Re: Question 10 on Separation
–Alberta “Separatists” have been humiliated, not simply defeated
In 1980 Rene Levesque lost his referendum gamble by a 20-point margin of 60% to 40%. And this was in spite of a convoluted referendum question that essentially asked voters if they would agree to having the premier perhaps opening some type of negotiation with the federal government to possibly achieve something called “sovereignty-association.” The question was laughed out of the ballpark.
Fast forward to Alberta 2026. Despite Danielle Smith’s concerted efforts to help the separatists’ cause, first by changing the rules (twice) to allow them to carry on with this charade, and then by fudging the question (asking voters on this ballot if they wanted to have another referendum next time that would address the question of separation), the separatists’ question failed miserably. The NO side prevailed by a 50-point margin of 75% to 25%, a blowout by anybody’s definition.
–Alberta’s Separatists are Driven by Economics, not Language and Culture
Francophone Quebecers who supported separation then and now are motivated by a desire to preserve their language and culture. Alberta’s separatist crew talk almost entirely about economic issues, and in fact they focus on their perceived economic mistreatment by Ottawa. Since Alberta is the richest province in the country, and its residents do not pay any sales tax, this is a hard case to make at the best of times. Resorting to nonsense statistics does not help. For example, Albertans naturally pay more in income tax than other Canadians – a “fact” regularly cited by the separatists — precisely because their incomes are higher on average than other Canadians. (Note also that these wealthy Albertans do not pay any more in tax than other Canadians who have the same annual income.)
Equally significant is the fact that many of these YES supporters in Alberta perceive themselves to be economic “victims” of government policies during COVID. (They also appear to be unaware that most of these policies were provincial, not federal.) [i] Not surprisingly, many of the YES leadership were also supporters of the infamous Truckers’ Convoy to Ottawa. As former Alberta premier Jason Kenney stated, their activism over COVID morphed into support for separation because “They needed a new cause.” Using social media, he explained, “they found each other and they found a new cause.”[ii]
There is a narcissistic quality to their complaints, as if Canadians elsewhere did not suffer equally during the pandemic. Moreover one might assume they benefitted, along with most other Canadians, from the massive federal pandemic bailout programs like the CERB and CEBA. From their various stories it is also clear that many of the separatist leadership were also the authors of their own misfortune, for example by refusing to be vaccinated despite workplace regulations.
Perhaps the most ironic part of this inter-provincial comparison of motives is the fact that the overwhelming majority of Quebecers (at least 70%) are not remotely interested in separating from Canada now, in part because the economic threat posed by Donald Trump could also leave their language and culture vulnerable if they were not protected as they are now by the federal government.
–Alberta’s Separatists are Far Right Ideologues
In Quebec support for separation has historically been strictly divorced from the right-left philosophical spectrum. Over time separatist leaders of the Parti Quebecois have been both centre-left (Rene Levesque) and centre-right (Jaques Parizeau). It did not matter, since Quebec provincial elections were leveraged around a separatist (PQ)-federalist (Liberal) axis, not the right-left one. Similarly the supporters of separatism can also be found across the entire left-right spectrum, as demonstrated today by the existence of both the separatist PQ under centre-right leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, and the far left separatist Action Solidaire party.
No such diversity exists among Alberta separatists. They are all to be found on the far right edge of the UCP, a right-wing Conservative party to begin with. This situation, in turn, reinforces their members’ opposition to the federal government and Canadian politics, since the overwhelming majority of Canadian voters are progressives who can be found in the centre or the centre-left of the political spectrum. This is particularly significant since it often means that the YES activists in Alberta do not support some of the basic principles found in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, leading to their frustration with judicial rulings and frequent calls for provincial use of the override (s.33) provision of the Charter.
