Jun. 4, 2026 "Alberta premier warns separation could cost $400B. Separatists, economists and Brexit scholars have thoughts": Today I found this article by Joel Dryden on CBC:
Almost $400 billion of transitional costs,
plus somewhere in the neighbourhood of $25 billion to $50 billion in annual costs.
That was Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s early estimate of the price tag facing her province should it separate from Canada.
“I think it’s responsible for us to be very forthright about the cost associated with what is being proposed,
so people can make an informed decision,”
Smith said Monday.
Contained within the estimate? What Smith called a long “laundry list” that runs the gamut from Alberta’s share of the national debt
— about $170 billion,
with about $10 billion a year in interest,
in her estimation —
to costs tied to
border control,
tariffs
and NATO.
A full costing document has been promised, potentially to be delivered by August, and is currently being prepared by Finance Minister Jason Nixon.
“We have to take some time with it,” Smith said.
“We want it out in time for people
to have enough time to digest it before the vote.
“But there are significant startup costs.”
That estimate is “insane” in the eyes of Jeffrey Rath, the chief lawyer for Stay Free Alberta.
“It’s just trying to terrify Albertans into not wanting to leave,” Rath said.
The Alberta Prosperity Project,
the group behind Stay Free Alberta,
released its own costed fiscal plan in July 2025, which it calls the Value of Freedom.
The document looks at the cost of setting up
armed forces,
immigration and deportation systems,
a postal service,
airports,
policing
and national parks,
among other necessities.
The transition number it came up with was approximately $6 billion, Rath said.
“If this is the best argument that the federalist Dani Smith can come up with, she better get back to the drawing board, because it's not an argument at all,” he said.
On Oct. 19, Albertans will head to the polls to vote on a number of referendum questions.
Among them,
whether Alberta should remain a province of Canada
or whether the provincial government should begin the process to hold a referendum on separation.
Trade costs, Brexit comparisons
In discussing the government’s forthcoming document, Smith mentioned that she thought University of Calgary economist Trevor Tombe had already done some “back-of-the-envelope” calculations.
Tombe told CBC News he hasn’t done work on setup costs to date. Tombe is part of the federalist group Lead Not Leave.
His research from July 2025 had suggested
higher trade barriers
following separation could
reduce Alberta's economy by about six per cent
or roughly $30 billion per year
in overall income generated.
He also pointed to the United Kingdom's experience following Brexit,
where investment levels remain significantly below where they otherwise would have been.
“Brexit was significantly easier than what Alberta leaving Canada would entail,” Tombe said.
“And so any of the costs around what the United Kingdom has experienced should be viewed as a substantial underestimate of the
potential costs and challenges that Alberta would face leaving Confederation.”
Interestingly, the British government’s estimate of the cost of leaving Europe
— pegged at roughly £4,300-a-year per family by 2030
— was one of the most contentious and scrutinized elements of the heated Brexit debate in 2016.
No doubt Canadians will be watching closely to see what number Nixon calculates for the cost of Alberta separation later this summer.
A British economist, meanwhile, told CBC News that Alberta’s separation discussions remind him of Scotland’s 2014 failed referendum seeking independence from the United Kingdom.
“The focus was much more on these costs …
of actually separating and that seems to me a much more direct analogy with what you're talking about in Alberta,”
said Jonathan Portes, professor of economics and public policy at King's College London and a senior fellow at the UK in a Changing Europe think tank.
“Although you probably ought to be talking about the potential trade costs as well.”
Portes noted that unlike Brexit,
the secession vote in Scotland lost
and thus economists were not able to observe its real-world effects.
But analyses suggested that the process would have been difficult,
especially when it came to dividing responsibilities for
taxes,
pensions
and other benefits,
he said.
“There are areas where either side could reasonably argue different positions on the allocation of cost of benefits,” Portes said.
“And hence, since it’s
not simple
or obvious,
you’re setting yourself up for some
long
and complicated
and possibly quite bitter arguments.”
Setting up a panel
Nixon, Alberta’s newly appointed finance minister, has said he’ll turn to outside experts to help inform the provincial government’s report on the costs of leaving Canada.
Lennie Kaplan, a former Alberta Finance official, has some experience in such matters. He was the executive director of the MacKinnon Report on Alberta’s Finances in 2019.
