Alberta election 2023

[Upper Canada Tory]

The NDP candidate (soon to be nominated) in Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo is Tanika Chiasson, a Suncor laboratory technician and former UNIFOR national representative and union organizer. It's kind of interesting that many workers in the oil patch are union members but that doesn't help the NDP even come close to winning there.

The extent to which unionized workers support the NDP has always been somewhat overstated. An EKOS poll in 2015 found that 23% of unionized Canadians intended to vote NDP in the next federal election, compared 19% of Canadians who intended to vote NDP in general. The percentage of Liberal support was 33% amongst unionized Canadians and 32% amongst Canadians in general and the percentage of Conservative support was 26% amongst unionized Canadians and 34% of Canadians in general. It seems like union members are not a monolith and have views as diverse as any bloc of voters.
https://www.ipolitics.ca/news/polls-theres-a-lot-of-tory-blue-on-union-workers-collars-siekierski

What this likely means is that the NDP needs to expand its base to more than just narrow interest groups such as unions and the insular & estoric hard-left, but it doesn't seem to be willing to do that for ideological reasons.

[Upper Canada Tory]

What this likely means is that the NDP needs to expand its base to more than just narrow interest groups such as unions and the insular & estoric hard-left, but it doesn't seem to be willing to do that for ideological reasons.

Is that really true of the Alberta NDP though? Rachel Notley seems to be about as successful as a "prairie populist" as one can be these days.

Nah, I think the Alberta NDP has been relatively successful at expanding their base (if not they wouldn't have governed with a majority government in Alberta for 4 years lol).

In fact, I would argue ON NDP and others need to learn from Alberta NDP on how to win over voters not traditionally part of their base.

[Upper Canada Tory]

The NDP candidate (soon to be nominated) in Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo is Tanika Chiasson, a Suncor laboratory technician and former UNIFOR national representative and union organizer. It's kind of interesting that many workers in the oil patch are union members but that doesn't help the NDP even come close to winning there.

The extent to which unionized workers support the NDP has always been somewhat overstated. An EKOS poll in 2015 found that 23% of unionized Canadians intended to vote NDP in the next federal election, compared 19% of Canadians who intended to vote NDP in general. The percentage of Liberal support was 33% amongst unionized Canadians and 32% amongst Canadians in general and the percentage of Conservative support was 26% amongst unionized Canadians and 34% of Canadians in general. It seems like union members are not a monolith and have views as diverse as any bloc of voters.
https://www.ipolitics.ca/news/polls-theres-a-lot-of-tory-blue-on-union-workers-collars-siekierski

What this likely means is that the NDP needs to expand its base to more than just narrow interest groups such as unions and the insular & estoric hard-left, but it doesn't seem to be willing to do that for ideological reasons.

I don't dispute any of that, but union workers tend to be more supportive of the NDP at the provincial than federal level I think due to labour laws mostly being provincial in Canada. Only federally regulated industries are subject to federal labour laws.

You can look at how the provincial NDP has historically done about 5% or so better than their federal counterparts (25% of the vote or so compared to 20%) even though that province is a similar 3 party system.

Edit to add: on reflection I don't fully agree with that description of the NDP coalition. The NDP is a coalition of union members, (left wing) social activists and academics. Is that any less broad a coalition than the federal Conservative Party which is a coalition of small business owners (though Canadian small business owners aren't as right wing as those in the U.S), self interested conspiratorial types (global warming deniers...), and other aggrieved individuals.

IMO, Conservatives have a much larger base in the country. The Prairies, or at least Alberta and Saskatchewan, are consistently CPC voting - you have very few parts of Canada with a similar population that are consistently NDP voting (at the federal level). The Prairies can be assumed to vote for the Tories because of the resource sector.

Conservative voters in Ontario likely vote that way for the reasons you mentioned - small business owners, some people who are self-interested for whatever reasons. Other people that vote CPC in Ontario are suburbanites concerned about budgets and crime and in rural areas in ON and all over the country, gun owners are also a somewhat significant part of the CPC base. The socially conservative vote is a factor as well. In the Atlantic provinces, many Conservative voters vote that way for reasons similar to those in the Prairies (resource sector).

Anyway, the NDP doesn't have as much of a loyal base. The most loyal people that the NDP has are places with high rates of unionization, but that includes Hamilton, Windsor and a few other cities with roughly 500,000 people or fewer. Larger cities like Toronto, Vancouver tend to switch between NDP and Liberal, NDP used to be popular in Quebec roughly a decade ago but not as much anymore.

