While on a CBC panel with former Alberta premier Jason Kenney, former NDP premier Rachel Notley said popularly elected Premier Danielle Smith was being disingenuous for saying there’s incredible demand for a referendum on unity in Alberta.

Notley went further in claiming that the “vast majority” of people who signed petitions asking for a referendum did so to say they don’t want to have the discussion.

Over 700,000 Albertans signed petitions demanding a referendum with Alberta’s place in Confederation on the ballot. In most countries that have citizen initiative legislation, the bar to invoke a referendum is set at 100,000 signatures or lower. Having 700,000 people sign in a province of five million people indicates incredible demand.

Notley is parroting petition organizer Thomas Lukaszuk’s repeatedly disproven claim that his petition wasn’t intended to trigger a referendum. The text on the petition presented to Albertans by Lukaszuk said, “Therefore, we as represented by the signatory and applicant below propose a referendum on the following question: Do you agree that Alberta should stay in Canada?”

The Stay Free Alberta petition that garnered over 300,000 signatures expressly called for a referendum as well. Both petitions were affirmed by Elections Alberta. The signatories presented identification and provided their signature on a physical form. It wasn’t an informal online petition or a non-controlled paper one.

People don’t go out of their way to find a petition station and take the time to commit their signature, along with their home address, because they don’t want a discussion on the issue.

Clearly, hundreds of thousands of Albertan citizens want the issue to be debated and resolved in a formal referendum on unity. Whatever side of the debate one may be on, they are being disingenuous if they try to claim that Albertans don’t want the question put to a vote.

Notley was also famously known for referring to Albertans as Canada’s “embarrassing cousin that nobody wants to talk about.” Considering that, one can understand why Notley doesn’t trust those embarrassing cousins with the ability to make a choice in a democratic exercise like a referendum.

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