On the 2026 Alberta Independence Referendum

At present the announced wording for the Alberta Government's independence referendum scheduled for October 19th, 2026 is:

Should Alberta remain a province of Canada, or should the Government of Alberta commence the legal process required under the Canadian Constitution to hold a binding provincial referendum on whether or not Alberta should separate from Canada?

This asks two different, non mutually exclusive, questions:

1. "Should Alberta remain a province of Canada?"; and,
2. "Should the Government of Alberta commence the legal process required under the Canadian Constitution to hold a binding provincial referendum on whether or not Alberta should separate from Canada?"

Presumably this will be presented in a "Choose One" format - but that has yet to be formalized.

I see three very basic things wrong with this:

1. The question is ambiguous: people who want Alberta to stay in Canada will want to vote yes first and then no, while others will want to vote no and yes.

   Consider, for comparison, the wording of the October 21, 2021 referendum on keeping daylight savings time in Alberta:

   Do you want Alberta to adopt year-round Daylight Saving Time, which is summer hours, eliminating the need to change our clocks twice a year?

   Although over a million people voted, only about 2,900 more votes were counted for "No" than "Yes", while exit polls and subsequent bickering showed that an overwhelming majority thought they were voting to stop switching the time twice a year - so, today, five years later, there is a bill pending in the legislature to stop doing the time changes and stay, instead, on year round daylight savings time.

   And if you cannot tell from the text above whether the vote was to keep, or get rid of, semi-annual time changes - well that same issue is going to affect the independence referendum if presented as worded above, with a significant number of voters wanting to vote Yes on keeping Alberta in Canada but unclear on whether to mark a Yes or a No on the ballot.

    

2. it's the wrong question: the right one would be along the lines of "Do you want the Alberta government to prepare a detailed plan for independence from the Canadian federation to be voted on if the federal government fails to fully and acceptably resolve [some list of grievances] by [some date]?"

   That question is unambiguous, would probably draw 80% or greater support in both Alberta and Saskatchewan, and forces the people in charge in Ottawa to choose between being fair to the west or breaking up the country.

    

3. the question is technically incorrect - there is no legal process under Canada's constitution because there there is no Canadian constitution in the American sense of something outside of government. What Canada has is an act of parliament called The Constitution Act which the federal government can, as it demonstrated several times during the Covid protests, ignore with no consequences beyond some minor bad press.

   Canadians watch a lot of American TV - so criminals often demand their Miranda rights (which, of course, don't exist here) and politicians often announce constitutional appeals as a way of kicking embarrassing cans far down the road while knowing perfectly well both that the federal government appoints the judges and that the court's decisions really only apply to non government entities anyway.

So what to do?

I believe there are two things any Albertan can do:

1. first, demand a clear question with exactly two mutually exclusive answers; and,
2. second, help others understand that voting Yes on staying in Canada and No on preparing to leave is a vote to break-up the country.

The claim that voting against independence strengthens the independence movement may seem either backwards or nonsensical, but it isn't because:

• Alberta independence probably has about 20% public support today. As a result a clear question: "Should Alberta leave the Canadian federation" Yes/No? would lose by a guessed at 80% of the vote.
• that loss would weaken the Alberta provincial government's negotiating position while encouraging an already absurdly arrogant federal government to continue treating us as a second rate colony;
• the people working for independence now would not suddenly become devoted federalists. What they would do, instead, is go quiet for a bit while doubling down on their commitments - so the next crisis, brought dramatically forward by the change in the balance of power between the federal and provincial governments incident to the federalist vote, will see a much higher percentage vote for independence - and the one after that will pass easily.

So, bottom line, if you want to protect Canada - which can't survive without Alberta - demand a clear question and then vote for independence because a pro-independence vote forces Ottawa to choose between treating us fairly, or breaking up the country; while a vote against independence strengthens the federal government, makes the separatist's case stronger, and so leads directly to Canada's ultimate destruction.