Regardless of its outcome, the 2023 provincial election will be a turning point. The last four years in Alberta politics have been fraught. The United Conservative Party stormed into office determined to undo much of what the NDP had done in government. They cut budgets, lowered corporate taxes and showered the oil and gas industry with love and reassurance. But the new government faced headwinds: the COVID-19 pandemic, instability in global energy markets, and an opposition party with experience, able to present itself as a credible alternative government.
Through all the twists and turns of pandemic politics and internal conflict in the UCP, the 2023 election has loomed. Can the UCP return Alberta to its “normal” pattern of decades-long conservative dynasties? Or will the NDP stage a comeback that signals a new era of two-party competition?
Much is at stake in this election. But who are these parties? What are the alternatives they present to Alberta voters?
Capturing the “essence” of a political party is no easy task. Parties are complex organizations. They have foundational commitments—to a set of principles or a segment of society, such as farmers or the working class. Individuals and groups within parties try to shape them to conform with their beliefs. Above all else, parties exist to try to win power, and so their policy stances are often malleable, bending to meet public opinion. Within parties, leaders play an outsized role, and so the selection of a new leader can reshape a party almost overnight.
Both of the main parties facing off in Alberta in 2023 have governed, and so we can look back at what they have done. We can also listen to what they tell us about their core beliefs and the policy commitments they make as they go into the election.
The core commitment of Alberta’s newly united conservatives is to personal freedom and small government.
Alberta is a conservative place. It reliably elects conservatives to Ottawa, and for decades elected a Progressive Conservative provincial government. Just as the populist Reform Party emerged out of Alberta to disrupt federal conservative politics, the Wildrose Party was formed in 2008 and quickly became a thorn in the side of the province’s governing PCs, channelling the discontent of populist, socially conservative and libertarian supporters. This competition on the right contributed to an outcome that shook Alberta conservatives to their core: the election in 2015 of Rachel Notley’s NDP.
The UCP was formed in 2017 through the merger of these two right-wing parties. Its raison d’être was to win power, restoring Alberta conservatives to what they see as their rightful place in government.
But even with this overarching purpose the party struggled to bring together the strands of Alberta conservatism. Under Peter Lougheed the PCs had been a centrist party, building up the Alberta state not only to develop the oil sands but also to invest resource revenues to build a diversified future economy. In contrast, Wildrose was firmly grounded in Alberta populism. It was fiscally conservative and advocated for more choice in how people receive services such as K–12 education and healthcare.
In the merger of the parties not much of the Lougheed legacy survived. The core commitment of the newly united conservatives is to the ideas of personal freedom and small government. The party is friendly to business in general and to oil and gas in particular. It sees its core commitments as fundamentally Albertan, and so it seeks to insulate the province from a federal government it perceives to be a threat to the province’s prosperity.
Freedom figures prominently in the party’s founding principles, which assert a vision of society “made up of free individuals” and commit the party to “economic freedom,” “free enterprise” and “freedom of speech, worship and assembly.”
The COVID-19 pandemic posed a fundamental challenge to a government supposedly committed to unfettered personal freedom. The Kenney government reluctantly imposed limits on personal freedoms to stop the spread of the virus. Restrictions on gatherings and mask and vaccination mandates so offended many party members and MLAs that Kenney’s leadership was thrown into question.
Under Danielle Smith, freedom has been reinforced as a—if not the—foundational value of the party, and the Kenney government’s COVID response has been thoroughly repudiated.
Along with “freedom,” smaller government is a foundational commitment for the UCP. Grounded in a belief in the efficiency of the market, party members prefer a smaller public sector and a bigger role for the private sector in the delivery of services. The party’s founding principles articulate this, making reference to “economic freedom in a market economy,” “limited government, including low levels of taxation” and “fiscal responsibility, including balanced budgets, debt reduction and respect for taxpayers’ money.”
In its first year, the Kenney government was guided by this desire to make government smaller, commissioning the MacKinnon Report to show that the province spent more per capita on education and healthcare than other Canadian jurisdictions. Its first budgets reduced corporate income tax rates and promised “to find more cost-effective ways (including private–public partnerships) to deliver services.” Pursuing cost efficiency, the government legislated to postpone arbitration for public-sector collective agreements, told arbitrators to impose wage cuts of 2 per cent or more, and privatized laundry, cleaning and food services in healthcare, laying off an estimated 11,000 workers all told in the public sector.
