increases in 2007, under what everyone, including the Calgary Herald, called, "fantastically generous terms".

This required two things:

a) A "conservative" government who ignored financial prudence, ignored the reality of it's strong mandate to act conservatively, and instead, broke the tax-payer piggy bank to dole out unreasonable salary increases and other benefits to Alberta teachers;

b) An ATA which, while continuing to bemoan class size and quality of education, when push came to shove virtually ignored using any of the government generosity to meaningfully increase the number of teachers and instead, put all of that money in their own greedy little pockets.

Is that too blunt for your Dave? 

Then comes the coup de grace.

StatsCan decides to change how they calculate the cost of living index and in 2009, teachers salaries increase a further 5.99% instead of what initially appeared to be 4.85%.

Think about that.

In the midst of the biggest financial recession of our lifetime, while untold numbers of Albertans were collecting pink slips, taking pay cuts, and struggling to find jobs - when the teachers were given the initial StatsCan increase of 4.85% - they said, "Not enough".  "We want more".

Like the obese Mr. Creosote of Monty Python fame, already grotesquely fat with a salary that would bring teachers from anywhere else in North America to tears of joy, when the Alberta government effectively gave teachers a full Boston cream pie of a 4.85% for desert they said, "we want more", another wafer thin mint if you will.. and they took the government to arbitration to seek yet an additional 1.14% on top. Just one more wafer thin mint.

And then their stomachs burst.

And now they cry crocodile tears about layoffs and cutbacks and how it will impact "the children".

Except the truth is that they didn't give a good god damn about the children when they demanded more and more salary increases making it impossible for even an overly generous Alberta government to reduce class size and actually improve our classrooms.

The Premier subtly stated the obvious.

That teachers have only themselves to blame for being short-staffed in difficult times.

But even that subtle honesty is too much for our so-called "conservative" Minister of Education Dave Hancock. 

Time to get on board with the Wild Rose Alliance.. and maybe hedge your bets by getting a PC Membership and parking a vote with leadership hopeful Ted Morton.  No law against two party memberships.. trust me, I worked the door during the last PC leadership vote, and was amazed with the number of Liberal and NDP supporters showing up at the door to make sure Ted Morton or Jim Dinning didn't get elected.