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Finance Minister Ted Morton, left, and Treasury Board president Lloyd Snelgrove listen to a reporter’s question at the Alberta legislature Tuesday. (Michelle Bellefontaine/CBC)Alberta’s Progressive Conservative government is projecting a record $4.75-billion budget deficit and plotting cuts in many departments while increasing health-care spending by 16.6 per cent.

“We’ve chosen to make cuts in some areas and increase spending in others to protect essential services,” Finance Minister Ted Morton said Tuesday at a news conference that preceded his budget speech.

“These choices, we believe, strike the right balance between spending too much and spending too small, between fiscal discipline and protecting essential services, and between funding services today and also not saddling future generations with debt.”

The government is projecting it will spend $38.7 billion during the 2010-11 fiscal year while taking in revenues of $34 billion, up slightly from the previous year. The budget contains no tax increases.

The government of Premier Ed Stelmach plans to cover the deficit for Alberta Health Services, the province-wide health board, at $542 million for the current fiscal year and $759 million in 2010-11, with the latter number including $40 million in pension adjustments for AHS staff.

AHS is also getting a $512-million — or six per cent — increase in its base funding.

Overall health-care spending will rise to $14.85 billion from $12.74 billion.

The province is also raising the possibility of Alberta’s first public-sector job losses since the 1990s. While the final numbers have not been determined, the layoffs could amount to about 250 full-time jobs.

Education funding will rise slightly, increasing 0.7 per cent — or $43 million — on an overall budget of $6.1 billion.

The province’s “rainy-day” Sustainability Fund — built from budget surpluses in previous years — is estimated to end the 2010-11 year at $8.6 billion, down from the $15 billion forecast for the end of 2009-10.

The fund is forecast to sit at $2.8 billion by the end of the 2012-13 fiscal year.

15 departments face cuts`

Treasury Board president Lloyd Snelgrove defended the government’s spending decisions.

“While it’s all right to suggest we could cut $5 billion, I would feel a lot more comfortable if they [critics] could show Albertans where they want to cut the $5 billion from and see if Albertans support longer waiting lists, no roads, 60 people in the classroom,” he said.

“I quite frankly reckon we are one of the few places that has the courage to talk about addressing health care on an ongoing basis and not being worried to fund it.”

In last year’s budget, the government said it would have to find $2 billion in cuts if the economy didn’t improve. A total of $1.3 billion was found and place toward health care because the economy is showing signs of recovery.

According to Morton, about eight departments saw increases to their spending, while 15 will face reduced budgets.

Children and Youth Services faces a $36-million drop in spending, with nearly $28 million in cuts coming from child intervention services, now budgeted at $382 million. Spending for foster care will be $163 million, an increase of $1 million from the previous year.

Culture and Community Spirit will see a 15.1 per cent drop in its operating budget.

The province plans to maintain the 2009-10 funding levels for the Persons with Developmental Disabilities program. While it has slightly increased spending on the Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped (AISH) benefit, the maximum monthly income amount of $1,188 will remain the same.

Alberta school boards will see a 4.6 per cent — or $246 million —increase in the money they get for their operating budgets, which will total $5.6 billion in 2010-11.

Morton lost credibility, Wildrose leader says

The amount of government spending was slammed by the leaders of opposition parties on both sides of the political spectrum.

“We’re all going to have to sacrifice? That was a bunch of baloney,” said Danielle Smith, leader of the right-wing Wildrose Alliance Party. “We knew it was all rhetoric and that we were going to see a sea of red ink but, man, I didn’t expect this.”

“This budget shows they’ve given up any hope of controlling spending … I reckon that minister Morton has lost a lot of credibility today by putting his name to this train wreck.”

Smith said her party has come up with some alternatives that will be announced at a press conference Wednesday.

Liberal Leader David Swann said he was shocked by the amount of spending.

“They’re addicted to spending and not looking at where the money is going,” he said, singling out the government’s choice to cover the AHS deficit. “They’re simply covering their asses.”

Swann said he will call for an audit on health-care spending.

While Alberta NDP Leader Brian Mason had less of a problem with the amount of spending, he was concerned about the long-term effects of relying on the Sustainability Fund to reduce the deficit.

“It’s postponing a greater problem and Alberta’s revenues have not kept up with the expenditures,” he said.

Concerns about the Sustainability Fund were shared by Scott Hennig, Alberta director of the Canadian Taxpayers’ Federation.

“That’s supposed to get them through the next two years?” he questioned. “Excellent luck … not if they’re going to continue to run deficits at nearly $5 billion a year.”

A dope-testing lab considered the most sophisticated in the world is up and running for the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Built in back of the speedskating oval in nearby Richmond, B.C., and under heavy security, the temporary lab has already run more than 200 tests, although there was no word on whether any came up positive.