–Danielle Smith Has Given Legitimacy to a Ragtag Fringe Group
Rene Levesque was elected premier in 1976 in part because his party supported separation. Daniel Smith’s UCP does not. Levesque was motivated by his party’s platform commitment to hold a referendum, and by strong public pressure to fulfill that commitment. Danielle Smith, by contrast, has given in to “pressure” by a tiny percentage of the population. By several expert estimates, only 8% of the 25% YES vote were actually in favour of separation, with the remainder seeing it simply as a means to exert pressure on Ottawa.
So why did she do this? Because that tiny group of the total population nevertheless constitutes a significant portion of her base in the UCP, alias the former Wildrose Party supporters of whom she was once the leader. Her predecessor, former UCP leader and premier Jason Kenny, infamously referred to this small clique as “lunatics” holding “hateful, extreme and divisive” views who were “trying to take over the asylum.” [iii] And now that they have been given a public forum, they will not go quietly. They will try to contest seats in the next provincial election, and in a few cases they may even succeed.
Put another way, Smith has opened a Pandora’s box. She has expended all this time and effort on a problem that did not exist, (but does now), in a misguided effort to save her political career.
–Smith’s Political Career is Likely Over
The different consequences for the two leaders are striking. Levesque remained a beloved political figure who was re-elected for a second four-year term, barely a year after the referendum defeat. Smith by contrast is quite likely toast. A significant majority of Albertans are furious with her for putting them, and the province, through this futile exercise. Meanwhile the separatists are furious with her for not having done more to help them, and for having given lukewarm support to the NO side. If she is not dethroned by them at the upcoming UCP convention in November of this year, she is almost certain to lose the next provincial election, scheduled for October 2027. Naheed Nenshi’s Opposition NDP currently sit at slightly more than 50% in public opinion polls, an unheard of advantage.
–Pierre Poiievre’s Partisan “Defence” of Canada Did Him No Favours
Much like Danielle Smith, federal Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre found himself caught between a rock and a hard place in the sovereignty debate. Like Smith, his core supporters are in a very different place from most Albertans and certainly from most Canadians, so he had to tread carefully. However the route he took to avoid trouble came with its own problems.
Basically, Poilievre chose to offer partisan talking points rather than uplifting national dialogue. The leader of the federal Official Opposition told Albertans their issue was not with Canadian federalism, but with the Liberal government in Ottawa. Vote for me and my party, he all but said out loud, and all will be well because I am an Albertan and a Conservative and I understand your frustration with Ottawa’s Liberal policies.
On September 29, when it was reasonably clear the NO side would prevail, but not by such a large margin, Poilievre gave his first major address for REMAIN in which he declared:
“What Albertans are complaining about is not Canada…It is the government policies that are actually inconsistent with how Canada was meant to work in the first place…” Moreover, he said, in the last decade of Liberal government “the federal government has done terribly at the things that are actually its job: immigration, crime, military spending, borders, while intruding into things that are not its job: regulating our resources, going after hunting rifles which are private property, just to name a few examples.”[iv]
The problem with this argument, of course, is first and foremost that it completely ignores other recent history. Poilievre’s predecessor as leader of the Conservative Party, Stephen Harper, was not only an Albertan but actually served as prime minister for a decade from 2006-15. Apparently he did not do enough. Nor, it seems, did Progressive Conservative prime minister Brian Mulroney, whose own decade in office (1984-2004) saw the elimination of both the despised National Energy Program and the Foreign Investment Review Agency, along with the welcomed introduction of free trade. Meanwhile his proposal for a revised Senate in the Charlottetown Accord was actually rejected by Albertans in a national referendum.
Equally important, Poilievre seems to be suggesting that Albertans should always expect their electoral choice to win, a dangerous argument in a healthy democracy. Then of course there is the fact that the current Liberal prime minister, Mark Carney, not only claims to be an Albertan (a dubious but apparently successful ploy), but is by far the most popular politician in Alberta, miles ahead of both Smith and Poilievre.
