Juno News - Separatists file new referendum question, target 1M signatures

00:00:00.000 Alberta's separatist movement is pushing ahead with new steam after the province passed Bill 14,

00:00:16.080 loosening the rules around citizen-initiated referenda and petitions. The Alberta Prosperity

00:00:21.360 Project has already filed a revised independence question and is laying the groundwork for a

00:00:25.840 province-wide signature drive early next year after setting a new signature goal. The changes

00:00:30.720 brought in by Bill 14 removed several legal barriers that previously limited what kind of

00:00:35.360 questions could move forward, shifting more authority to the justice minister and creating

00:00:39.120 what the government describes as a more permissive process. Separatist organizers say the legislation

00:00:44.560 fundamentally alters the political landscape and brings an independence vote closer than ever. At

00:00:49.120 the same time, Alberta's relationship with Ottawa is under fresh strain after the legislature

00:00:53.600 unanimously endorsed Premier Daniel Smith's memorandum of understanding with the federal

00:00:57.680 government on energy and infrastructure. Smith framed the deal as a potential turning point

00:01:02.400 after years of federal hostility towards Alberta's economy, but that optimism was short-lived after a

00:01:07.920 related motion failed in the House of Commons prompting separatist groups to declare the agreement

00:01:12.640 meaningless and proof that confederation is beyond repair. We'll also look at dueling year-end press

00:01:18.000 conferences from the Alberta UCP and NDP as both parties wrapped up the false sitting with sharply

00:01:23.280 different assessments of the government's direction and priorities. And finally, we'll break down

00:01:28.000 Alberta's latest job numbers as the province once again leads the country in employment growth and

00:01:32.880 saw its unemployment rate drastically fall. I'm your host Isaac Lamoureux and let's jump right into that

00:01:37.680 first exclusive. The Alberta Prosperity Project unveiled the new separation referendum question they

00:01:43.360 presented to the Chief Electoral Officer on Thursday, just an hour after Bill 14 officially received royal

00:01:49.920 assent. The new question is, quote, do you agree that Alberta shall cease to be a province in Canada and

00:01:55.680 become an independent state? The question differs slightly from the original separation referendum question

00:02:00.880 unveiled by the group in May, which was, quote, do you agree that the province of Alberta shall become a

00:02:06.000 sovereign country and cease to be a province of Canada? And I spoke with APP General Counsel

00:02:10.960 Geoffrey Rath, who told me the change was made to align more closely with section 1 subsection 3 of the Clarity Act. The section reads, quote,

00:02:17.920 in considering the clarity of a referendum question, the House of Commons shall consider whether the

00:02:23.040 question would result in a clear expression of the will of the population of a province on whether the

00:02:27.760 province should cease to be a part of Canada and become an independent state. Rath explained that Bill 14

00:02:33.360 now requires the group to submit a notice of intention and then wait 30 days to file the official

00:02:38.560 application. He celebrated being the first in line, confirming that signature collection will begin in late

00:02:43.600 January or early February of next year. He said that they will start by reaching out to the over 300,000

00:02:48.960 Albertans who pledged to sign the petition, set up various collection areas, conduct door-to-door campaigns,

00:02:54.560 and aim for 100 town halls a month. But as for signature goals, Rath told me that the Alberta Prosperity

00:03:01.280 Project is now aiming to collect 1 million signatures. He said they will do everything in their power to

00:03:07.280 collect more than Thomas Lukaszak, who surpassed 450,000 signatures for his anti-separation petition.

00:03:14.400 However, Lukaszak was of course later accused of misleading supporters after subsequently disavowing

00:03:19.760 a referendum that he got people to sign to support. The lawyer clarified that because the APP's question

00:03:25.200 is a constitutional matter, it must be a standalone question according to the statute. He also said he

00:03:31.040 does not expect Alberta Premier Daniel Smith to confuse Albertans by asking two similar questions,

00:03:36.880 adding that Lukaszak's referendum question does not need to be honoured because it was a policy question.

00:03:41.840 Rath said, quote, we're going to be doing everything we can to convince our fellow Albertans that life

00:03:46.320 without any federal taxes or any federal regulation is a life worth living. Rath explained that he hoped to

00:03:52.160 distribute millions of copies of The Value of Freedom across the province, stating that residents' disposable

00:03:58.080 income could increase by 33% simply by removing federal income tax including GST, excise tax,

00:04:04.560 and corporate income tax. The Alberta Prosperity Project previously revealed its fiscal blueprint.

