{"id":938672,"date":"2026-10-19T09:58:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-19T09:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/938672\/"},"modified":"2026-10-19T09:58:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T09:58:09","slug":"as-canadas-alberta-holds-referendum-separatists-not-very-likely-to-win-today-finds-survey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/938672\/","title":{"rendered":"As Canada\u2019s Alberta holds referendum, separatists \u2018not very likely\u2019 to win today, finds survey"},"content":{"rendered":"

As Canada’s Alberta province votes today on whether to hold a binding referendum on leaving Canada, a survey has found that fewer than a quarter of residents support leaving the country. <\/p>\n

As Canada’s Alberta province votes on Monday on whether to hold a binding referendum on leaving Canada, a survey has found that separatists are unlikely to win as fewer than a quarter of residents support leaving the country.<\/p>\n

The latest Ipsos-Global News survey found that 70 per cent of Albertans plan to vote to stay in Canada.<\/p>\n

In his message of unity, Prime Minister Mark Carney dubbed the vote as existential<\/a>, urging Albertans to “vote like Canada depends on it because it does”.<\/p>\n

“Don’t be fooled by the idea you can ‘send a message’ with your vote. This is not poker. A vote against Canada is a dangerous bluff that will lead to years of deep division and great uncertainty,” said Carney.<\/p>\n

Oil-rich Alberta has long been at odds with the federal government, particularly with Liberal prime ministers, as the province has complained that federal policies have not allowed the oil industry to prosper \u2014 the province has the world’s fourth-largest known oil reserves.<\/p>\n

Carney referred to Alberta’s oil wealth and warned that US President Donald Trump has been stoking separatism so that he could own the province’s resources. He said the “referendum comes at the worst possible time”.<\/p>\n

\"world\"More from World<\/p>\n

“The world has become more dangerous and divided. Some outside our borders are working to break us so they can own us,” said Carney.<\/p>\n

In his second term, Trump has vowed to annex Canada and turn it into the 51st American state<\/a>. He also mounted a political and economic campaign against the country and roped in far-right leaders to his bidding \u2014 a strategy he has also pursued in Europe.<\/p>\n

The vote in Alberta comes within weeks of separatist Parti Quebecois (PQ) party winning elections in the French-speaking province of Quebec, with party leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon vowing to secede from Canada.<\/p>\n

Did unlikeliest prime minister save the day?<\/p>\n

In Alberta, where people have often clashed with Liberal prime minister, Carney has found support in unsuspecting quarters.<\/p>\n

Carney acknowledged grievances that have fueled alienation in Alberta and said that “the frustrations that many Albertans have felt are real”.<\/p>\n

Carney, who grew up in Alberta, said that while growing up, Ottawa made Albertans feel “like our resources weren’t our own” and the province has lately been made to feel its energy contributions were “against the tides of history”.<\/p>\n

In a bid to bridge the trust deficit that has caused suspicion towards Canadian leaders among Albertans, Carney has taken steps that have garnered him unlikely support in the province. He fast-tracked a proposed new oil pipeline to the Pacific Ocean and vowed to develop Canada as an energy superpower on the back of Alberta’s reserves \u2014 he said that the pipeline would develop more than 140,000 jobs and generate revenue for social programmes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As Canada’s Alberta province votes today on whether to hold a binding referendum on leaving Canada, a survey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":938673,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[25159,35932,49,48,321612,1376,126219,2659,44,92848,207976],"class_list":["post-938672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-alberta-referendum","tag-alberta-separation","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-unity","tag-donald-trump","tag-energy-superpower","tag-mark-carney","tag-news","tag-oil-pipeline","tag-oil-reserves"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/938672","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=938672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/938672\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/938673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=938672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=938672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=938672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}