Mandryk: Government losing focus on what it should be doing

By Murray Mandryk

If it seems to you that the Saskatchewan legislature hasn’t been working all that well of late, it’s probably because it hasn’t.

Even at the best of times, it’s tough to make this place work.

We are a jurisdiction just slightly physically smaller than Texas with, at last count, 1,179,906 people.

Texas has 29,360,757 people - the second-most populated state with 10 million fewer people than California, but 8 million more than Florida. Saskatchewan can be better compared with Montana (1,080,577) or North Dakota (766,309) - only much, much bigger.

Having a small population scattered over a vast area only magnifies our problems.

A Saskatchewan government must ensure everyone has heat, light, power, water and telephone and Internet, plus good roads to travel upon. Our government must see to it that everyone has decent and affordable access to schools and hospitals, plus ensure that people are safe and secure.

At any time in the history of Saskatchewan, this is a pretty formidable to-do list. Still, it’s that much more formidable amidst what’s now the fourth wave of a global pandemic that’s, unfortunately, killing more people. At the top of the government’s “to-do” list is getting reluctant people vaccinated.

Unfortunately, the Saskatchewan Party government’s inability to properly focus on immediate problems or long-term ones is where it seems to have gone awry this fall.

The above population numbers tell the tale of why Premier Scott Moe’s talk this fall sitting of land-locked Saskatchewan being a “nation within a nation” is especially silly.

One fully gets the frustration with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the federal Liberal government that views Saskatchewan as insignificant and doesn’t seriously consider the challenges we face as an agriculture/natural resource-based economy servicing a sparse population over a vast area.

One even gets why Moe and the Sask. Party might think this is a good tactically approach with Ottawa or at least, why a governing might say this to appease equally frustrated voters.

But to be talking about being “more independent” from Ottawa or the rest of Canada at a time when you are signing provincial/federal agriculture deals or when you have to send your ICU patients to other provinces because your own ICUs are filled to capacity is more than a little troubling.

The reality is that even if Moe was just talking about taking charge of more things that normally fall under federal jurisdiction — policing, tax collection and even immigration — he is talking about things that add costs to a province that was cash-strapped long before this pandemic came along.

In what way is what Moe is now promoting helpful to the average Saskatchewan voter in a place where we already have to deal with enough problems?

One gets that in a province of a million people, there are a million problems.

The story during this fall sitting of five-year-old Conner Finn — whose rare disease required his parents to take him to the University of Minnesota for an $832,000 bone marrow transplant — should make you sympathize with the tough daily choices. Sometimes, the government even makes the right ones.

But given the million problems a government must face on any given day, does it make sense for the government to make even more problems for itself at the Saskatchewan legislature?

For example, was it all that important or even necessary to move a bill for what seems to be another security detail at the Saskatchewan legislature that already has top-notch security provided by ex-RCMP officers in the Sargeant-At-Arms office? Wouldn’t that money be better spent on policing in rural Saskatchewan that likely has a great crime problem than the Marble Palace?

It’s hard enough for the Saskatchewan government to deal with the problems we have. We don’t need to create new ones.