The NDP needs to increase its base from simply people in communities with high rates of unionization (Hamilton, Windsor, etc al) and swing Lib-NDP voters in Toronto. They need a region of the country they can call their consistent base. As I mentioned, the Alberta NDP is a great example of how this can be done, but the NDP in other provinces are unlikely to reproduce this strategy because they are always expected to be on the left wing of the political spectrum regardless of circumstances or other considerations.

[Upper Canada Tory]

My results for the Alberta vote compass thing:
UCP: 67%
LIB: 56%
NDP: 54%
WIP: 49%
AP:  49%
GRN: 37%

[Upper Canada Tory]

I decided to do a riding-by-riding prediction... or a not all that informed guess, really. Don't blame me if it doesn't add up. Anyway, instead of guessing the popular vote and estimating the seats based on that, I tried to put every seat into one of six groups: seats that I think will be won by UCP with 50-ish, 60-ish and 70-ish percent, and ditto for NDP. I did it based on these assumptions:

– A 5-ish point gain for NDP in rural Alberta, mostly from AP while UCP stays put or gains a little from small far-right parties
– A 5-10 point gain for NDP in and around Edmonton, mostly from AP and a little from UCP
– A 10-15 point gain for NDP in Calgary, mostly from AP but also 5-ish points from UCP

Of course, the problem with Calgary is that there are wildly different opinions on who the swing voters end up flocking to. This left me with some half dozen tossups, which I decided to allocated in a way that would give the most infuriating/entertaining result: a one-seat UCP majority. Then I added up the votes, subtracted a few percent that will probably go for third parties and ended up with this:

UCP 51% [▼4] 44 seats [▼19]
NDP 46% [▲12] 43 seats [▲19]
Others 3% [▼8]

The six categories are the ones mentioned above. If NDP does better, the next seats to fall will probably be Calgary-Foothills, Calgary-North West, Calgary-Peigan, Strathcona-Sherwood Park and Fort Saskatchewan-Vegreville. I don't think the two Red Deer seats or the five southern Calgary seats will go NDP unless they win in a landslide.

Pale orange is NDP gains, pale blue are the five seats mentioned above.

Just saying, I think people vastly underestimate how well the UCP will do in Calgary, especially northeastern Calgary. Most of that area was pretty blue in 2019 and the UCP's polling numbers are not so much worse this time that they would be expected to lose that many ridings. Plus as others have pointed out prior in this thread, there is the potential for a 'shy Smith voter' phenomenon.

[Upper Canada Tory]

My hot take for the day is that UCP and NDP both suck and Alberta Party is based. Change my mind.

[Upper Canada Tory]

My hot take for the day is that UCP and NDP both suck and Alberta Party is based. Change my mind.

0.7% of the electorate can't be wrong!

Virgin UCP:
-Doesn't support climate action
-Supports coal mining
-Has a leader found guilty of having violated the conflict of interest act

Virgin NDP:
-Raised taxes during a recession
-Ran large deficits
-Pandered to Calgary with $1B worth of promises and still lost

Chad Alberta Party:
-Doesn't support raising taxes during a recession
-Supports both oil/gas and lithium mining
-Is against coal mining
-Supports provincial climate action
-Supports fiscal responsibility and balancing the budget

[Upper Canada Tory]

Rachel Notley shouldn't try to stay on like Dave Barrett did after losing an election as opposition leader. I don't think she can further increase NDP support in the regions where they fell just short of the needed breakthroughs. More likely Danielle Smith is pushed out as Premier than Notley wins the next election.

I'm of the "if she can't, who can?" POV.  Basically, given the nature of Alberta, *all* potential leaders are skunked in that light, however "right of the party" they might stand.

Notley's sort of "half Barrett, half Doer" in that light.

Exactly. Until there is a known successor who can be as popular as Notley, the NDP would be foolish to turf her.

IMO, once the UCP gets a more moderate leader, ANDP is sort of screwed. The UCP won this time even though Smith was a certified lunatic. How much better would the UCP do if, say, Travis Toews were the leader?

[Upper Canada Tory]

My hot take for the day is that UCP and NDP both suck and Alberta Party is based. Change my mind.

0.7% of the electorate can't be wrong!

