In this week’s episode of The Line: Alberta Podcast, Rob Breakenridge takes a closer look at the controversy surrounding procurement at Alberta Health Services and what we learned last week with the release of a major report into the matter.
Retired Manitoba judge Raymond Wyant was brought in by the province to conduct a third-party investigation into the contract for the 2022 purchase of children’s pain medication, as well as contracts to conduct publicly-funded surgeries at private clinics.
The report concludes that there were conflicts of interest and that policies were not followed, but it also found no evidence of wrongdoing by any elected officials or any political staffers. The premier’s former chief of staff, Marshall Smith, has also denied any wrongdoing.
The opposition, though, has pointed to limits in the scope of this investigation and say the report only strengthens the case for a public inquiry.
In this episode, a conversation with Carrie Tait, reporter with the Calgary bureau of The Globe and Mail. She has done some important work on this story and helped bring many aspects of this controversy to light. We’ll get her insight on what this report uncovered, what questions remain unanswered, and where this whole scandal goes from here.
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The Line: Alberta is a provincial bureau of The Line, edited by Jen Gerson and Matt Gurney. Email us at alberta@readtheline.ca.
