“We are all in this world together, and the only test of our character that matters is how we look after the least fortunate among us. How we look after each other, not how we look after ourselves. That’s all that really matters.” 

— Tommy Douglas

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My heart broke recently as I once again witnessed the Alberta government’s brutal cruelty toward the most vulnerable individuals in society, including those with disabilities and low-income cancer survivors.

To put it bluntly the Alberta government’s right-wing regressive policies have contributed to a tragic suicide, an incident that has been met with both sorrow and outrage. Bruce Johnson was 57. He had lived with severe mental health challenges since age 10. For almost 30 years, he received Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped, Alberta’s disability support program. 

The assistance helped Johnson survive, although, as with the majority of AISH recipients, it provided just enough to scrape by—not enough to be financially secure in today’s economy. AISH paid Johnson $1,940 a month. However, Statistics Canada’s poverty line for a single person in a city like Calgary or Edmonton sits above $2,200 a month. 

Bruce Johnson wasn’t living comfortably; he was clinging to the edge. Then, the Alberta government sent out a callous form letter to thousands on social assistance. Beginning July 1, 2026, Johnson would be moved from AISH to a new program called the Alberta Disability Assistance Program, or ADAP. His monthly support would drop by $200, to $1,740. And he might be required to participate in employment programs and job searches, or risk losing support entirely. No increase for cost of living, instead the exact opposite. 

So, here was a man who’d struggled with mental illness since childhood. A man who’d already tried employment and knew his limits. A vulnerable person already living below the poverty line who was now told he would receive less but would be expected to do more to keep it. Bruce Johnson attempted to push back. He wrote to the government, to media, to advocates. He tried reaching out to anyone who might care enough to listen.

Yes, Johnson had mental health issues, but it was the fact the province was making his already intolerable life more unliveable that drove him over the edge. On June 8, Alberta RCMP responded to a fatal fire at a home in the Village of Empress. It was Bruce Johnson’s home. “The Alberta Government kicked me in the teeth with the introduction of ADAP,” he had written in a final message. “Just something that has finally pushed me to end everything.”

Johanson, a person who was desperate wrote to his government. He told them exactly what their policy was doing to him. And when he was gone, they used a spokesperson and called it a tragedy as if misfortunes just happen, as if no one in power made the decisions that led to this event. The government’s response was a press release. Kind of like the “thoughts and prayers” spouted by officials in our neighbours to the south every time there’s a major tragedy there.

Minister of Community and Social Services Nathan Neudorf expressed his condolences, but he declined an on-camera interview. HIs official statement didn’t acknowledge any connection between Bruce Johnson’s death and the government policy changes that Johnson himself mentioned as the reason he could not go on. Meanwhile, Premier Danielle Smith was conveniently unavailable for comment.

What should disgust and infuriate any compassionate human being is how the Alberta government chooses to spend its revenue, not on healthcare, education or social services. On October 19, 2026, Alberta will hold a pointless referendum. Administering this referendum is projected to cost taxpayers up to $100 million. And yet there is somehow $200 less a month for Bruce Johnson and other Albertans in his same situation. 

“This isn’t a budget miscalculation. This isn’t a tragic oversight. This is a choice,” emphasizes Calgary-based philanthropist and entrepreneur, Arlene Dickinson. “It’s a deliberate declaration of who matters and who does not. We are not bystanders; we are concerned citizens.”

Dickinson is calling on Albertans to take steps in opposing Premier Danielle Smith’s barbaric policies. “Bruce Johnson had a voice and he used it, and no one in power listened. The people who will be hurt by this transition are already exhausted from fighting to be seen. They shouldn’t have to fight alone.”

“We can be bystanders. We can scroll past this, feel briefly sad, and go about our day. Or we can be engaged citizens and people who understand that a government’s budget is a moral document, and that silence in the face of injustice is its own kind of moral answer,” pleads the well-known businesswoman in her call to action,

“Please. Call your MLA. Write to Minister Nathan Neudorf at the Ministry of Assisted Living and Social Services. Write to the Premier. Tell them you know what Bruce Johnson wrote. Tell them you are watching. Tell them that a government willing to spend $100 million on a separatist referendum while cutting disability supports below the poverty line does not get to call itself a government that protects its people.”