Virgin UCP:
-Doesn't support climate action
-Supports coal mining
-Has a leader found of having violated the conflict of interest act

Virgin NDP:
-Raised taxes during a recession
-Ran large deficits
-Pandered to Calgary with $1B worth of promises and still lost

Chad Alberta Party:
-Doesn't support raising taxes during a recession
-Supports both oil/gas and lithium mining
-Is against coal mining
-Supports provincial climate action
-Supports fiscal responsibility and balancing the budget

It's easy to be all things for all people when you don't have a cat's chance in hell of winning. I don't think the Alberta Party, or any party, could represent a significant number of Albertans without alienating as many or more, because of how polarized the province is.

I'm being half facetious, but yeah, this is true.

[Upper Canada Tory]

Rachel Notley shouldn't try to stay on like Dave Barrett did after losing an election as opposition leader. I don't think she can further increase NDP support in the regions where they fell just short of the needed breakthroughs. More likely Danielle Smith is pushed out as Premier than Notley wins the next election.

I'm of the "if she can't, who can?" POV.  Basically, given the nature of Alberta, *all* potential leaders are skunked in that light, however "right of the party" they might stand.

Notley's sort of "half Barrett, half Doer" in that light.

Exactly. Until there is a known successor who can be as popular as Notley, the NDP would be foolish to turf her.

IMO, once the UCP gets a more moderate leader, ANDP is sort of screwed. The UCP won this time even though Smith was a certified lunatic. How much better would the UCP do if, say, Travis Toews were the leader?

Haha, do you think that gang of nutbars is going to pick a moderate leader? I'm not too worried about it right now.

Believe it or not, times change. The final ballot of the leadership election was 54 vs 46 Smith vs Toews. I wouldn't be surprised if in a future leadership election Toews or someone like him may flip enough voters to win.

[Upper Canada Tory]

Rachel Notley shouldn't try to stay on like Dave Barrett did after losing an election as opposition leader. I don't think she can further increase NDP support in the regions where they fell just short of the needed breakthroughs. More likely Danielle Smith is pushed out as Premier than Notley wins the next election.

I'm of the "if she can't, who can?" POV.  Basically, given the nature of Alberta, *all* potential leaders are skunked in that light, however "right of the party" they might stand.

Notley's sort of "half Barrett, half Doer" in that light.

Exactly. Until there is a known successor who can be as popular as Notley, the NDP would be foolish to turf her.

IMO, once the UCP gets a more moderate leader, ANDP is sort of screwed. The UCP won this time even though Smith was a certified lunatic. How much better would the UCP do if, say, Travis Toews were the leader?

Well it's hard to say because the certified lunatic objectively saw an improvement in UCP fortunes compared to her predecessor. Jason Kenney was more of a moderate on the surface, but he was extremely politically toxic, more so than Smith was this campaign. The NDP's strongest attacks on the UCP were related to things that happened under Kenney, and with Smith there was just enough plausible deniability that those didn't quite land as they would have against Kenney.

I do agree with you that Travis Toews would have been a better leader. He would have more Kenney-era baggage, and TBA-style movements might have gravitated more to the right-wing fringe parties with him as leader - but conversely, the NDP might not have been able to eat up the Alberta Party, Liberals and Greens quite as much, with Toews being a less "scary" candidate to those on the left. Overall, UCP would probably have done slightly better in Calgary and had a more efficient vote.

But I don't think this election would have been a UCP blowout without Smith. The Alberta NDP is one of the most well-organized and well-funded centre-left parties in Canada. Alberta really hasn't even trended that hard to the left, but it is trending that way and the ANDP has monopolized that trend, helped by the collapse of the Alberta Libs. So I wouldn't underestimate the ANDP and assume that they were only competitive because of Smith. As long as the ANDP sticks to an Alberta acceptable position (don't go too far to the left, and support oil and gas), they will remain competitive

The problem with Alberta NDP is that they haven't changed with the times. They essentially campaigned on the same policies with which they governed while they were in office. Raising the corporate tax during a recession (Alberta is not in a recession right now but an upcoming recession is widely expected globally), not challenging the federal government's environmental policy excesses to any significant degree, large amounts of government spending which as we saw, is not a good strategy in Alberta because it did not sway Calgary.

I'd say in 2015, Alberta NDP was victorious for three reasons:
1. Widespread dissatisfaction of 40-year PC rule
2. The fact that the carbon tax wasn't a part of the political discussion in Canada back in 2015, so they didn't campaign on it
3. Vote splitting on the right (PC+Wildrose)

These factors are pretty much no longer there. I think the fact that Notley campaigned on the carbon tax in 2019 (and was assumed to be on board with it in 2023) opens up the attack line that she's a 'proxy of Trudeau' to which she really has no good counterargument. In 2015, she didn't have to address this issue.