The desire for smaller government translated into significant cuts to public funding for post-secondary education. Operating grants were reduced across the sector. The largest cuts were to the University of Alberta’s grant, which was reduced by 33 per cent. Other institutions saw sizeable cuts, such as the University of Lethbridge, at 21 per cent between 2019 and 2022–2023. At the same time, the government permitted institutions to raise tuition by 7 per cent each year. After four years the result is Alberta’s post-secondary institutions rely less on public funding and more on individual students to cover costs.
In K–12 education, the UCP’s new funding model for school boards was intended to reduce costs, even as funding lagged (and still lags) behind growth in student numbers. Significant cuts to funding for children with disabilities added additional strain to school board budgets. These cuts have been partially reversed, and some funds have gone to boards to address pandemic learning loss and concerns about students’ mental health. Despite its preference for smaller government, the UCP’s 2023 budget included significant increases in funding for K–12 education and healthcare. But, overall, per-student funding for K–12 education has shrunk. The UCP government also gave money to support the opening of new charter schools, which receive public funding but operate outside public school boards and aren’t obligated to accept all students.
When it signed an agreement with the federal government to expand public supports for childcare, the Kenney government accepted both a shift toward non-profit delivery of childcare and a greater public role in subsidizing childcare. That said, the agreement allowed for a more significant role for the private sector to deliver childcare in Alberta than in most other provinces’ agreements. The Smith government has emphasized the importance of private operators as it has worked to implement the agreement.
The preference for private over public ownership also drove the UCP’s approach to affordable housing: the party released a plan to divest the province of ownership of affordable housing assets over a 10-year period. And although she has not yet acted on them, Smith has in the past praised the potential use of market mechanisms to control costs and improve accountability in the delivery of public services, using schemes such as vouchers and health spending accounts. The government has also entered into agreements to increase the number of publicly funded surgeries done by private providers in the province.
The NDP platform marries support for oil and gas with moderate environmental policy and progressive social policy.
With its commitment to “jobs, economy, pipelines” the Kenney government continued a Conservative government tradition of defining Alberta’s prosperity as synonymous with oil and gas. To fight back against a global movement away from fossil fuels, Kenney created an energy “war room,” launched an inquiry into alleged foreign actors targeting the oil sands and spent $1.3-billion to try to keep the Keystone XL pipeline project viable, only to see it cancelled by the Biden administration.
Under Smith, the UCP remains determined to ensure growth of the oil and gas sector, gearing up for conflict with Ottawa over a proposed emissions cap on oil sands production. An early skirmish in this conflict flared in January 2023, when Smith went on the offensive against the federal government’s planned “just transition” legislation, intended to help workers transition to a low-carbon economy.
There is, of course, a long and rich history of conflict between Alberta’s government and its federal counterpart. The UCP has cultivated an ideology of “Albertanism” that asserts the superiority of Alberta’s approach to governance, a keenness to exploit natural resources and a commitment to “conservative values.” These stand in contrast to—in the UCP’s estimation—an exploitative federal government unable to deliver on its core commitments and intent on pandering to Quebec.
Under Kenney, the focus of Albertanism was on the federal equalization system, understood to take money from virtuous Albertans to subsidize indolent Quebeckers. The Kenney government held a referendum in 2021 asking Albertans whether they favoured a change to Canada’s constitution to remove the commitment to equalization. It also appointed the Fair Deal panel, which recommended the creation of an Alberta police force to replace the RCMP, a provincial pension plan to replace the CPP, and a provincial tax collection agency.
A commitment to “Albertanism” grew even fiercer under Smith. Her government passed her signature Alberta Sovereignty within a United Canada Act, which claims to allow the province to not enforce federal laws. It directed provincial Crown prosecutors not to act on some Criminal Code provisions relating to guns. And Smith kept proposals for provincial police, pensions and tax collection alive, even as she delayed implementation until after an election.
The Alberta NDP’s constitution says the party’s purpose is “to promote the principles of democratic socialism in Alberta and to establish and maintain a democratic socialist government in Alberta through the electoral process.” Many different definitions of democratic socialism exist, ranging from old-school calls for public ownership of the “means of production” to more moderate commitments to equal opportunity and a role for government in regulating the economy. The NDP under Rachel Notley is certainly at the moderate end of any spectrum of democratic socialist thought. Many on the Alberta left even question whether the party can be called “socialist” in any meaningful way.
As the 2023 election approaches, the party has developed a platform that marries support for oil and gas with moderate environmental policy and progressive social policy. Its main focus is on affordability, healthcare and economic development.
