This conversation occurred one week before the provincial election and canvassed three main topics- fiscal and economic policies, and politics.
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Robert Bhatia is a retired, long-term Alberta public servant rising to the position of deputy minister. He served as deputy minister in four ministries including Alberta Revenue and Alberta Finance.
During his tenure he served on the boards of provincial agencies including the Alberta Investment Management Corporation and the Credit Union Deposit Guarantee Corporation.
Since his retirement, he has joined the Local Authorities Pension Plan Board, was chair of the Alberta Balancing Pool and was named as a public member to the Credit Union Central Alberta board of directors where he is now Vice-Chair. He had significant executive coaching practice and is an instructor and examiner with the Institute of Corporate directors.
,We started the conversation about the role of Alberta’s Heritage Fund with Bhatia providing insights on its origins and evolution. Ironically one of the reasons it’s been difficult to deal with the Heritage Fund is because, with the advent of consolidated budgeting it is extraordinarily difficult to treat non-renewable resource revenue (NRRR) outside the budgeting process. The accounting treatment for NRRR is not a trivial matter because, unlike other revenue sources, it is effectively a transfer of a physical asset – bitumen, for example, to a financial asset.
With respect to tax policy, Robert noted that the margin of policy disagreement between the UCP and NDP has narrowed significantly, particularly promises not to raise personal taxes or bring in a sales tax.
On economic diversification, Mr. Bhatia noted it was very difficult for Alberta’s non-energy companies to compete for investment and human and capital resources with oil and gas companies. Alberta has a highly developed venture capital business but it is almost exclusively in the oil and gas sector.
Bhatia referred to work of Credit Union Central Alberta’s economist who has observed earnings are not being reinvested back into the oil and gas sector. The narrowing compensation gap between Alberta and other provinces is a sign that perhaps the influence of the oil and gas sector on compensation practices is becoming less in Alberta’s labour markets. Given this, he sees some room for optimism as the dominance of oil and gas recedes freeing up more resources for other economic sectors.
The challenge of climate change or climate heating is a fundamental issue. While Ottawa is moving to support a transition towards a low-emissions environment, Alberta and other provinces are opposing such mores and this opposition is “unhelpful.”
An important aspect of advancing solutions is the importance of ensuring a full range of interests are represented at the various policy tables. This means left wing governments talking with business and right wing governments meeting with unions. The importance of having a wide range of views to the table is essential. There needs to be more dialogue between interests. “If it’s only between oil companies and the government, this is a bad thing.”
With regard to education there has been precious little talk about a vision for education and importance of education beginning in early childhood to post-graduate work. Bhatia worried about right wing governments who distrust post-secondary institutions and left-wing governments who are unimaginative. Education is foundational not only for the economy but also for social life. We need education to enable students to become open-minded and tolerant of other views.
Government has a lot of work to do to help society meet the challenges. facing an increasingly divisive population.
We ended the conversation by discussing how governments mobilize resources to address climate change and other significant issues. Robert noted that over the past decades government departments had evolved the capacity to better work and coordinate with other departments.
Reproduction of any or all of the conversation is prohibited except with written permission of Abpolecon.ca
Series production by Brendan Ruddy- As the Crow Flies.