New Cabinet Announced

The conservative landslide now complete, our premier has announced he cabinet (which he expanded).

Thought it was interesting that Mary-Ann Jablonski was announced as a a new addition to the cabinet, she is the Red Deer North Representative.

Have a read.

Alberta to launch a new strategic plan to curb the current woes of the Construction Industry

New strategy planned to assist the ailing contruction industry in Alberta. Numerous options are bing looked at including:

1) Encouraging Women and Aboriginals into the trades, through mentorship opportunities since the current numbers peg males as being over 85% of the currents workers in this area.

2) Battling Ottawa to revise EI rules so that individuals being laided off in High Unemployment areas could easily move to Alberta without red tape issues.

Article also has some great info and stats on the current market in Alberta.

Alberta the Second, Saskatchewans Boom Offically Arrives

Good article mimicking the Alberta boom in Saskatchewan. Worrisome if this trend continues though, we are already tight for workers without competing with Saskatchewan.

Alberta Tuitions Jump Nearly Double the Canadian Average

Alberta tuition jumps show they are considerably more then the rest of the country:

1) Alberta average tuition = $4900 ($400 more then anywhere else in the country)

2) Alberta tuition jump from last year = 4.9% (in comparision to the national average of 2.8%)

Alberta Advantage? Not in post secondary!

Christmas Nightmare ... for employers staffing their stores

Good article discussing Alberta's current job boom and worker shortage and its potential affect on the Christmas Retail Rush.

(Near) Country Wide Has Loonie Soaring and Job Rate Falling

Amazing article that really outlines the Dollar and new job growth and how they have been effected over the past year. Found it encouraging that the total number of new jobs in Canada this year has been well over a quarter million:

"The new jobs helped to boost the total number of positions created in the country this year to 283,000, representing an increase of 1.7 per cent for the period."

NAIT opens massive Trades training expansion

Yet another indicator that the trades are booming:

"The Northern Alberta Institute of Technology, which trains half of Alberta's apprentices and 20 per cent of those in all of Canada, threw open the doors on state-of-the art training facilities Tuesday that will see capacity for instrumentation apprentices grow by more than 60 per cent and by 25 per cent for millwright apprentices.

The $39.6-million NAIT Spartan Centre for Instrumentation Technology and Petro-Canada Centre for Millwright Technology officially opened with a ceremony featuring the Loyal Edmonton Regiment Blacklight Drum Line."

Pretty mind boggling to think of the measures the province and post-secondary schools are going to in an attempt to solve teh Alberta Labour crisis, specifically in the trades.