Saskatchewan NDP Leader Carla Beck says Prince Albert residents should expect to see more of her party as it works to show voters it is serious about forming government.
Beck, who is also the leader of the Official Opposition, was in Prince Albert Thursday for meetings, a caucus meeting and a health-care town hall called “Your Care, Your Say.”
“We always want to come to Prince Albert,” Beck said. “There’s no secret that we are working every day to not only fulfill our role as the official opposition, but to show Saskatchewan people that if they are looking for change, that the Saskatchewan NDP is serious about forming government.”
Beck said health care was one of the major topics during the visit, including concerns about staffing for the Victoria Hospital expansion and the role Prince Albert plays as a hub for northern Saskatchewan.
She said the province should have acted earlier on health-care retention, especially as more workers approached retirement and as other provinces worked to recruit nurses, doctors and other health professionals.
“These issues don’t get fixed overnight,” Beck said. “What I will say is, since I’ve been in the legislature, and certainly since 2019, we’ve been raising the alarm in terms of our declining retention rates in health care.”
Beck said the province should be listening more closely to frontline health workers and local communities. She said the NDP is using its health-care town halls to gather ideas from residents, workers and communities across Saskatchewan.
She said Prince Albert’s hospital should be supported in a way that reflects its role for the North.
“If you’re thinking of emergency care, mental health care, obstetrics, so many things that people from all across the north, half the province, come to Prince Albert,” Beck said. “We should make sure that we have the staffing levels and the support for that hospital that is befitting that role.”
Beck also criticized the province’s handling of emergency room service disruptions. She said the public should have access to real-time information when emergency rooms are temporarily closed.
“It’s dangerous,” Beck said. “It’s dangerous if you’re coming in from outside of the city or you’re travelling on a highway, and you’ve got an emergency, if you don’t know that the town that you’re driving to, that the emergency room is closed.”
Beck said the information exists and should be made available to the public. She said the NDP brought forward a bill in the legislature that would have required the Saskatchewan Health Authority to provide real-time updates on emergency room closures.
In a written response, the provincial government said the SHA has been directed to move to at least twice-daily reporting of temporary emergency room service disruptions. Since May 19, the government said the SHA has been updating its emergency service disruption webpage at 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. daily.
The province also said HealthLine 811 has real-time information about the availability of emergency services across Saskatchewan, and that patients and families can call 811 at any time for advice on service availability or health guidance.
On Victoria Hospital, the government said expanding health-care services in Prince Albert remains a critical provincial priority. It said staffing is projected to increase by more than 500 jobs once the expanded facility becomes fully operational.
The province said SHA is working on a staffing plan that includes targeted promotion, expanded education programs, additional clinical placements, conditional offers to students before graduation, community engagement and a First Nations and Metis recruitment and retention plan.
Beck also raised concerns about the province’s wildfire response, following the release of the MNP review into Saskatchewan’s 2025 wildfire season.
She said she remembered being at the Prince Albert Exhibition Grounds as some of the first evacuees arrived last year. She said volunteers and community members stepped up, but the scene also showed a lack of communication and coordination from the province.
“Great people, lots of volunteers showing up, food just showing up, and the community wanting to support, but the chaos, the lack of communication was something I still remember very, very, very clearly,” Beck said.
Beck said the MNP report has done little to build confidence that the province has learned the lessons from last year’s wildfire season.
“It has, I would say, done little the way the government has handled this to build the trust that really needed to be built between last year and this year’s fire season,” she said.
In response, the province said it announced immediate actions on June 12 to strengthen Saskatchewan’s wildfire strategy following MNP’s independent review. The province said the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency has been directed to implement 11 actions immediately, and that a Future Preparedness and Implementation Unit has been created within SPSA.
The province said those actions include daily Provincial Emergency Operations Centre calls once an emergency happens, secondary calls with impacted communities and organizations supporting evacuees, and designated representatives for affected ministries, agencies, Crown corporations and communities at the PEOC.
Beck also said affordability remains a major issue for Saskatchewan families. The NDP has called for measures including PST relief on groceries and children’s clothing, along with fuel tax relief.
Beck said many residents are still struggling even as the government points to the province’s economic performance.
“This is a government that, on one hand, wants to brag about how well the province is doing and how well the economy is doing, yet we have more people every day who can’t pay their bills, who are falling further and further behind,” Beck said. “There’s a disconnect here.”
The province said cost of living is top of mind for residents and said every provincial budget now includes more than $2.5 billion in affordability measures. The government pointed to the Saskatchewan Low-Income Tax Credit, tax credit enhancements, annual indexation adjustments and savings tied to the removal of the federal carbon tax on SaskPower customers.
When asked what the Sask. Party government has done right, Beck pointed to highway passing lanes, saying they have made some highways safer. She also said expanding nurse practitioner roles was positive, although she said the government had to be pushed to act.
If she became premier, Beck said the first change Prince Albert residents would notice is that local voices would have a stronger place in provincial decision making.
“They would have a voice again,” Beck said. “The needs and wants and the unique strengths of Prince Albert would be a part of the decision making process.”
Beck said her message to voters who may not see themselves as traditional NDP supporters is to look at the state of the province and ask whether it is good enough.
“Don’t you think we can do better than what we see right now?” she said. “And if you think it’s time for change, have a look at us.”
