Premier Danielle Smith's immediate priority must be a reaching a contract settlement with the province's teachers before school starts next week, says Alberta's NDP leader Naheed Nenshi.

"Right this minute, the thing on fire before us, is we're very likely to have a province-wide teachers' strike. This is entirely preventable. The government could have settled this months ago, but they chose not to," said Nenshi, who was coming to Red Deer for the NDP's Better Together Summer event (registration full) at Festival Hall on Wednesday night.

He said parents are worried about finding childcare if a strike happens. Employers are telling parents they will have to use their vacation time to take care of their children, if necessary.

"I've yet to find a parent who thinks the teachers are being u

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