{"id":234180,"date":"2025-10-23T10:39:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-23T10:39:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/234180\/"},"modified":"2025-10-23T10:39:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-23T10:39:14","slug":"petition-to-keep-alberta-in-canada-really-close-to-collecting-enough-signatures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/234180\/","title":{"rendered":"Petition to keep Alberta in Canada \u2018really close\u2019 to collecting enough signatures"},"content":{"rendered":"

The former Alberta politician trying to keep the province from splitting up with Canada says his \u201cForever Canadian<\/a>\u201d campaign is getting \u201creally, really close\u201d to collecting enough signatures to trigger a vote on the province\u2019s future in Canada.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The campaign, led by former MLA Thomas Lukaszuk, needs to collect almost 30,000 signatures on a petition that asks, \u201cDo you agree that Alberta should remain within Canada?\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tFormer MLA Thomas Lukaszuk, who was in Jasper and Hinton on Wednesday, said in a post on social media that organizers are getting \u201creally, really close\u201d to collecting enough signatures on the petition.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tX\/@LukaszukAB\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

In an update on social media<\/a> on Wednesday, Lukaszuk expressed confidence that the campaign will be able to collect enough signatures, but he also urged people to continue to sign the petition because he expects some of the signatures collected will be rejected.<\/p>\n

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\u201cNo one really knows (how many signatures we have) because a large number of petitions haven\u2019t been delivered yet, but we are getting really, really close, we know that for sure,\u201d said Lukaszuk.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow we need to get over that bump, because we know that some signatures will inevitably be rejected for one reason or another.\u00a0 So we need at least a 10 to 15 per cent buffer,\u201d Lukaszuk added.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\"The<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tThe application from the organizers of the Forever Canadian peitition asks the simple question \u201cDo you agree that Alberta should remain within Canada?\u201d.\t\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tElections Alberta\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

A spokesperson in the office of Alberta\u2019s Chief Electoral Officer<\/a> says if the petition is successful in gathering the required number of signatures, it would then be referred to the provincial legislature which would refer it to a committee.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\"Get<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tGet daily National news<\/p>\n

Get the day’s top news, political, economic, and current affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox once a day.<\/p>\n

Lukaszuk claims the committee would have two choices: recommend Albertans be given an opportunity to vote in a referendum, or allow MLAs to vote on the petition question on the floor of the legislature.<\/p>\n

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He says the \u201cright thing to do, both morally and fiscally,\u201d would be to give MLAs a chance to vote.<\/p>\n

Lukaszuk is confident if that happens, \u201cthe majority will vote in favour\u201d of Alberta remaining in Canada and \u201cthis nonsense talk about Alberta separation could cease immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Click<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t1:59
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\u2018Forever Canadian\u2019 campaign continues to collect signatures on Alberta separation question\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The Forever Canadian campaign was started as a counter to Alberta separatists, who want a referendum on Alberta independence.<\/p>\n

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has declined to endorse the Forever Canadian campaign, saying instead that she wants to see a sovereign Alberta within a united Canada.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Click<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t1:46
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCourt hears arguments over Alberta separation question\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

However, both Smith and\u00a0 Justice Minister Mickey Amery have said an opposing question asking whether Alberta should separate from Canada is constitutional and should have been approved by Elections Alberta.<\/p>\n

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The province\u2019s chief electoral officer referred that question, proposed by the Alberta Prosperity Project<\/a>\u00a0to the Alberta Court of Kings Bench, for a judicial review<\/a> of whether it violates the Canadian Constitution, including treaty rights.<\/p>\n

The deadline for Lukaszuk to deliver his Forever Canadian petition to the province\u2019s Chief Electoral Officer is Oct. 28.<\/p>\n

\u2013with files from The Canadian Press.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2025 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The former Alberta politician trying to keep the province from splitting up with Canada says his \u201cForever Canadian\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":234181,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[35932,49,48,28598,44,714],"class_list":["post-234180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-alberta-separation","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-forever-canadian","tag-news","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234180"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234180\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/234181"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}