People don't really associate the Notley era with very positive connotations, because the Albertan economy wasn't doing very well at the time, which wasn't entirely her fault but her policies didn't make it much better, so campaigning on the things you campaigned and governed on back then + things that are evidently unpopular in Alberta (eg, the carbon tax) is not really going to win you many votes. I would say that in this election, the fact that Smith was a bit of a lunatic really did help Notley gain more votes than she otherwise would have. If Notley had avoided the rhetoric about raising taxes and at least appeared to challenge the perceived federal government's hostility to the energy sector, she would have done a lot better.

[Upper Canada Tory]

One thing that strikes me about the results is that the NDP vote is actually very efficient. getting 38 seats while losing the popular vote by almost 9% is a good showing and points to a lot of wasted UCP votes in rural ridings where they run up these North Korean like margins. If this sort of pattern holds four years from now I think its safe to say that the NDP could win easily win more seats than the UCP if they came within 4 or 5 percent in the popular vote (i.e., if the popular vote had been 50-46 rather than 52.5-44 - the NDP likely would have won 44-45 seats). And over the coming years the demographic shifts in Alberta will continue. Old people will die off, younger people will enter the electorate. Calgary and Edmonton will get bigger and rural Alberta will stagnate.

Its impossible to predict what the next four years will bring but it has already been pointed out that oil has dropped below $70/barrel and that already through Danielle Smith's budget assumptions out the window. The war in Ukraine will eventually end and that could quickly kick the price of oil back below $50/barrel and then Alberta is back in a 2015 style revenue collapse...  

For what it's worth, there have been times when commodity prices were low but Alberta's economy still came out strong. For example, commodity prices were low in the 1990s but Alberta had the highest economic growth in Canada and even achieved a balanced budget. I think it depends on how the current UCP government would handle a future economic downturn that will make the difference.

[Upper Canada Tory]

Rachel Notley shouldn't try to stay on like Dave Barrett did after losing an election as opposition leader. I don't think she can further increase NDP support in the regions where they fell just short of the needed breakthroughs. More likely Danielle Smith is pushed out as Premier than Notley wins the next election.

I'm of the "if she can't, who can?" POV.  Basically, given the nature of Alberta, *all* potential leaders are skunked in that light, however "right of the party" they might stand.

Notley's sort of "half Barrett, half Doer" in that light.

Exactly. Until there is a known successor who can be as popular as Notley, the NDP would be foolish to turf her.

IMO, once the UCP gets a more moderate leader, ANDP is sort of screwed. The UCP won this time even though Smith was a certified lunatic. How much better would the UCP do if, say, Travis Toews were the leader?

Well it's hard to say because the certified lunatic objectively saw an improvement in UCP fortunes compared to her predecessor. Jason Kenney was more of a moderate on the surface, but he was extremely politically toxic, more so than Smith was this campaign. The NDP's strongest attacks on the UCP were related to things that happened under Kenney, and with Smith there was just enough plausible deniability that those didn't quite land as they would have against Kenney.

I do agree with you that Travis Toews would have been a better leader. He would have more Kenney-era baggage, and TBA-style movements might have gravitated more to the right-wing fringe parties with him as leader - but conversely, the NDP might not have been able to eat up the Alberta Party, Liberals and Greens quite as much, with Toews being a less "scary" candidate to those on the left. Overall, UCP would probably have done slightly better in Calgary and had a more efficient vote.

But I don't think this election would have been a UCP blowout without Smith. The Alberta NDP is one of the most well-organized and well-funded centre-left parties in Canada. Alberta really hasn't even trended that hard to the left, but it is trending that way and the ANDP has monopolized that trend, helped by the collapse of the Alberta Libs. So I wouldn't underestimate the ANDP and assume that they were only competitive because of Smith. As long as the ANDP sticks to an Alberta acceptable position (don't go too far to the left, and support oil and gas), they will remain competitive

The problem with Alberta NDP is that they haven't changed with the times. They essentially campaigned on the same policies with which they governed while they were in office. Raising the corporate tax during a recession (Alberta is not in a recession right now but an upcoming recession is widely expected globally), not challenging the federal government's environmental policy excesses to any significant degree, large amounts of government spending which as we saw, is not a good strategy in Alberta because it did not sway Calgary.

