Viewers will get laughs and learning from AUPE anti-privatization video
FALUN – Viewers will get a bellyful of laughs — and a dollop of serious education — when they watch a new AUPE video about privatization that is now in production.
Film crews were at work this week at a private liquor store in the Central Alberta hamlet of Falun (population 26), about 60 kilometres southwest of Edmonton, which provides a colourful backdrop for the video as a private business that sells booze, issues birth and death certificates and acts as a nursing home.
“Not so different from Alberta in real life,” said Greg Maruca, AUPE Union Representative, Education, who is co-ordinating production of “Keeping It Public,” which will premier in September.
The video stars well-known Edmonton comedy actor Donovan Worken as a frustrated customer, and 80-year-old Marie Perras as a resident of the liquor store/nursing home.
“The video is hilarious,” said Maruca. “But while viewers will get a big laugh, the idea is to use the humour of the situation as a tool to make a very serious point about what’s wrong with privatization schemes.”
“The video forms part of a tool-kit of anti-privatization materials to sensitize our members to the different ways privatization is disguised by its advocates in government,” he explained.
“Governments often try to sneak in privatization, for example in the guise of ‘public-private partnerships,’ because business rhetoric seldom matches the reality of private delivery of public services,” Maruca said.
“Experience around the world shows that privatization is mostly about benefiting a few friends of people in government while the public pays the bill,” he added. “Service usually gets worse — often endangering the health and welfare of the public — and costs increase.”
AUPE’s anti-privatization toolkit will teach members to use the Privatization Early Response Model (PERM), which helps public employees spot the early signs of privatization, and to respond quickly to alert the public and media to the dangers of what is being planned.
The video is being produced by Vicom Media Productions of Edmonton, with a script by Scot Morison. Other actors include Dana Anderson as Mr. Bigg, the owner of the privatized business, and Michael Grinnel as the kid who works for him.
AUPE wishes to thank Brady Gustafson, owner of the Falun Liquor Store, for allowing the film crew to use his premises, Maruca noted.