Fw: Teri- judges/alberta

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Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2002 11:25 AM

Subject: Teri- judges/alberta

Monday, July 9, 2001 Alta. premier lashes out at judge Alberta Premier Ralph Klein makes a face as he flips pancakes at his annual stampede breakfast in Calgary Monday July 9, 2001. (CP PHOTO/ Wyld) CALGARY (CP) -- Premier Ralph Klein lashed out at Alberta's top judge Monday, saying her decision to move appeal court operations out of Calgary was more of a job action than related to health concerns. Chief Justice Fraser announced last week the court would move its operations to Edmonton due to toxic mould and other harmful substances found in the building. Klein said Fraser wants to move the Court of Appeal to Calgary's Petro-Canada building -- one of the most expensive pieces of office space in the province. He suggested the notion that the old courthouse was making judges sick was nonsense. "Why are the people who appear in the court house not getting sick? Why are not the clerks? Why is it just the judges who are getting sick," Klein said. Since January, the province's highest court has been running proceedings from the Calgary Court of Queen's Bench building. This locale kept the judges away from easy access to their library, registry, files and mediation and court rooms. Fraser justified her decision in a release last week that suggested it was time for action. "Approximately 2/3 of judges and 3/4 of staff who worked in the old courthouse continue to suffer from respiratory and other health problems that prevent them working at full capacity," she said. Klein said while the decision to make southern Albertans attend Appeal Court in Edmonton would be inconvenient, there was little he could do. "If judges want to get sick to satisfy their demands to occupy the top two floors of the Petro-Canada building, I guess they'll have to get sick." This is not the first time that Klein has tangled with the judiciary. A long-standing fight over provincial judges' salaries began in 1994 when Alberta's Tory government tried to slash judicial wages by five per cent to match other public sector cuts. The scrap lasted for years and ended up in the Supreme Court twice as the judges argued that politicians interfering with their pay violated their judicial independence. It was only resolved when Canada's top court refused to hear the province's appeal of a ruling that bumped up their pay. Fraser said last week that it would take six to nine months to make needed alterations after a suitable location is found in Calgary. And she said a facility to house all levels of court under one roof -- a luxury that Edmonton already has -- is no solution to the current situation because it wouldn't be ready for six years.