I'd say in 2015, Alberta NDP was victorious for three reasons:
1. Widespread dissatisfaction of 40-year PC rule
2. The fact that the carbon tax wasn't a part of the political discussion in Canada back in 2015, so they didn't campaign on it
3. Vote splitting on the right (PC+Wildrose)

These factors are pretty much no longer there. I think the fact that Notley campaigned on the carbon tax in 2019 (and was assumed to be on board with it in 2023) opens up the attack line that she's a 'proxy of Trudeau' to which she really has no good counterargument. In 2015, she didn't have to address this issue.

People don't really associate the Notley era with very positive connotations, because the Albertan economy wasn't doing very well at the time, which wasn't entirely her fault but her policies didn't make it much better, so campaigning on the things you campaigned and governed on back then + things that are evidently unpopular in Alberta (eg, the carbon tax) is not really going to win you many votes. I would say that in this election, the fact that Smith was a bit of a lunatic really did help Notley gain more votes than she otherwise would have. If Notley had avoided the rhetoric about raising taxes and at least appeared to challenge the perceived federal government's hostility to the energy sector, she would have done a lot better.

One of the unique things about this election was that Notley has a record that Albertans are well aware of, and by and large, not fond of. I don't think she was going to change many minds about herself or her party. In fact, both parties seemed to recognize this, and this election was more about turnout than persuasion, with both leaders basically taking a "don't compare me to the almighty, compare me to the alternative" approach. The UCP landed some good attacks on the NDP, as you mentioned, and maybe the impact of those could have been mitigated.

The NDP, however, I think focused on the wrong things in attacking the UCP. They focused a lot on some of the really stupid things Smith said as a talk show host, as well as some very fringe positions like on healthcare. And maybe that could have worked if Smith had taken a GOP-like approach of doubling down and giving credibility to Democrat attacks, but instead Smith significantly moderated her image, even showing contrition at times. She was sometimes compared to Kari Lake, as two right-wing women with a history in media and a pattern of saying some very fringe things. But while Lake played up that image even more, Smith played it down a lot and came off much more premier-like than she did in her shock-jock talk radio days.

As far as attacks go, I think focusing more on the UCP's shaky handling of provincial government services would have been better, because that points to a tangible thing that Albertans personally dealt with. Most of it was under Kenney, true, but most of Kenney's top ministers were also in Smith's cabinet.

But that's the thing. The most successful politicians are adaptable. Doug Ford, who won two straight majorities, campaigned on Wynne fatigue and reining in government spending in 2018 (and won), did a shift during COVID as being the responsible Premier willing to help during tough times around 2020 and won an election in 2022 by campaigning on investing in infrastructure, social services and appealing to labour unions. No one remembers 2018 Doug Ford anymore. Notley could have done the same thing and had it been convincing, she could have won.

[Upper Canada Tory]

For what it's worth, there have been times when commodity prices were low but Alberta's economy still came out strong. For example, commodity prices were low in the 1990s but Alberta had the highest economic growth in Canada and even achieved a balanced budget. I think it depends on how the current UCP government would handle a future economic downturn that will make the difference.

That's not quite true. Alberta was seriously slammed by the recession and low commodity prices of the early 90s (and also when the same happened in the early 80s). Don Getty was PC premier in the late 80s and early 90s and was ridiculously unpopular and was driven out of office. It looked like the PCs were facing certain defeat in 1993 to the Alberta Liberals and in the 1993 election campaign it was a contest between the PCs and the Liberals over who could promise the most drastic, draconian cuts to social programs and spending etc... The PCs under Ralph Klein won by seeming slightly less rightwing than the Alberta Liberals who at the time were very "blue grit" under Lawrence Decore. Then the rollercoaster ride happened and oil prices soared and the provincial coffers filled up again.

The UCP handled the latest downturn very badly. Kenney's first couple of budgets had the highest deficits in Alberta history and he picked fights with everyone under the sun. At one point at the start of the pandemic during the lockdown oil from Alberta was worth less than zero. The only thing that saved the day for the UCP (though too late for Kenney) was a spike in world demand for oil post-pandemic coupled with the Ukraine war sending oil and gas prices through the roof. Right now Danielle Smith is presiding over a "sugar high" and is spending like a drunken sailor. But as usual, the party will end, commodity prices will crash and then Smith will be put to the test. Its the easiest thing in the world to government when revenue is flooding in and you can buy people off.  

The Alberta economy is very simple. When the world price of oil goes up the economy gets a sugar high and whoever is in power claims credit. The when the world price of oil declines, there is an economic collapse and everyone blames whoever is in power.    

During the 1980s oil glut under Don Getty, yeah, Alberta had a downturn. But during the 1990s recession when there were low commodity prices (which was separate from the 1980s one) Alberta came out relatively unscathed.