What are the political risks of Alberta referendum? Analysts weigh in | CTV's Question Period

Añadido: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]What does a potential referendum mean for Prime Minister Mark Carney and Pierre Paul? How should they approach the issue and what risks are there for them? Our Sunday strategy session is here. Scott Reed is former communications director to Prime Minister Paul Martin. Jason Hatcher is a CEO of Signal Hill and former adviser to the late Jim Apprentice. And Tom McCair is former leader of the federal NDP. Hi everybody. It's good to see you. Scott, I'll start with you and the prime minister's reaction to uh to everything that developed over the week in Alberta.

[00:00:27]Uh he did it. He made his comments at the Library of Parliament uh kind of referencing some of the the figures of Canadian history and and how significant Alberta has been. What do you think the strategy there is >> to be measured to try do not sound partisan to almost not engage the debate and inflame the debate in an aggressive fashion at this early stage but also to be firm in saying that the project of Canada is the best project available. Uh I thought his I thought his words made sense. I mean one of the big challenges that I think uh federal leaders other premers face is how much torque to put into this conversation. Premier Smith has left so much room uh for this to rise quickly to an emotional level that I think other leaders particularly the prime minister have to really measure their uh u measure their tone in these early days. How big of an issue do you I mean to be pointed about it Jason like we're talking about a referendum essentially on a province of this country leaving Canada and uh you know against the backdrop of an economic crisis with with our trading partners to the south. Um how big of an issue for the prime minister over the next five months is this going to be?

[00:01:45]>> Look I think it's obviously a significant issue. Uh there are major risks to this referendum. Um the premier has obviously made a political calculus that the best way to uh address the discontent in Alberta, the 50 the 20% of people that are absolutely committed to independence uh another 20% that are either soft separatists or uh those that want to send a message to uh to to Ottawa if you will that the best way to deal with that in her mind is to hit this deadon with anou in hand and and try to arrest this in its in its tracks and and really manage it. But the risk cannot be understated and it's to the prime minister and to the premier.

[00:02:19]First, the obvious risk to the country.

[00:02:21]But secondly, at a time when the prime minister is trying to attract both domestic and foreign capital for major projects across the country where the premier is uh seeking to uh attract capital for green field energy production and pipelines. Um capital markets we know require certainty and demand certainty, but that's a real risk. And then of course lastly from both the prime minister standpoint and the premier standpoint there's a political rest to them uh individually we've seen uh already a letter from 14 members of the Liberal caucus regarding theou and obviously the premier uh has already heard from separatists uh that they're not happy with the approach she's taking. So there's a risk to her that she ends up sort of not pleasing anybody >> in this case specifically now that we know the question that's going forward in October. Tom, if I were were the prime minister, I'd be even more worried only because it it appears to leave, you know, the impression that your vote is not necessarily as consequential as it will be if this second referendum happens. Right? So, if I among those, you know, 15% 20% as Jason uh so rightly points out who are so-called soft separatists who are there to send a message who feel that way to send a message rather than actually leave. You might feel safer actually casting your vote against the the state side. Until that memorandum of understanding, Danielle Smith was definitely in the send a message camp. And that's the tricky part for her right now. I've always found that it was a mistake to underestimate Danielle Smith. She's a very clever politician. But here, I believe she's being too clever by half.

[00:03:53]She's trying to have it both ways. She's trying to tell the base that turfed Jason Kenny that she's still on side with them. She's going to hold this referendum. Do you want to stay in Canada? or and by the way, you can't have a referendum on something as consequential as that with an a two-part question. You either ask one or the other, but you can't do both at the same time. Everyone's always gone after Quebec, rightfully so. Uh for for both its 1980 question and it 95 question is leaving tons of room for interpretation.

[00:04:22]You know, in 1980 it was, oh, we're not really separating. We want a mandate to start negotiating separation. It reminds me of that sort of artifice. So, if you're going to be the premier of the province of Alberta and you're going to put this forward, all of a sudden you get the mandate to ask the separation question, what side are you on? It's your government putting this forward.

[00:04:42]Who leads the no side? Is it the government leading the no side? They're the ones who are proposing it. It doesn't make any sense as it rolls out.

[00:04:50]But when you're in a tight corner, sometimes, you know, as I love to say, when you've painted yourself in a corner, sometimes you have to walk on paint. The paint that Danielle Smith is walking on here, I think is going to leave stains on a lot of politics. And I love the way Jason put it. I for I was there in the 1980 referendum. I was a lawyer in Quebec City. I was there in the 95 referendum. I was an elected member of the Quebec National Assembly.

[00:05:14]These things are awful. They're awful in the workplace. They're awful in communities. They're awful in families.

[00:05:19]People really divide up over this. And yes, they do provoke a lot of insecurity. Who needs that at a time when you've got Mark Carney on side to help Alberta play a better role using its own resources, promising to help get new pipelines in place so that they can do that responsibly. And all of a sudden, she's still playing with the matches of lighting a fire that would break up Canada. It makes no sense.

[00:05:44]>> Scott, the the premier insists that she will campaign on the stay side. uh Pierre Polyv, the leader of the Federal Conservatives, also pretty emphatically said this week that that he and his uh conservative federal conservative MPs will do the same. What do you envision um you know, the voices on that side are going to have to be like? Who are they going to have to be? Uh and what kind of things are they going to have to do over the summer?

