Alberta MLA ousted from UCP caucus gets it right in criticism of budget’s rural priorities, Opposition says

Speaking his mind about rural spending plans may have cost a northern Alberta MLA his caucus position, but it’s also earned him respect from the Opposition.

Scott Sinclair, the member for Lesser Slave Lake, was punished for “simply standing up for his constituents, something every MLA is elected to do,” an NDP critic told the legislature March 11.

Jodi Calahoo Stonehouse, the NDP’s shadow cabinet minister for forestry and parks, characterized Sinclair’s ousting as a slight against rural Albertans and Indigenous communities.

“Instead of listening to a rural, Indigenous member of their own team, (the UCP) shut him out. Instead of listening to the member for Lesser Slave Lake about his constituents’ concerns for better health care, better infrastructure so rural Albertans can get treatment close to home, or finishing critical roadways like Highway 88 so Albertans can travel safely, they fired him from their own team,” said Calahoo Stonehouse.

“Rural Albertans and Indigenous communities expect better.”

The UCP ousted Sinclair March 7 after he criticized the budget on social media. He reportedly refused to confirm he’d vote in favour of the budget, so the party removed him and now he sits as an Independent.

Finance Minister Nate Horner said the budget tabled Feb. 27 spreads proposed spending through Calgary, Edmonton and “everywhere else, corner to corner.”

He said: “I wish this budget didn’t have a negative sign in front of the $5.2 billion. Absolutely. But Alberta, leading the way before any other province had put their budgets forward, brought the tariff risk into our budget, into our baseline.

“B.C. didn’t do that. B.C. put an addendum to the side.”

As Alberta also deals with record population growth, recorded at 4.4 per cent in 2024,  “we’re going to continue to build this province while weathering this storm,” said Horner.

Most of Lesser Slave Lake’s commonly identified communities are First Nation reserves, Métis settlements or otherwise largely made up of Indigenous residents. Considered mostly rural and remote, the riding features the biggest of its two towns in the southernmost fifth of the riding. Slave Lake is about 250 km northwest of Edmonton.

The other town, High Prairie, is also in the south end of the riding, 120 km west of Slave Lake. 

Sinclair is a fifth-generation Indigenous businessperson. Elected in 2023, he is one of three Indigenous representatives in the legislature. The other two are Brooks Arcand-Paul and Calahoo Stonehouse, both shadow cabinet members for the NDP.

Sinclair’s post said he found most of the budget “at best, disappointing and, at worst, unacceptable for me, my family and my constituents.”

Calahoo Stonehouse, who represents Edmonton-Rutherford, said Sinclair accurately called out the UCP’s 2025 budget for doing “little to nothing” for rural Alberta while running a deficit.

“He’s right. It’s chaos, corruption and cuts,” Calahoo Stonehouse charged.

Sinclair’s post said: “The continuous flow of our GDP to urban centers while rural Alberta — the backbone of this province — gets left behind is appalling.”

He said health care in his riding has “hit rock bottom, and while I hear of positive changes happening elsewhere, they aren’t happening here. How are we to accept multiple emergency department closures when the nearest care is hours away?”

If it’s going to run a deficit — a move Sinclair said he doesn’t normally favour — he suggested that the UCP government stop closing hospitals, bring back local maternity services, allow for surgeries closer to home and build a helipad in High Prairie.

But in the legislature Horner called it “absolute garbage” to assert that critical infrastructure and corridors were ignored in Lesser Slave Lake. Two schools, two road projects and an EMS facility are earmarked for dollars there, he said.

As a broader example of geographic diversity, Horner pointed to $225 million budgeted over three years for school projects across Alberta, including planning and design for five new projects in the north. Design and planning are also happening for widespread transportation projects, he added.

On his northern list were $101 million for Highway 63 twinning north of Fort McMurray; $87 million for a bridge in La Crête and $189 million for a replacement bridge in Beaverlodge; $80 million for the La Crête maternity and community health centre; and “on and on.”

“I don’t even like getting down into the riding level. I’m from a remote rural part of the world as well, if any of you aren’t aware,” said Horner, who represents Drumheller-Stettler. “Sometimes things have to go on priority lists.”