EDMONTON — If you need to improve health services, you may as well get a trucker to figure out the best way to deliver them. That’s what’s happening in Alberta, anyway. Health Minister Fred Horne announced yesterday that Stephen Lockwood, president of Mullen Group, has been appointed the new board chair of Alberta Health Services.

Lockwood said that he would “challenge conventional thinking and be creative to make things better …” and that they will “work to ensure that everything we do has a useful purpose…”.

“Mr. Lockwood’s business and financial skills as well as his experience on the AHS board will ensure strong board governance and help us continue our goal of better access to and effective delivery of health care,” Horne said in news release yesterday.

Lockwood takes over immediately as the new Chair of the Alberta Health Services Board. He has been a member of the board since 2010. He is president and co-CEO of Mullen Group Ltd., based in Okotoks. Prior to taking on that role in 2004, he practised law with Carscallen Lockwood LLP, a firm he helped establish in 1988.