[00:06:08]Well, I I thought to his credit, Pure Pol was emphatic and he was declarative.

[00:06:13]Uh and he talked about it from the perspective of if he's someone who aspires to be prime minister, then his first obligation is to ensure that he is a champion of keeping Alberta within Canada. I must say uh Premier Smith has offered uh very flimsy assurances by way of comparison and you know this this notion uh that you know she says well I'm going to uh campaign for Alberta to stay here but she talks of it so casually at a Friday press conference well I'll do some town halls like I do town halls I'll talk about all nine questions no doubt this question will come up this is a engineered question to create division to ignite dangerous elements. I mean, as you said yourself, you know, it is a question that's it's a cake and eat it too question. It invites obviously separatists to vote to leave, but it also invites all others to say, well, you know what, maybe this is a strategic vote. Perhaps I can wedge a little bit more out of Ottawa and the other provinces, the rest of Canada, if we perpetuate this and move toward there's no downside. There's no consequence. There's no immediate separation. So, let's just keep this thing going and see if it offers us leverage. The challenge, of course, is that that perpetuates uncertainty. The premier in the same breath that she talks about the need to get this issue resolved is herself the sponsor of it.

[00:07:39]She is offering the platform for the separatists, for the spread of at least for five months misinformation. She is creating a climate where these divisions and this dialogue will unfold and she acts as though she's just a cork in a raging river of democracy. She's steering the ship and she's steering it toward the shores of separatism.

[00:08:01]>> Jason, what do you think of that? Um, and why do you think that the premier has arrived at the position she has?

[00:08:08]Because to be fair to her and and I take everything Scott's saying, she she she did, you know, enable this to happen.

[00:08:15]She is the one putting forward the question, but she did also at the same time embark on very what and turned out to be very fruitful negotiations to actually come to a compromise with the federal government and agree to anou. So what is like really going on here where from where you said >> well look I mean first and foremost this is not a new issue in Alberta. So this is just the latest chapter in it. You know you go back to Peter Lahed in the constitutional discussions in 1980.

[00:08:38]great great Canadian Peter Lahi was not a separatist but certainly advocated for Alberta rights in in the 90s we saw Preston Manning with the West once in again not a separatist and someone who worked to articulate it but the reality is is for the last 10 years Albertans have felt very much vilified by their federal government by the previous administration uh they felt that uh one region was pitted against uh another and that's never works in this country but at this moment in time the premier has stood up and said she is going to campaign on behalf of Canada and advocate for that. Our chief of staff has said the same thing in media uh uh today. Now is the time for federalists like myself, passionate Canadians to lean in. We have to check our political baggage at the door and work together.

[00:09:20]And yes, this may make for some strange political bad fellows, but we must work together to arrest us in its tracks right away. And that means that it's not about political games. It's not about fingerpointing. We can do that in the future once we're past this. But federalists need to work across the country and across Alberta now to to make sure that we stop this referendum in its tracks and make sure there's a strong uh endorsement of of the great country that is Canada and the dream that we have.

[00:09:44]>> So who are those key federalists Tom from from where you sit? How do you see the impact on the prime minister on Mr. Palv on other key federal figures?

[00:09:54]I I agree with my colleagues that frankly Palev has been four square on this one and it's very refreshing to see u Nahed Nenshi also the leader of the opposition in Edmonton frankly very strong on this um in Ottawa this is not Mark Carney's favorite subject he has stayed away from it in Quebec he he gets along with everybody his priority is how do we make Canada weather this storm with the Americans and come out of it much stronger econom economically and socially, but this is something that's being thrown at him and he's going to have to pick up the terminology quickly and handle it. He did a heck of a lot of the work beforehand by coming up with thatou and dealing with Danielle Smith in terms that nobody in Alberta was expecting. But when your politics have been based on recrimination and grievance, as Danielle Smiths have been, including when she was the leader of the Wild Rose Party, it's very difficult for her to then turn around to the base that did throw out Jason Kenny and say, "Look, we've got all this. Let's calm down." She can't do that. So, she's coming up with this two-step and it's not going to work. Carney's going to have to move in there. The less said by federal ministers, the better because it only aggravates. But I'll add to what you and Scott said with regard to people who might have been in the soft zones of of this thing deciding, you know, maybe in that case to vote, you know, to to put pressure. There's another side to it because this whole thing is so mushy that I think that you might have a very low participation rate of people who actually do just want to stay in Canada, but they don't sense that it's going to be that important. And I I've seen how that can happen in in votes. In the 95 vote, it was the opposite. In Quebec, it was a record high vote because it was clear what it meant with somebody like Jacqu Pariso there. It was a break with Canada. It was breaking up the greatest country in the world. But here it is mushy and there is this middle and there are two questions at the same time. So I'm very concerned as as has been expressed that not only would some people say, "Yeah, let's let's send them a strong message." Others might say, "It's not that important. I can stay home." And I think that the combination of those two again is playing with fire.

[00:11:59]>> A lot for us to talk about between now and October. Thank you very much everybody. Our Sunday strategy session, Scott Reed, Jason Hatcher, and Tom Mulair.