00:04:09.440 The plan estimates that between 2025 and 2045, an independent Alberta would generate direct revenue

00:04:15.520 of $4.71 trillion, save up to $678.5 billion, and generate 300,000 to 450,000 jobs,

00:04:24.560 while adding $1.3 to $1.4 trillion to the Heritage Fund. Total economic activity is estimated at around

00:04:30.800 $8.2 trillion. And just earlier this month, the Alberta Prosperity Project declared Bill 14 a

00:04:36.720 massive win for the independence movement, arguing the legislation removes barriers that previously

00:04:41.360 allowed Elections Alberta to block or delay referendum questions, including those related to

00:04:46.080 separation. Justice Minister Mickey Amory said the bill would also bring the group's ongoing legal

00:04:50.640 challenges to an end, noting that court proceedings tied to rejected initiative

00:04:55.680 applications would be discontinued. One of the most consequential changes is that proposed referendum

00:05:00.560 questions are no longer required to comply with sections 1 through 35.1 of the Constitution Act

00:05:06.160 before entering the petition phase, meaning they are no longer pre-screened for charter compliance.

00:05:11.280 Amory said, quote,

00:05:12.800 The purpose of what we're doing here is intended to create a permissive environment, a simpler environment,

00:05:17.200 a more streamlined one for individual Albertans who have important matters that they want to put

00:05:21.200 forward to other Albertans to be able to do so. He added, quote,

00:05:24.480 Whether I like the questions or not, whether I agree with the question or not, is completely irrelevant.

00:05:29.680 Separatists also celebrated the shift of oversight away from the Chief Electoral Officer and toward the

00:05:34.320 Minister of Justice, arguing it removes what they called red tape and previously, of course,

00:05:38.400 stalled their efforts. But our next story will cover the MOU, and specifically the differences we saw in

00:05:43.680 Alberta supporting it while it was disavowed federally almost simultaneously. So earlier this

00:05:48.720 week, Alberta's legislature unanimously endorsed Premier Daniel Smith's Memorandum of Understanding

00:05:53.840 with Prime Minister Mark Carney, outlining cooperation on energy development, emissions reductions,

00:05:58.960 and a potential West Coast pipeline. And yes, this might be hard to believe, but not one MLA voted

00:06:04.480 against the motion in Alberta, not even Alberta NDP members who can't seem to agree with UCP on much at all.

00:06:10.080 Alberta lawmakers voted Tuesday to endorse the province's new energy agreement with Ottawa,

00:06:14.560 backing a motion that recognizes the Memorandum of Understanding as a major step toward expanding

00:06:19.760 Alberta's resource sector and building a new West Coast pipeline. Government Motion 16, introduced by

00:06:25.520 Joseph Scal, states that the MOU side between Alberta and the federal government is a critical

00:06:30.400 step towards building a stronger and more vibrant Alberta economy. The motion also urged Alberta,

00:06:36.160 Ottawa, British Columbia, and other involved parties to take all necessary steps to ensure these

00:06:41.200 commitments can be achieved as quickly as possible. And as I mentioned, the motion passed 63-0, with

00:06:47.760 Smith framing the agreement as a possible turning point after years of what she described as federal

00:06:52.480 hostility towards Alberta's economy and workers. Smith said, quote,

00:06:57.440 After 10 years of the members opposite and their constitutionally connected members in Ottawa,

00:07:02.160 waging an ideological war on Alberta's economy and workers, there is a potential pathway to prosperity.

00:07:08.400 She argued the deal opens the door to expanding export capacity and constructing a new indigenous

00:07:13.440 co-owned bitumen pipeline to the Pacific. She said, quote,

00:07:16.560 this is a massive first step that will provide us with more export capacity and allow us to increase

00:07:21.280 production. Alberta's proven oil and gas reserves represent trillions of dollars in value,

00:07:26.400 which represent a generational opportunity to secure prosperity. Smith also defended the federal

00:07:31.760 commitment to suspend the clean electricity regulations and set aside the federal emissions cap,

00:07:36.480 calling Alberta's approach a model for balancing development and emissions reduction.

