Chaos descended upon a bipartisan Alberta legislature meeting determining the fate of an anti-Alberta separatism question Wednesday afternoon.
A committee of MLAs established to review Thomas Lukaszuk’s Forever Canadian petition recommended the province include a question for Albertans to vote on the province remaining in Canada during the Oct. 19 provincial referendum, according to a news release issued by the United Conservative Party.
The problem is: that did not happen.
The UCP news release was issued shortly after 3 p.m., while the Select Special Citizen Initiative Proposal Review Committee meeting was still underway and before a vote had been held — leading to confusion and chaos both inside and outside the room.
The motion was expected to pass, given the UCP members on the committee outnumber the Opposition NDP members, but it was still being debated when the UCP caucus published the premature statement announcing the vote had taken place and the motion had passed.
“I understand the UCP has already issued a release about a referendum being called and that’s already been released to media,” said Edmonton-Whitemud NDP MLA Rakhi Pancholi in the meeting.
“So a little awkward since we’re still debating the motion but perhaps, that is because this committee has always been treated like a sham by the members opposite.”
The news release had said with more than 400,000 Albertans signing Lukaszuk’s Forever Canada petition, combined with the reported 301,000 who signed the Alberta Independence petition, it meant over 700,000 Albertans deserved the opportunity to have their voices heard in a referendum.
The NDP members of the review committee called a point of privilege after realizing the news release had been sent out before a motion had been voted on.
“I have just had the opportunity to review an absolutely shocking news release,” said NDP MLA Christina Gray, who then read out a section of the news release containing quotes from committee chair Brandon Lunty, who is a UCP backbencher.
“Oftentimes, it feels like the politics of the UCP is a stage play to exercise their power to do what they want — but I very seriously raise this point of privilege now, because it has been nevermore apparent than the fact this committee is still meeting and still debating this motion and a press release from you as the chair has already gone out.”
The news release, which even had laudatory quotes from chair Lunty, was pulled back by the caucus about 20 minutes later.
“We would like to clarify that the previous statement was inadvertently distributed in error. Please disregard the earlier communication,” UCP caucus communications said.
The NDP said the premature release called into question the process and Lunty’s impartiality and called for it to be brought to the legislature Speaker’s attention.
The United Conservatives voted against escalating the issue but time on the meeting ran out before the vote on the Oct. 19 referendum could occur.
United Conservative member Jason Nixon said he agreed the premature release was a mistake, but he and the other UCP members ultimately voted against taking the matter any further.
“The employees that are involved have apologized for it, and I think it’s probably best if we move on with the business of Albertans,” Nixon said. “If we were to go after every member of the legislature every time staffers make a mistake, it would be ridiculous.”
Lunty asked for consent to extend the meeting, which was denied.
The meeting was then adjourned without a vote being held, meaning the committee did not recommend the question be added to the referendum ballot as the premature news release indicated.
The committee will meet again on Thursday afternoon.
Lukaszuk said the damage is already done and feels the entire process was rigged.
“It was always abundantly obvious that this government wanted to have a referendum on tearing Canada apart by hook or by crook. And the process was fixed to such a point where they already had press releases ready,” Lukaszuk said after the drama played out in front of him at the meeting where he spoke about the seriousness of a separatism question being included in the fall referendum.
“No matter what I would have said in this meeting, it wouldn’t have mattered.”
The vote is the latest development in what has become a long and tortuous path in a tale of two petitions.
Lukaszuk began gathering signatures a year ago under the name Forever Canadian.
Under provincial citizen-initiative rules, he needed just under 300,000 names to force Smith’s government to consider the issue. He received well over 400,000, and by the end of the year, Elections Alberta had certified the petition as valid.
The question on Lukaszuk’s petition reads: “Do you agree that Alberta should remain in Canada?”
However, up until Wednesday, Smith’s government had done little to act on Lukaszuk’s petition.
They sent it to Lunty’s committee for recommendations on how to proceed and to clear up outstanding issues. Smith has said one critical issue was what Lukaszuk wanted done with the petition.
Lukaszuk has said he collected the names not to force a referendum but simply to compel politicians in the legislature to stand and affirm they believe in a united country, but has also at times expressed support for a referendum.
Nixon doubled down on that angle after Wednesday’s meeting, saying it’s clear 400,000 people wanted a vote when they signed the Forever Canadian petition.
“We’re not scared of what Albertans have to say. We respect Albertans’ rights to participate in democracy. I look forward to hearing what my constituents and other Albertans have to say,” Nixon said.
The competing separatist petition, organized by the group Stay Free Alberta, has had, by turns, an easier and a harder path.
Their question reads: “Do you agree that the Province of Alberta should cease to be a part of Canada to become an independent state?”
Unlike Lukaszuk, Stay Free organizers only needed to gather about 178,000 names to trigger a government response after Smith’s government rewrote legislation last year.
They also faced having their petition tossed out as unconstitutional by a judge last year after Elections Alberta asked the courts to affirm the question was not offside with the Constitution.
But before the judge could rule on that, Smith’s government changed the law again, this time voiding Elections Alberta’s right to put such questions to the courts.
The judge involved issued his ruling anyway, saying such a question would, indeed, have violated the Constitution.
Despite the ruling, Stay Free Alberta’s second attempt at a petition was issued in January, and three weeks ago the group submitted for verification what they said were more than 300,000 signatures, far more than what was required.
However, that petition was put into legal limbo last week.
Several First Nations had challenged the decision to issue the petition in court, calling for it to be scrapped on the grounds that it violated treaty rights.
Last week, a Court of King’s Bench judge agreed with them, and quashed the petition.
Smith has promised to appeal that decision, calling it “anti-democratic.”
“You would have to be absent from Alberta and not watch any news for the last year, not to see that government has very systematically gone out of its way to support separatists,” Lukaszuk said, noting how the province changed legislation twice.
“They overrode Elections Alberta, they overrode the decision of the Court of King’s Bench. They’re trying to ignore the most recent decision of the Court of King’s Bench.
“You know, what more can they do?”
The NDP has accused Smith of being both arsonist and firefighter, proclaiming she loves a united Canada while clearing the path for a vote on separation.
They say Smith is walking a political tightrope, championing Canada in order to stay onside with the majority of Albertans while also clearing the path for a separation vote in order to appease hardliners in her caucus and party.
“What this means is what we have known all along. The UCP is a separatist party,” Pancholi said after the meeting.
“They were determined to have a referendum on separatism for the past year, and they’ve done everything they could to make sure that that happens.”
Smith has said she has been a Canadian patriot from the start but that the voices of those disaffected in Confederation deserve to be heard.
— With files from Jack Farrell, The Canadian Press
© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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