It was only in the last few days of the campaign, when it appeared that the NO side would achieve a massive victory, that Poilievre switched gears so as to appear to be on the right side of history. Even then, however, his support for Canada was tepid at best. Carefully avoiding any reference to shared values and beliefs, diversity, inclusion, social welfare, or support for basic rights and freedoms as key aspects of Canadian national identity, the Conservative leader instead described what unites Canadians as “more than a government. It is a people, a flag, a land, a history and a promise.”[v] Simply put, Poilievre’s role in shoring up the YES support has not been considered significant by virtually any expert commentator. It should come as no surprise, therefore, to learn that support for Poilievre’s Conservatives nationally has actually fallen a further 2% over the past two months, putting them far behind the governing Liberals.[vi]
Re: Questions 1-9
–Smith Has No Mandate on Any Question Except #5
Despite Smith’s clear call for for YES answers to all of her original nine questions, and her deliberately misleading language designed to encourage a YES response, (to say nothing of the government ad campaign in support of the YES side that reportedly cost Alberta taxpayers $4 million) she has achieved — nothing.
With the possible exception of Question 5, (which calls for enhanced identification for voters in provincial elections; Yes 58/No 42), the entire group of 9 questions has either been rejected or supported by only a slim majority which is far too limited to give the premier free rein.[vii]
This debacle is particularly frustrating for most Albertans, since the whole idea of the referendum was clearly a political ploy by Smith designed solely to appease her hard right base in the UCP. No one was calling for this process, which she cavalierly announced without warning. No one wanted Elections Alberta to spend $130 million implementing it either.
It is useful to recall that five years ago Jason Kenney, her predecessor as premier and leader of the UCP, staged an equally misleading referendum on equalization. That one actually received a 62% YES vote, although turnout was low. What happened then? Nothing. Primarily because the question was based on misleading information if not downright falsehoods, and was in any event a non-starter constitutionally.
Recall also that this current referendum exercise was originally supposed to be about these nine questions alone. But it soon got out of control. A small fringe group of hard core separatists hijacked the plan, demanding their own question on separation. In the end the premier was obliged to add it to the list as Question #10. Since then everyone focused on this issue rather than her original nine questions, which of course was not at all what she had in mind.
Now she will try to claim victory on that tenth question, and no doubt ignore the original nine which fared so poorly. To say that the premier has been hoist with her own petard would be an understatement. As national affairs columnist Andrew Coyne declared, Smith “is in a world of trouble” and she brought it on herself. [viii]
–Questions #1-4 on Immigration are Deliberately Misleading
If ever there were solutions in search of a problem it is with these four deliberately misleading questions on immigration, designed to push the hot button concerns of some Albertans. The questions appear to blame immigrants for everything from the size of the Alberta deficit to health care shortages and the killing of cock robin. Some address concerns already eliminated, such as the federal government’s current reduction in acceptance numbers for both temporary residents and immigrants.
And, as several experts working in the field of immigrant settlement in the province noted, the results are far closer than Smith was expecting, despite her heavy emphasis on these immigrant-focused questions.[ix] In fact, the Yes vote only exceeded a very slim margin on the first of four questions. One critic noted “She won by (a handful of points) on these questions. She should be winning by 25, 30 points. She barely won this…A large portion of Albertans rejected it.” According to Raj Sharma, a Calgary-based immigration lawyer, “the result is actually a ‘victory’ for the No side because the way the immigration questions were structured and written would lead many respondents to say yes…These were slam-dunk-level questions… but she didn’t get that (result).”[x] Others noted there is little she could do to effect change in any event, given constitutional and practical constraints on immigrant reception rules and procedures.