00:07:40.640 Alberta NDP MLA Kathleen Ganley told the legislature her caucus supports the MOU,

00:07:46.080 calling it a promising opportunity while warning that key details remain unresolved. She said, quote,

00:07:52.160 This MOU is a hopeful sign and Alberta's new Democrats support it, but the devil is always

00:07:56.480 in the details and some of them are lacking here. She raised concerns about long-term emissions

00:08:00.560 planning and how treaty rights will be honoured. However, despite some debate between the Alberta UCP

00:08:05.600 and Alberta NDP MLA's, as I said previously, the motion passed unanimously with 63 voting in favour

00:08:11.920 and zero against. But while the deal received unanimous support in Alberta, a related motion failed in

00:08:18.960 the House of Commons when Liberal NDP and Bloc Québécois MPs voted it down. Conservative leader Pierre

00:08:24.720 Poliev sponsored an opposition motion supporting the MOU that was signed on November 27th. The motion

00:08:30.480 urged MPs to support the construction of one or more pipelines enabling the export of at least one

00:08:36.240 million barrels a day of low-emission Alberta bitumen from a strategic deepwater port on the British

00:08:41.440 Columbia coast to reach Asian markets, including through an appropriate adjustment to the Oil Tanker

00:08:46.480 Moratorium Act while respecting the duty to consult Indigenous peoples. After the Liberals and other 0.99

00:08:52.000 parties indicated their intention to vote against it, Poliev amended the motion to include language from

00:08:57.360 the MOU specifically, making it more likely for the Liberals to support the measure. However,

00:09:02.880 the federal vote still failed after Liberal Bloc Québécois and NDP MPs voted against it. The federal

00:09:08.480 vote immediately drew backlash from Alberta separatists who said it confirmed their long-standing argument

00:09:13.840 that Ottawa cannot be trusted to honour agreements with the province. The Alberta Prosperity Project

00:09:18.880 pointed to the final tally, which was 196 votes against and 139 in favour, calling the Smith-Carney MOU

00:09:26.480 meaningless. The group said in a news release, quote, Premier Daniel Smith had touted the MOU as a

00:09:31.760 breakthrough just weeks ago, promising it would unleash our energy sector. Yet, in a move that

00:09:36.480 reeks of bad faith, the Liberal Caucus, led by Mark Carney, rejected the very commitments they had

00:09:41.760 inked. This isn't mere parliamentary gamesmanship, it's a deliberate sabotage of Alberta's economic

00:09:47.120 lifeline. On November 28th, which was the day after the MOU was signed, the CEO of the APP, Mitch

00:09:52.240 Sylvester, called it a useless piece of paper with no binding commitments, no guaranteed pipeline,

00:09:57.680 and no surrender of federal authority over Alberta's energy sector. And in an email sent on Tuesday,

00:10:03.040 the group said, quote, We told you so. The Liberal vote proves Smith-Carney MOU was worthless and

00:10:08.800 Confederation is irreparably broken. The federal opposition to the MOU follows decades of federal

00:10:14.000 neglect to Alberta, according to the APP. The group said, quote, It's the latest chapter in a decades-long

00:10:20.240 saga of federal neglect, from the National Energy Program of the 1980s to endless delays on projects

00:10:26.080 like Energy East and Trans Mountain. Alberta sends billions in equalization payments to Ottawa,

00:10:32.080 only to see our resource sector strangled by carbon taxes, regulatory red tape, and virtue-signalling

00:10:38.000 policies that prioritize net-zero fantasies over real jobs and prosperity. The APP said the events in

00:10:44.400 Ottawa should motivate Albertans to accelerate the province's independence movement. But for our next story,

00:10:49.520 we'll jump back to the Alberta legislature, where the UCP and NDP did not find any agreement in their

00:10:54.640 year-end press conferences. Both major parties wrapped up the fall sitting with sharply different

00:10:59.600 assessments of Alberta's direction. Speaking at the UCP's year-end presser, Jobs, Economy, Trade,

00:11:05.120 and Immigration Minister Joseph Scow said the government was proud of the work that we have done this

00:11:09.360 sitting. He pointed to 14 passed bills and the province's new energy agreement with Ottawa.