Notley’s NDP is firmly ensconced in the moderate and pragmatic approach embraced by the NDP in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. After forming government in Alberta in 2015, the party raised corporate taxes modestly and reintroduced progressive income tax rates, ending the flat tax the Klein government had implemented. Like conservative governments before and after it, the NDP did not bring in a provincial sales tax. Its 2023 fiscal plan commits the party to limiting the use of non-renewable resource revenues to cover operating expenses and imposes a debt ceiling.
In government, and in its policies leading into the 2023 election, the Alberta NDP remains committed to the extraction of fossil fuels. This support is balanced against a concern for the environment. In government, the party worked with industry to develop a climate plan that put a price on greenhouse gas emissions, phased out coal-generated electricity and capped oil sands emissions. But Notley remained a strong proponent of the industry, working to build a coalition to get the Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion built, buying rail cars to get oil to market and declining to raise provincial royalty rates.
Although centrist in orientation, the NDP remains firmly committed to public delivery of core responsibilities of the provincial government, including healthcare, education and affordable housing. The party is highly critical of the UCP’s efforts to privatize delivery of healthcare, including opposing the contracting out of services that employ unionized workers in the public sector.
When it was in government, the NDP froze post-secondary tuition and kept funding to institutions largely stable. Its commitment prior to the 2023 election was to increase funding to institutions, abolish the performance-based funding model, improve student aid and cap tuition to inflation. Its platform commitments include significant public investments in affordable housing, public education and healthcare.
The NDP is also inclined toward the use of the government’s regulatory authority, whether to limit auto-insurance rate increases or to raise minimum wages.
A central commitment for the party is social equality, both in terms of economic equity but also with reference to systemic discrimination based in gender, race or other characteristics. Its “Alberta’s Future” website declares that the NDP has “a vision for an economy that works for everyone, not just the rich” and features “equality and inclusion” as a key principle. In government, the NDP appointed the province’s first minister responsible for the status of women and enacted legislation protecting gay–straight alliances in schools. In opposition, the party introduced legislation (which the UCP majority government did not pass) to require collection of race-based data and establish an anti-racism office within government.
If Danielle Smith had her way, the question in the minds of voters as they go to the polls would be “Who do you think will stand up for Alberta against Justin Trudeau?” Under Kenney’s leadership, the UCP adopted a dual strategy of confrontation with Ottawa and fortification of Alberta by asserting autonomy where the constitution allowed. Smith has continued this dual strategy, dialing up the rhetoric of confrontation and, with her Alberta Sovereignty Act, pushing fortification beyond what the constitution permits.
The strategy has involved legal challenges to federal government actions, including the carbon tax, the Impact Assessment Act, the use of the Emergencies Act and the ban on single-use plastics. The provincial referendum in fall of 2021 asking whether Albertans wanted the principle of equalization removed from the constitution was another element of confrontation. Smith characterizes her Sovereignty Act as a type of confrontation.
The second strategy, fortification of Alberta, was endorsed by Kenney’s “Fair Deal” panel. Recommendations (replace the RCMP; replace CPP; create a provincial revenue collection agency) now appear to have become official party policy, with all of them included in the mandate letters Smith sent in November 2022 to members of her cabinet.
The NDP’s approach to relations with Ottawa will involve neither confrontation nor fortification. As premier, Notley occasionally engaged in confrontational tactics (including a standoff with BC premier John Horgan over bitumen transport, which briefly saw Alberta ban BC wines), but overall she sought co-operation. She points to the federal government’s purchase of the TMX pipeline as evidence of the success of her approach. Her party has opposed the UCP’s proposals to fortify provincial autonomy through policing, pensions and tax collection, and is vehemently opposed to what it calls the “job-killing” Sovereignty Act.
If the UCP wants voters to be thinking about who is best equipped to “stand up to Ottawa,” the NDP wants voters to be asking which party is best equipped to repair the healthcare system. In March Notley released her party’s “plan for modernizing primary care” by creating family health teams, followed by a commitment to provide free prescription contraception. The previous fall Notley had introduced a private member’s bill that would have established standards for healthcare delivery and increased transparency around wait times. The NDP is firmly committed to public delivery of healthcare and has criticized the UCP government for expanding the role of private service providers, its ongoing conflict with healthcare workers, its underfunding of services and its handling of the pandemic.
