Letter accuses UCP of limiting health review
Hon. Peter Guthrie, P. Eng., MLA for Airdrie Cochrane, issued a letter Oct. 20 on Legislative Assembly of Alberta letterhead alleging the United Conservative Party government set up a constrained review of Alberta Health Services procurement that contained rather than exposed problems and left Albertans without clear answers on who directed major decisions and why.
Guthrie wrote that after intense public pressure the government chose a limited process led by an out of province judge instead of a full independent public inquiry with powers to compel evidence. He said Justice Raymond Wyant’s work “delivers anything but the exoneration this government was counting on,” arguing it revealed systemic failures, conflicts of interest and a pattern of concealment, misdirection and political interference.
“The result? Justice Raymond Wyant’s report delivers anything but the exoneration this government was counting on,” Guthrie wrote. He also called the process “an inquiry designed not to expose the truth, but to contain it.”
The letter quoted Wyant’s own caveats, noting the investigation had a short focused timeline, no subpoena power, no testimony under oath and no opportunity for vigorous cross examination, which meant the reviewer could not make findings on the credibility of verbal accounts. It said key figures did not testify, naming the premier, the health minister, a former health minister, the health minister’s chief of staff and all former AHS board members. It also said more than 2.25 million documents were provided unindexed and unorganized, and that Wyant was left with the impression that on some occasions interviewees were not truthful. It highlighted Wyant’s statement that when he found no wrongful interference by government officials that meant only that he found no evidence, not that he could make a final and absolute determination.
Guthrie tied those limits to his decision to resign as minister of infrastructure on Feb. 25. He wrote that he brought troubling information to cabinet and later tabled it in the Legislature, and that the premier’s office and the health ministry were aware of the issues before his intervention. He said the government then fired AHS chief executive Athana Mentzelopoulos, dismissed the AHS board, removed senior executives and expelled him from caucus after he sought a judicial review.
“In my opinion, this was a coordinated effort to ensure the truth would not reach the public,” he wrote.
On children’s pain medication purchased during the 2022 shortage, the letter said Alberta made a fourteen-million-dollar upfront payment on a seventy-million-dollar deal without Health Canada approval and before awarding the contract to MHCare. It said the contract was awarded quickly, MHCare and its related company received favourable treatment, product specifications were not vetted by AHS, legal counsel did not review the contract and the decision was shaped by a public perception of urgency promoted publicly by the premier. The letter said a New Jersey supplier believed to be Johnson and Johnson withdrew despite offering brand name Tylenol at a lower price.
It quoted Wyant’s conclusion that: “Alberta taxpayers have paid a significant price for products that, for a variety of reasons, have not benefitted Albertans.”
The letter also pointed to surgical contracts. It cited a direction from the minister of health that AHS extend its Nov. 1, 2022 agreement with Alberta Surgical Group to April 30, 2025 with adjustments to procedure volumes and costs following activity by a registered lobbyist. It described a separate Charter Surgical file where AHS, through senior procurement official Jitendra Prasad, claimed there was no relationship with MHCare, where clear conflicts were not reported or investigated and where inconsistent contracts raised questions about value for money. The letter said Prasad was placed on leave and later reinstated by the premier’s chief of staff so he could retire without consequence.
Guthrie wrote that similar patterns extended to other public spending, citing hospital and infrastructure contracts, government grants, charter schools and the province’s new private education capital funding program, as well as crown corporations and recovery centres. He said he proposed a Financial Oversight Committee in May 2024 made up of experienced ministers and deputy ministers to review high dollar contracts and ensure value for money, and that after months of suggesting they would act the premier, the executive director and the chief of staff rejected the idea.
He added that several of Wyant’s recommendations mirrored reforms he had been developing as minister, including a procurement centre of excellence, standardized contracts with due diligence, stronger conflict compliance and audits and renewed whistleblower protections. He argued the problem is not the rules themselves but a refusal to enforce them, an absence of consequences and a culture that normalizes secrecy.
“It’s time for real answers. And it’s time for a government that doesn’t fear the truth,” he wrote.
The letter emphasized that Wyant said his investigation related to Alberta Health Services, not the Department of Health or senior political offices. It asked why current and former ministers did not testify, whether senior officials had relationships with vendors, why AHS leadership was removed while trying to recover taxpayer dollars and why, if the goal was the truth, the process lacked the tools to demand it.
Guthrie concluded that the auditor general’s work and an RCMP inquiry should continue where the constrained review could not. He urged Albertans to read the report and pressed for a process with full powers to compel testimony and documents so the public can test the evidence in full.
