Prentice and Notley take their shots at each other in Calgary

A supporter gets her photo taken with Rachel Notley after a rally in Calgary, on April 25, 2015.

The Tories and NDP kept their cannons aimed squarely at each other Saturday in Calgary with a week-and-a-half to go in the Alberta election campaign.

But the other two main parties also took their shots, with the Wildrose insisting they’re the only ones that can stop the recent NDP surge, while Liberal Leader David Swann urged voters to cast a ballot for anyone but the long-governing Tories in the May 5 election.

Speaking to about 150 people at a campaign breakfast for Calgary-Cross candidate Rick Hanson, Tory Leader Jim Prentice repeated his recent line that “Alberta is not an NDP province,” while not mentioning the Wildrose or any other party.

But NDP Leader Rachel Notley, speaking to supporters at Joe Ceci’s Calgary-Fort campaign office, fired back at the Tory talking point.

“Alberta is not an NDP province. It’s not a PC province. It’s not a Liberal province. It’s not a Wildrose province. Alberta belongs to Albertans,” she said to cheers.

“And they are going to decide how out-of-touch and arrogant this government is and they are going to tell this government not to tell them who they are or how to vote.”

Notley said the May 5 election is a choice between her party’s commitment to protect health care and education, with the help of a corporate tax hike, versus PC cuts and “corporate tax giveaways.”

Prentice, when asked by reporters about his focus on the NDP, also framed the contest as one of “two competing visions” for the province. He said the NDP vision consisted of “bigger government, more public spending, higher taxes and specific things that are going to turn away jobs and investment.”

He slammed Notley’s comments that she would not support the proposed Northern Gateway to the Pacific coast or lobby on behalf of the Keystone XL line into the United States.

“I disagree completely with her,” said Prentice.

“We need pipelines in every direction and government policy should be to try to encourage pipelines.”

Later Saturday the NDP issued a news release noting Notley’s support for the proposed Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain line to Vancouver and Energy East project to the Atlantic.

“The PC campaign, desperate to save a floundering government, accused Ms. Notley of opposing all pipeline construction — a gross distortion of her position,” read the release.

The Tory attention to the NDP has attracted attention, especially as polls show a tight three-way race between the Wildrose, NDP and PCs.

Mount Royal University political scientist Lori Williams said Prentice presumably has good reason to be treating the NDP as a bigger threat than the Wildrose.

“If that’s simply a strategy and not based on actual polling information, it’s a dumb strategy. But he’s not a stupid strategist,” she said.

But Wildrose Leader Brian Jean thinks Prentice is focusing on the NDP to avoid having to directly take on Wildrose, which is calling for a reversal of the Tory tax hikes in the provincial budget and deeper cuts without affecting services.

“It’s fairly obvious now that the only way to not have an NDP government is to vote Wildrose at this stage,” he said from Fort McMurray.

Liberal Leader David Swann, campaigning in his riding of Calgary Mountain View, thinks Prentice’s approach shows he’s facing trouble from progressive voters.

He said the primary thrust of the campaign has to be to end the PCs’ four decades of uninterrupted power in Alberta, the longest tenure of any government in Canadian history.

“They simply are not acting in the long-term public interest and it’s time to vote anything but Tory,” said Swann.

“If you can’t vote Liberal, vote anything else but the Tories.