A Foothills-area MLA will be one of nine members from Alberta’s Wildrose and Progressive Conservative parties on a committee studying a possible union.
Livingstone-Macleod MLA Pat Stier was selected as one of five Wildrose Party members to be part of a nine-person discussion group assigned to create a framework for a potential union with the PCs.
“We’re going into immediate discussions on how we can get this started,” he said.
Stier is one of three sitting MLAs. Other members include leadership from constituency associations and party executives.
The framework would need to respect the principles and views of grassroots members of both parties and will ultimately have to be ratified by members of both parties. The group has been asked to produce a report within four to six weeks.
Stier said it’s essential the two parties merge to challenge the NDP government in the next provincial election.
“Everywhere I go, no matter where I’m at in whatever part of the province, people are demanding ‘When are we going to get this done and how soon will we get all conservatives voting together so we can challenge the government in the next election?’” Stier said.
Stier supports unification of the two parties.
“I’ve been saying that all along,” he said.
Stier said he joined with many other former PCers to form the Wildrose Party because they disagreed with the direction the Progressive Conservatives were going. However, he said almost 10 years have past and it’s time for conservatives in both parties to reunite.
Stier said many of the issues that caused the split are not as much of a concern anymore or they have been addressed. He said he left the PCs, in part out of concern over land use policies and the Alberta Landuse Stewardship Act.
However, if a private member’s bill Stier introduced to enhance private property rights is passed, he said it would address the concerns many had when they left the PC Party.
“That puts out a lot of the fire we used to have about that,” said Stier.