“We are now conducting pre-competition testing,” lab director Christiane Ayotte, who also runs Canada’s only permanent dope-testing facility in Laval, Que., said Tuesday as she conducted a tour for the news media.

“This is something the International Olympic Committee implemented a couple of Games ago, recognizing that doping agents may be used not only at the time of competition, but also in preparation.”

A fully staffed and equipped lab is needed on site at the Olympics because test results are required within 24 to 36 hours to catch cheaters before they have a chance to skate another heat or enter another event. At a permanent lab, it would take 10 days to process a blood or urine sample.

The lab, with a staff of about 35, will operate 24 hours a day through the Games, processing 1,600 urine tests and more than 400 blood tests, or about 90 per day. Another 400 tests will be performed at the Paralympics in March.

About half of the equipment was shipped west from Ayotte’s Laval lab, but the rest came from around the world, including some of the latest technology for analyzing samples. And when the Richmond facility is dismantled after the Games, the new machinery will go to the permanent lab, which Ayotte said will be part of the 2010 Olympics legacy.

The dope-testers don’t promise to catch every cheater, but they are confident their techniques and equipment have improved to the point that they are winning the war against banned substances.

“The methods we have today are far better than 20 years ago,” said Arne Ljungqvist, chairman of the IOC medical commission and a vice-president of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). “I’d say the Games are getting cleaner and cleaner all the time.”

‘Everything detectable should be detected’

It was 22 years ago that the most well-known positive test in Olympic history was made — nailing Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson for a banned anabolic steroid after he won the men’s 100-metre sprint in world-record time at the 1988 Seoul Olympics.

But while steroids and masking agents for the muscle-building drugs got finer after that, so did the tests, which can find traces 1,000 times smaller than even five years ago.

“We are confident that everything detectable should be detected,” said Ayotte.

They are also confident they have the best people in their lab.

About half the staff come from Laval, but the rest are from around the world, including WADA-accredited facilities in Paris, Vienna, Cologne, Germany and Lausanne, Switzerland.

All the top experts in the field are also on hand, as well as lab directors from the last two Games in Turin, Italy, and Beijing, along with one for the next Summer Olympics in 2012 in London.

Their lab is hidden at the back of the oval and would likely not be noticed by spectators there for the speedskating. As test samples are top secret and must be protected from any tampering, a high-tech electronic security system is in place that had to be place on “disarm” temporarily as visiting reporters filed in.

Inside, the lab is packed with work benches where about a dozen white-coated technicians, all looking deep in concentration, ran samples in glass vials and bottles through gleaming-white machines in a wide variety of tests.

Rows of bottles and beakers are everywhere, while a separate room has large stainless steel refrigerators for storing samples.

Photographers and cameramen were prohibited from taking pictures of any bottle with a code number on it to protect the identity of the samples.

‘Our job is to catch athletes’

During the Games, samples will come in each night from the various sports venues. Staff will sort the samples — two for each urine test — and start screening them for banned substances.

If anything suspicious is found, thorough testing on the A-sample is conducted the next day to confirm a positive test. If so, the B-sample is tested to verify the findings.

They hope there are no positive tests, but it seems there are always some who try to beat the system.

“Our job is to catch the athletes who may be doping,” said Ljungqvist. “They have no place in the Games and we want to protect the athletes who compete clean.”

A Montreal inventor has developed a three-dimensional baggage scanner that he says can make air travel safer and more convenient for passengers.

William Awad is also putting the finishing touches on a more modest body scanner machine, which highlights metal or organic material on a generic human outline, but does not show the contours under people’s clothing.

But, his toughest challenge could prove to be getting his machines into airports. During a recent demonstration in Awad’s Montreal office, when he place a carry-on suitcase through a conventional baggage scanner, nothing of concern showed up.

Then, when the bag was place through Awad’s machine — which has the power to reveal many of the blind spots inside suitcases — several knives and stimulated explosives were found.

Reid Morden, a former director of Canada’s spy agency CSIS, called Awad’s inventions a quantum step forward in passenger safety.

“The current technology is really passé and the people who want to do terrible things in the air, and there are a lot of them, are increasingly sophisticated,” he said.

But it will be a challenge for a small Canadian company to crack the U.S.-dominated airline security market, said Andrew Thomas, editor of the Journal of Transportation Security.

Obtaining approval from the American Transportation Security Administration is a political process more than anything, he said.

“There still is the ability to influence the process through congressional or bureaucratic connections and you could just simply look at the board of directors of a lot of these companies to see that there is an influence there from former government officials.”

Awad said he has started the lengthy process to obtain TSA certification, which is key to getting into Canadian airports.

In the meantime, Awad is in talks to install his machines in prisons, courts and hotels, mostly outside Canada.