On Wednesday, he drew up some recommendations on how a panel focused on measuring the economic and fiscal impacts of Alberta independence could function.
“By using an expert panel,
I think you maybe defuse some of the conflict,”
Kaplan said.
“Having it outside the scope of government
by having government staff available
to provide assistance,
to run shock analysis
or answer questions,
provide data,
et cetera, I think that’s a useful template. And that’s what we used with the MacKinnon Panel.”
That panel should consist of
independent and impartial experts
tasked with contrasting the government
and the separatist estimates,
he said.
It should
assess national debt and assets,
setting up new federal-style institutions like a tax agency
and a central bank,
he said,
replacing major social programs and pensions,
and modelling the economic impact of potential trade barriers.
All told, it should provide Albertans with a comprehensive study, Kaplan said.
“Albertans can judge for themselves whether moving toward some
sort of independent state
or remaining within Canada under some maybe different fiscal arrangements would be a better alternative,”
Kaplan said.
Rath, meanwhile, isn’t convinced about the merits of Smith’s efforts to engage Nixon on the file.
“[They will] come up with more silly numbers to try to scare Albertans into not wanting to leave Canada.
You know, I think it just further undermines her credibility,” Rath said.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/danielle-smith-jeffrey-rath-separation-cost-9.7222674
Jun. 19, 2026 "Alberta separatists launch campaign, says province has resources to go it alone": Today I found this article on CTV:
Four months to the day from an upcoming referendum on whether Alberta should stay in Canada, about 35 people rallied Friday at a Calgary hotel ballroom to formally launch a campaign to convince voters it’s time for the province to separate.
The campaign is called “Let Alberta Decide.”
Organizers promise it will be a serious, fact-based initiative to persuade people that Alberta has
the workforce,
the financial wherewithal,
and the energy
and agriculture resources to go it alone.
The campaign is to use
news media,
social media,
advertising
and public engagement.
The people behind it include Keith Wilson, a prominent separatist advocate who recently made a case for separation in debates with former Alberta premier Jason Kenney.
But Wilson, one of the co-chairs of the group, acknowledged it is an uphill battle.
“We’re definitely the underdog and I do believe if the vote were held today, we wouldn’t be successful,” he told reporters.
“But I think a lot of people haven’t engaged on this or the information they’ve received has been very skewed from those who are advocating in support of Ottawa.
“We want a balanced discussion, so that’s why we’ve launched this campaign.”
Premier Danielle Smith has announced that on Oct. 19,
Albertans will vote on whether to stay in Alberta
or hold a second referendum on whether to leave.
Smith says hundreds of thousands of Albertans have weighed in on the topic and deserve to be heard,
while critics say she is behaving recklessly to appease separatist hardliners in her party.
Wilson’s co-chair, Tanya Clemens, describes herself as a fourth-generation southern Alberta farmer, educator and Alberta independence advocate.
But she said that wasn’t always the case.
“I was undecided at one point. I was more a proponent at one point back before I learned a bunch about this, of a sovereign Alberta within or without Canada,” she said.
“I always tried to put the ‘within’ first.
“But as I started to gain some education and the steps we’ve taken through history … I realized we can’t do this within Canada anymore.”
Smith has promised to push for a pro-Canada vote.
Wilson dismissed the fact that Alberta Conservative MP’s are planning to campaign on the pro-Canada side, too.
“They’re part of an establishment that hasn’t served Alberta’s interests and they are essentially in a mode of preserving their jobs and their role,” he said.
“And we’re advocating, those of us who support independence, that we don’t need to be governed by Ottawa. We don’t need federal members of Parliament.”
There were no flags or chants during the campaign kickoff. One man wore a dark blue T-shirt reading “I support and independent Alberta.”
Clemens said there will be several third-party advertisers and independence groups during the campaign but they won’t be formally linked.
Polls have suggested a large majority of Albertans want to stay in Confederation,
but the debate itself is splitting communities.
A recent rodeo parade in the town of Sundre was cancelled amid threats and abuse following parade organizers rejecting a float festooned with Alberta flags.
Another case involved separation advocate Cory Morgan, who was Friday’s event.
In Taber, official directed him to take down a pro-separation billboard from town land by last weekend.
The board remains up and two more signs have been added.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 19, 2026.
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