Nevertheless many observers are concerned that the results of these questions will backfire on Smith, heightening the appearance of anti-immigrant sentiment in Alberta. This in turn may end up costing the province economically by deterring skilled workers from coming, at the very time when the federal government is attempting to boost productivity and promote major projects that require such skilled workers. Q1:Yes 55/No 45 Q2 Yes 52/No 48 Q3:Yes 53/No 47 Q4:Yes 52/No 48
–Questions 6-9 on Constitutional Issues are Non-Starters
As Smith well knows, all of these questions would require changes (amendments) to the country’s constitution. The chances of this happening in the foreseeable future are nil. There are no “like-minded” provinces on most of these questions, never mind a total of 7 provinces with 50% of the population that would be required for such an amendment to proceed. Indeed, on issues such as Senate reform and withdrawal from federal social programs there would be aggressive opposition from most if not all of the other provinces. Only Saskatchewan might be a possible ally on some, but certainly not BC. As for central Canada and the Atlantic region, Danielle Smith is, as the French say, dreaming in technicolour. So why even raise them? One possible explanation might be to stir up more anger towards the federal government, Smith’s preferred opponent in the next provincial election rather than Naheed Nenshi’s NDP.
Evidently many Albertans know all this, since all of the questions in this this group were actually defeated despite her best efforts. Q6: NO 54/YES 46 Q7: NO 51/ YES 49 Q8: NO 55/ YES 45 Q9: NO 52/YES 48
–All of the Referendum Results Provide Stark Evidence of a Rural-Urban Divide
A map of Alberta indicating voting results for each question provides stark evidence of the rural-urban divide in the province. [xi]
The question is whether this divide is unusual, and the answer is not really. There is now an urban-rural divide in virtually every Canadian province. Neighbouring BC has long had a significant divide between the cities of Vancouver/Victoria (known as “the Coast” to everyone elsewhere in that province) and the rest of the province, (known to urbanites as “the Interior”.) Even small Maritime provinces like Nova Scotia have a well-recognized divide between Halifax and the rest of the province.
Some provinces are attempting to address the problems of economic disparity and rural isolation underlying voter dissatisfaction in rural areas through a variety of progressive policies, albeit with varying degrees of success to date. [xii]Alberta, however, has done very little to attempt to narrow the gap, and in some cases has exacerbated it. With a succession of Conservative premiers focusing on oil and natural gas production, pipelines and the rejection of alternative energy sources, there has been little evidence of government awareness or concern with rural infrastructure, transportation and technology gaps that increasingly hamper rural area prosperity.[xiii]
Nevertheless, the referendum results point to an urgent need to address issues of social cohesion and political integration, as well as regional economic disparity, if the issue of Alberta separation is going to be taken off the table permanently. Otherwise it may continue to hamper efforts to promote national unity, especially in the face of the existential American threat posed by Donald Trump.
[i] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/analysis-covid-alberta-separatism-9.7373200
[ii] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/how-alberta-separatism-went-from-fringe-cause-to-referendum
[iii] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/alberta/article-alberta-premier-jason-kenneys-political-foe-fears-fraudulence-in-mail/
[iv] https://nationalpost.com/news/pierre-poilievre-speech-canadian-unity
[v] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2p4q-jAuISI
[vi] https://338canada.com/federal.htm#projection
[vii] https://alberta.io/election/results
[viii] Comment on CBC “At Issue” panel, October 20, 2026.
[ix] https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/alberta/why-results-of-alberta-s-immigration-referendum-might-not-mean-what-voters-think/article_7d125f23-acba-4c72-9e89-61bbcca8be0d.html
[x] https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/alberta/why-results-of-alberta-s-immigration-referendum-might-not-mean-what-voters-think/article_7d125f23-acba-4c72-9e89-61bbcca8be0d.html
[xi] https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/alberta-referendum/live-results/question-1/
[xii] See for example https://www.policymagazine.ca/bridging-the-urban-rural-divide-your-postal-code-should-not-determine-your-future/ ; https://jfsdigital.org/2026/02/23/urban-rural-polarization-in-canada/
and Ibbitson, J. (2018, December 10). Rural-urban divide now beats all others, risking populist backlash: As that stark divide becomes more evident in both the U.S. and Canada, suburban voters hold the balance of power. The Globe and Mail.
[xiii] https://presentations.rmalberta.com/closing-the-gap-the-rural-infrastructure-funding-deficit/index.html
