Paul Parks, an emergency physician in Medicine Hat and a former president of the Alberta Medical Association, is seeking the NDP nomination in the Cypress-Medicine Hat riding. If he wins it, he would face Justin Wright, the United Conservative Party MLA who now serves as Alberta's primary health minister. The nomination outcome has not yet been decided, and the date of the next provincial general election has not been stated.
Parks directs emergency medicine at the Medicine Hat Regional Hospital and still works full time in the city's emergency department. He has spent years advocating nationally for emergency and family medicine, and he has been one of the more prominent public voices defending the publicly funded health system in Alberta. In explaining his decision to seek office, he said the UCP has ignored the input of front-line health professionals on its health reforms. He argues that decisions made far from the bedside are reaching patients who are already waiting for care.
Parks has named privatization, dual billing and for-profit contracting as his main concerns. In August 2025 he wrote an opinion piece for the Calgary Herald warning about the risks of privatizing parts of the health system. His critique rests on his daily work in the emergency department, where he sees the effects of system decisions first hand, rather than on a broader ideological position. Dual billing, which allows physicians to charge patients for services also covered by the public system, is a recurring point of dispute in Alberta's health debates.
Wright won the riding handily in the 2023 general election. Parks would therefore be contesting a seat held by a sitting minister, a significant challenge for any opposition candidate. Wright's dual role as the MLA for the riding and the minister responsible for the primary health portfolio will likely frame the contest around the government's health record.
Parks describes himself as socially progressive and fiscally conservative. He says the UCP leaves little room for progressive conservative voices, and that he hopes to offer voters in Cypress-Medicine Hat a different way of thinking about health care and public spending. Outside medicine he is active in the Medicine Hat Musical Theatre, and he recently sold his Medicine Hat craft brewery, a change that frees more of his time for political work.
The candidacy comes as the provincial government faces questions about its approach to health governance. Alberta now has four health ministers, and the value of that structure remains unclear to critics. The government has also continued to opt out of federal pharmacare and dental programs, even after voters rejected a referendum on opting out of federal programs on October 19. That referendum reportedly cost about $150 million, a figure that has become part of the wider debate over the government's spending priorities.