Elections don't count.

On Wednesday this week, I was surprised to find out that Premier Alison Redford had made another provincial proposal to teachers for a framework for their contracts.  The Provincial Executive Council of the Alberta Teacher's Association has sent it on to locals for consideration.  This could mean we'd be entering into another province-wide agreement very shortly.

Two things from this. If it takes the Premier to get involved everytime, such as when Dave Hancock was Education Minister when then Premier Ed Stelmach pitched a 5-year and got it signed, and now with Redford superseding current Education Minister Jeff Johnson, why bother having a Minister of Education at all?

But that's not the biggest thing I get from this. The biggest thing starts from the question "where was the Alberta School Boards Association in all this?"  It seems to me they had no idea this was going down at all, trustees were never informed the conversation between the PC government and the ATA was even happening, and one blogger has even wondered why the ASBA even exist in the first place.

That's not deep enough.  The ASBA has other purposes, just like the ATA is not simply a bargaining entity.  However, trustees don't have too many other significant duties than good interactions with their teachers.  Well, okay, they give direction to the implementation of education in their area as well.

Trustees have been sidelined for years now, starting most prominently with Stelmach. When he pitched a 5-year deal, ASBA was concerned then about funding, but much worse, trustees were not given the opportunity to bargain as much for local issues.  Some boards didn't even have trustees involved at all, and instead had Employer Bargaining Authorities, like the one that my Board was a part of called the School Boards Employer Bargaining Authority.  That means that trustees have been removed from discussing complete contracts with their employees for over 8 years.  Some trustees have never even been involved in such discussions at all.

So why do we even have elections for them if they aren't given an opportunity to represent us?  Well, okay, they give direction to the implementation of education in their area as well.  However, if you were to ask Education Minister Jeff Johnson, the only direction required should be "Inspiring Education". So again, why do we even elect trustees at all?

Then I recall some of the recent goings on following the latest provincial election. Evan Berger, appointed (without a competition) to a six-figure post in the Alberta Government, despite being dumped by the electorate for a Wildrose MLA in Pat Stier. A police college that was expected to go into Fort Macleod because those citizens elected a mayor that would make it happen got cancelled.  It makes one wonder ... if the PCs are in government, does it matter who we elect?

We want elections to count. We want our voices heard. So we vote for trustees who we think will represent our interests best. We vote for MLAs who we believe will do the same. We vote for mayors who will work to better our communities, but aren't able to anyway because their hands are tied to the Alberta Government's purse-strings.  Our elections don't count.  Considering our elections come up this October, the fact that who I elect doesn't matter bothers me significantly, because I firmly believe we need trustees who are empowered, and councillors and mayors who aren't going to have to worry about the PC boot falling on them.

If we are to see this change, we need to vote for a party who will make elections count. They'll give your vote an opportunity to work. They'll give trustees, councillors and mayors the opportunity to represent our interests to the better of our community.

Do you know of a party who has made it their platform to get elections to count?