A referendum is looming in Alberta, which will reveal this fall how far the province is ready to go toward the independence option.
For the rest of Canada, a big question revolves around how much are we willing to do to keep Alberta in the federation. Some new polling by Abacus Data may offer some insights into that question and the short answer is: quite a lot.
Abacus probed Canadians outside Alberta about their feelings toward the prospect of separatism and not surprisingly, more than three quarters of those polled — 76 per cent — prefer that the province remain in Canada, and 63 per cent said that was a strong desire.
That attachment to unity was further underlined when Abacus asked what Ottawa should do to ward off Alberta separation. A majority said they were prepared for the price to be high, with 25 per cent saying Ottawa should “do whatever it takes,” while another 26 per cent said they would endorse “significant concessions.”
Only about one quarter said no special effort should be made, while 13 per cent said they’d go along with minor concessions.
On the face of it, this is good news for Albertans and Premier Danielle Smith, who could use numbers like this to get the province a better deal in the federation. It may be good news for Mark Carney too, giving him some public-opinion room to make that better deal.
However, Carney has said publicly how he worries about the parallels to Brexit, when voters in the United Kingdom saw that referendum as a bargaining chip to get a better deal out of the European Union and ended up separating altogether.
“I saw firsthand what happened in the United Kingdom when the view was, ‘Vote for this. It will be soft and then we’ll negotiate, etc.,’” Carney said a few weeks ago.
These numbers from Abacus also strengthen the view that as long as separation is on the table, Canadians may be in a giving mood. So since the referendum in October is only on whether to pursue another referendum — a referendum on a referendum, they say— some Albertans could well decide that there’s no harm in keeping the debate an active one.
Abacus also probed a bit further, into what specifically Canada should or could do to keep Alberta from leaving.
Again, the results may surprise some. A majority, 54 per cent, supported a pipeline through British Columbia, even if there is provincial opposition. A slightly smaller majority, 51 per cent would go along with reform of the country’s equalization system. A full 49 per cent said they could live with ending the fuel and gas emissions cap.
“Even proposals that would grant Alberta greater autonomy such as running programs currently managed by Ottawa or creating its own pension plan and provincial police force receive support from nearly half of Canadians outside Alberta,” Abacus CEO David Coletto wrote in his summary of the findings.
The survey was conducted with 2,884 Canadian adults living outside Alberta from June 12 to 17, 2026. Margin of error can’t be calculated from surveys conducted online, as this one was, but a similar-sized, probability-based random sample would be within 1.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
Though the results show that many Canadians outside Alberta are clearly prepared to do a lot to keep the province from separating, fundamentally there’s optimism that it won’t happen.
“Seven in 10 think Alberta leaving Canada is unlikely over the next several years, compared with only 20 per cent who think it is likely,” Coletto writes. “Younger Canadians are notably more inclined to believe separation could happen, suggesting that while most dismiss the prospect, there is a growing awareness that the referendum represents more than a symbolic political exercise.”
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre recently kicked off his united-Canada pitch to Albertans by saying that separatism has been fuelled by bad policy in Ottawa. In other words, Canada is fine, but the federal government is not.
This Abacus poll seems to give some backing to that contention, with four in 10 saying federal policies have made it difficult to develop energy projects, export oil and gas or expand production.
“While fewer agree that Alberta is uniquely targeted by Ottawa, the data suggest many Canadians outside the province acknowledge at least some basis for Alberta’s frustrations,” Coletto writes.
All of these findings have persuaded Coletto that Canadians are taking seriously the possibility of Alberta separatism. The environmentalists in Carney’s caucus may worry about these results too, nervous that there could be more backsliding away from climate-change measures — which prompted former minister Steven Guilbeault to resign.
B.C. Premier David Eby has said that what’s happening between Canada and Alberta right now could amount to rewarding bad behaviour. This latest Abacus poll seems to indicate that Canadians outside Alberta are mostly OK about that.
Opinion articles are based on the author’s interpretations and judgments of facts, data and events. More details