In its first year in government, the UCP tried to reduce healthcare costs by unilaterally breaking its contract with doctors and keeping other workers’ compensation flat. It was committed to moving toward private delivery of publicly funded surgeries, and has made some progress on that front.
But COVID-19 threw the healthcare system into crisis. Through most of the pandemic, Alberta had the most liberal approach of any province to pandemic restrictions, placing considerable pressure on the health system. The UCP blamed Alberta Health Services for these poor outcomes, with the Kenney government removing AHS CEO Verna Yiu, and the Smith government firing the Kenney-appointed AHS board of directors and replacing Chief Medical Officer of Health Deena Hinshaw. As a candidate for the UCP leadership, Smith called for an amnesty for people charged with violating COVID-19 restrictions; in office she has been embroiled in controversy over her alleged efforts to influence the prosecution of Artur Pawlowski related to his actions at the Coutts border blockade.
Before taking office, Smith mused publicly about introducing health-spending accounts and requiring Albertans to pay for primary care. Faced with an ongoing crisis in acute care, her government made changes to EMS, directing some ambulance rides to be replaced by taxis and redirecting some 911 calls to Health Link, among other reforms aimed at reducing pressure on emergency rooms.
Voters will choose between two parties with very different visions for the future of Alberta.
Both parties agree that oil and gas will remain an important part of the province’s economy for some time. With its energy war room and vocal opposition to environmental initiatives from Ottawa, the UCP has been the louder advocate. During the 2022 UCP leadership race Smith said she believes the industry can reach net zero by 2050, but she was roundly criticized by other conservative candidates and hasn’t repeated the claim since. In its 2022 throne speech, her government committed to provide “continued leadership in hydrogen and petrochemicals and development in helium, lithium, liquefied natural gas, geothermal energy and minerals.” Her stance on the federal government’s “just transition” legislation insists that any federal action should “incentivize investment and job growth in both the conventional energy sector as well as in emerging industries.”
The Smith government’s commitment to the industry extended to a pilot project offering companies money to clean up old wells—a departure from the “polluter-pay” approach the province has long taken. In March 2023 the NDP introduced a motion in the legislature endorsing the polluter-pay principle but it was defeated by UCP MLAs.
As the election neared, the NDP released policy documents indicating ongoing support for the oil sands (“bitumen beyond combustion”), further development of the petrochemical industry and cutting regulations through a “fast pass” for companies with strong records of compliance with environmental regulations. Other documents show interest in developing alternative energy, including hydrogen, geothermal and renewables.
The Kenney government sparked controversy when it repealed a 1976 coal policy that protected the eastern slopes of the Rockies from coal development. The NDP strongly opposed that move. The UCP government eventually reversed course.
Both parties recognize that inflation has created significant financial strain for many Albertans. The UCP has approached the issue with a combination of tax breaks and direct payments to Albertans. These include suspensions to the provincial fuel tax, rebates to electricity and natural gas consumers, the indexation of personal income taxes and cheques of $600 to most seniors and parents.
The UCP acted on many of the NDP’s proposals in this area, including indexing income tax brackets and social assistance payments such as the Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped (AISH), which payments the Kenney government had frozen four years previously. The NDP called on the government to take action to regulate costs, particularly for auto insurance, and the Smith government acted on this early in 2023. The NDP also criticized the UCP’s decision to remove the Notley-era cap on electricity rates for consumers.
In four years in government, the UCP did little to signal support for equity-deserving groups. It didn’t maintain a stand-alone ministry responsible for the status of women, having demoted the portfolio to a parliamentary secretary. The party also eliminated a human rights education and multiculturalism fund in 2019. The Kenney government’s proposed changes to the provincial social studies curriculum (which they eventually postponed) were criticized as Eurocentric and ignoring Indigenous perspectives.
The NDP has been consistently critical of the UCP on a range of issues relating to equity and inclusion, from the failure to consult Indigenous leaders before moving ahead with the Sovereignty Act to the refusal to consider legislation requiring collection of race-based data. The party’s policy statements are attentive to issues of inclusion; for instance, the policy statement on childcare talks about public support for services as a way to encourage women’s participation in the paid workforce.
When voters go to the polls at the end of May, they will choose between two parties with very different visions for the future of the province. One emphasizes freedom, limited government and conflict with Ottawa. The other highlights equality, public delivery of services and a reduction of hostilities with the federal government. On election day, one way or another, voters will set the direction of the province for years to come.
Lisa Young is a professor of political science at the U of C.
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