Maybe they can keep the sentiment alive.

Well, I mean, there has been a certain amount of support for separatism or an expression of Western alienation, and it's been pretty stable over years.

We do have a different element in terms of the organization within the United Conservative Party.

They're exercising outsized influence, and they have had a premier that has enabled a little bit more of that influence on a number of policies, including this referendum.

They're not going away, but the question now becomes how much influence they will have in the future on the party.

The party's now associated with this referendum, a very unpopular referendum, and also associated with separatism.

And they're going to have to reckon with that within the party.

Does this then put any kind of pressure on any other premier, or can they just say, yeah, we're not interested?

Maybe you could help us understand some of those tensions and maybe even open up some of the information that people are getting for a bit of a fact check.

Yeah, so, I mean, Julie's quite right.

Public opinion seems to have shifted, not just in Canada, but the United States and Europe around immigration.

And quite often people will sort of see something or hear something and think that whether it be housing or employment or whatever has become harder because of the levels of immigration.

And there's no question, under Justin Trudeau, we saw a surge in immigration and it did create Some issues in some areas.

Danielle Smith, you know, in 2024, wrote a letter to Justin Trudeau to increase the provincial nominee program, immigrants under that program, to 20,000.

In 23, she said that she wanted to grow Alberta's population to 10 million.

That said, what does he mean when he says that it's a dangerous game or when he warns against using a yes vote if you don't really mean it, if it's just a way of signaling political discontent?

How does Alberta's separatism end? If the vote doesn't send us down the path to a binding referendum, can it end? Here's Williams talking about that.

I mean, I know some people are saying, looking forward, and I think that's part of your question, some people are saying if there's a decisive win for the stay in Canada side, that that will give the UCP the capacity to tamp down some of the influence of separatism within their party and begin the task of making things better down the road.

Certainly that's the hope, but there are a lot of factors that we've talked about that are gonna make that more difficult.

So what do we know about the rules? What's onside? What's offside?

Well, for starters, we know that the rules for third-party advertisers place a limit, a total of $607,000 for each registered third-party advertiser, a TPA.

But political parties don't have those limits.

And the government of Alberta can spend all that it wants without any limitations.

So that's the first source of questions around that.

around fairness, what counts as an expenditure in this referendum campaign has to be something that deals with one or more of the questions that are on the ballot.

So something, and there's certain words that have to be in there.

But what's your sense? I mean, are we at the stage where, you know, I mean, the flag flap, we're just at a stage where we can no longer just look at a flag and have it be something that we're proud of, that there is going to be a political charge with these flags going forward?

I thought this meant there would be a pipeline, but I'm not sure where that pipeline would be if one is imposed on British Columbia, if they're going to continue to say there will no longer be, they'll continue with the tanker ban.

So we're hearing leaks from the Alberta government that they've actually chosen or are proposing a southern route that goes along similar lines to the Trans Mountain, the TMX pipeline.

And that has been sort of discussed by even business leaders as the least effective problematic route for expansion of pipelines through British Columbia.

And this, of course, we've been hearing all along that BC knows that it cannot stop pipelines from going through its province.

but that it wants to be involved in the negotiations.

And this sort of brings that all to fruition.

It says this is what we're going to get, by my count, about $14 billion being invested in British Columbia over the next 10 years.

But certainly this is a much different, I know to a lot of conservatives it's the same, but this isn't the same liberal government doing this kind of stuff.

And is she going to be able to galvanize those outside the party to stay within Canada?

There's an entire Alberta audience that has to be borne in mind.

And even though a larger proportion of Albertans within the United Conservative Party support separation than outside of it, the overall percentage is still there.

only somewhere in the, let's say the 15 to 20, 25, 30% range support separatism.

More recent polls are showing that support for separatism within the UCP is actually just under 50%, still a significant proportion.

And Daniel Smith is claiming that her caucus and cabinet do support saying in Canada that While at the very same time, there are at least two members of her party who either won't say what their position is on this, or one, in fact, has actually written a letter to a journal in Alberta saying that people should sign the petition in support of separation.

So I think there are a lot of questions about how much of her party actually supports staying within Canada.

What kind of tightrope does he have to walk?