EDMONTON—Premier Jason Kenney says the United Conservative Party’s first provincial budget will be released in late October.

Kenney made the announcement in front of media on Monday morning in Calgary.

The budget, he said, will be introduced three days after the federal election — on Oct. 24 — calling it the “pathway to balance.”

“Albertans gave us our marching orders ... and a central part of that platform was to stop the dive into debt, which risks our future,” Kenney said.

Kenney said there will be no reduction to education and healthcare in the fall budget, and added his government has decided to make “targeted investments,” including funding for 4,000 additional spaces across the province for drug addiction, treatment and recovery.

Kenney, however, added the public sector of Alberta will be expected to reduce administrative costs.

He said Alberta is operating the least-efficient provincial government in Canada, and the budget will aim to get more bank for the taxpayer’s buck.

“We will be challenging the broader public sector of Alberta to try to operate at least as efficiently as British Columbia or Ontario,” Kenney said.

He also thanked the government’s blue ribbon panel tasked with finding ways to curb provincial spending.

The panel’s MacKinnon report, released on Sept. 3, called for tightening Alberta’s fiscal belt to the tune of $600 million, which will require a significant overhaul to the province’s public services.

Kenney said the panel’s report provided “sobering advice, which underscored just how the government of Alberta is wasting tax dollars by overspending.”

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