00:11:14.560 Scow said the government focused on protecting provincial jurisdiction, improving healthcare,

00:11:19.360 strengthening education standards, and advancing major resource projects. Scow also cited Alberta's

00:11:25.200 economic performance and job creation numbers and said the pipeline memorandum of understanding with

00:11:29.840 the federal government would unleash our energy sector by removing the oil and gas production cap,

00:11:35.120 repealing net-zero power regulations, building a one million barrel per day pipeline to Asia,

00:11:40.080 and more. He said, quote,

00:11:41.680 It's why people are coming here by the droves, and it's a great place to be,

00:11:45.200 adding that Alberta was the lowest tax jurisdiction and simultaneously leads in investment. Scow highlighted

00:11:50.880 the government's focus on protecting provincial jurisdiction, advancing major resource projects,

00:11:55.440 and improving economic conditions, arguing Alberta continues to attract workers and investment

00:12:00.160 from across the country. But just one hour later, NDP leader Nahid Nenshi delivered

00:12:04.960 one of his most forceful criticisms since becoming opposition leader, opening his remarks by asking,

00:12:10.320 quote, What the heck was that? And accusing the government of passing legislation that does not

00:12:15.120 address the real concerns of Albertans. Nenshi claimed, quote, This is an extremist government.

00:12:20.640 This is not the government that Albertans thought they were voting for in the closest election

00:12:24.560 in Alberta's history in May 2023. The Alberta NDP also issued a press release critical of the UCP for

00:12:30.960 using the notwithstanding clause to send children back to school, continued calling the province's

00:12:35.680 healthcare reforms American style, and highlighted some of the bills the Alberta NDP proposed,

00:12:40.800 all of which were voted against by the UCP and ultimately did not pass. But of course,

00:12:44.560 Alberta Premier Daniel Smith previously told True North that labeling the healthcare reforms as

00:12:48.960 American style was false, and several of her ministers have echoed that sentiment. Smith said,

00:12:53.680 quote, It's European-style healthcare. Even the Americans don't want American-style healthcare,

00:12:57.760 so why would we go in that direction? But the UCP and NDP also traded blows when they attacked

00:13:02.480 specific MLAs on each side of the aisle for their conduct during the session. Nenshi outlined the NDP's

00:13:07.840 legislative proposals, which included minimum wage increases, energy affordability measures,

00:13:12.560 whistleblower protections, and grid reliability. He said the UCP had turned down every effort.

00:13:18.160 Scal, meanwhile, dismissed recall efforts, separatist petitions, and outside controversies as

00:13:23.520 distractions. And while Nenshi has been extremely critical of the governing party in recent months,

00:13:28.640 his polling has barely changed, and 338 Canada keeps the Alberta UCP at a 99% chance of winning

00:13:35.040 a majority government if an election were held today. But for our last story today, we'll cover

00:13:40.800 Alberta's recent job growth, which led the country. Statistics Canada's Labour Force survey shows that

00:13:46.560 Alberta added 29,000 jobs last month, a 1.1% increase, and the second major gain in three months.

00:13:53.600 The province's unemployment rate fell from 7.8% in October to 6.5% in November. And the province

00:14:00.640 now employs more than 105,000 additional people compared to a year ago, marking a year-over-year

00:14:05.920 employment growth rate of 4.2%. Also, Alberta's participation rate rose to 69.1%, while the employment

00:14:13.520 rate climbed to 64.6%. One ex-commentator highlighted it even in a bit more detail,

00:14:19.520 showing job creation over the last two years. He explained that Canada created 396,000 full-time

00:14:24.880 jobs over that timeframe, saying that Alberta accounted for almost one-third of them. He said,

00:14:30.000 quote, Alberta has created more full-time jobs than Ontario, and more full-time jobs than all the

00:14:35.520 provinces east of Ontario combined. But Alberta leading the way is nothing new, of course. The Alberta UCP

00:14:41.200 highlighted that the province stood in a league of its own in October as well, when it created 42,500

00:14:47.360 jobs, 71% of the nation's total. But the province's employment growth rate of 4.2% between November

00:14:54.160 2024 and 2025 is the largest in the country, and Alberta also had the highest participation rate

00:14:59.920 and employment rate among all provinces, reflecting a labour market where a larger share of residents

00:15:05.120 are both working and actively engaged in the workforce. Nationwide, public sector employment

00:15:10.080 grew by 2% over the past year compared to 1.8% in the private sector. Alberta saw far stronger gains in

00:15:16.240 both categories, with public sector positions rising 10.8% year-over-year and private sector employment

00:15:22.080 increasing 3.6%. The province added 48,000 public sector jobs and 63,300 private sector jobs over that

00:15:29.760 period. Again, outpacing national growth rates in each category. But for today, that wraps up this

00:15:34.960 week's Alberta Roundup. My name's Isaac Lamoureux. Have a great weekend, thank you, and God bless.

Juno News - December 15, 2025

Separatists file new referendum question, target 1M signatures

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