CALGARY —If an Alberta Pension Plan (APP) had been on the October 19 referendum ballot, there is no doubt in Premier Danielle Smith’s mind that it would have been defeated.On Friday, the premier told Western Standard publisher Derek Fildebrandt that a proposal regarding a new provincial plan still lacks majority support from Albertans."If we put the Alberta Pension Plan on this last ballot, it would have failed. There's no question in my mind," Smith said."At the moment, I don't think that there's a majority support for that. That's why we didn't put it forward."The admission comes after all four of the premier’s constitutional reform questions on the ballot failed to win majority support, despite the five questions regarding immigration all receiving over 50% support.Smith had previously promoted the idea of withdrawing Alberta from the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) and establishing a provincial alternative, arguing Albertans could benefit from lower rates and improved benefits.The premier’s Alberta Next Panel travelled across the province throughout 2025, putting seven questions to Albertans in the hopes of gauging public opinion on multiple topics, including the APP, with mixed reactions..WATCH: Danielle Smith on the fallout from Alberta’s referendum.Many concerned Albertans had raised unanswered questions, such as how much money Alberta would be able to withdraw from the national pension plan after years of paying into it.The Alberta Prosperity Project was also identified by Smith as one group that had begun to promote a provincial pension plan."I think Alberta Prosperity Project started there, but I don't think that they were collecting signatures to put that on the ballot," she said."It's a shame. It would've been nice if we'd had that public discussion."Smith also told Fildebrandt her government would still need more information from Ottawa before it could make a case for a provincial pension plan going forward."I still think that there's a potential if we could ever get the number from the federal government and people understood what it would mean for their contributions as well as their benefits and what it would mean for the investment,” Smith stated.“There's a potential that would win some hearts and minds. So there's some more work that needs to be done on that.”The premier also suggested that she didn't want to put forward questions she believed would fail, because “once something failed, it becomes very difficult to ever bring it back again.”
