Is Alberta employing tactics seen in fascist governments, where immigrants are painted as existential threats?
“Generally in Canada, we’re proud that we have not weaponized immigration to solve internal matters or to win votes,” said Anna Triandafyllidou, an internationally-renowned expert on immigration at Toronto Metropolitan University.
“And I’m concerned that is what is happening here.”
She was responding to some controversial comments this week by Bruce McAllister, executive director of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s office in Calgary.
In a social media post on Wednesday McAllister railed against Canada’s immigration policies, saying, “unsustainable mass immigration into Canada” fills him “with profound disgust.”
“‘Why import from nations with failed systems when our Judeo-Christian heritage and principles have worked so well here?’” asks McAllister in his comments, posted on X.
“I’m not sure where all this worry comes from,” said Triandafyllidou.
She noted Canada wasn’t just built by people from Western European or Anglo-Saxon descent.
“Edmonton and Calgary, as you know, these are very multicultural cities which actually cherish and value their different communities and diversity brings a lot of innovation, a lot of creativity.
“Canada is built on these premises, so I find these comments a little misplaced.”
Triandafyllidou said people should not underestimate the importance of migration for the smaller communities in Alberta.
“I think there are many small towns in Alberta that are flourishing thanks to immigration. For instance, Brooks is actually a great textbook case of how communities come together and build their lives together and build a better future and how the economic aspects go hand in hand with the cultural aspect.”
Asked during an unrelated press conference for her response to McAllister’s comments, Premier Danielle Smith said on Wednesday that immigration is one of the issues she planned to discuss during her province-wide television address on Thursday evening, in which she announced a referendum over immigration, Constitution changes.
But she also defended McAllister.
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“I can tell you that Western society is based on the so-called Judeo-Christian tradition,” said Smith.
“However, Alberta was also created since 1905 based on the immense diaspora of communities that come here, and one of the reasons why Alberta works so well, historically, is because when people arrive, they have a good-paying job, have time to determine whether this is where they want to put down roots and have a family,” added Smith.
“That is the pace that I think works not only for the newcomer to understand the new society they’re moving to, but also to ensure that we’ve got the supports so that they have access to the health care and education and other social supports they need.”
During last summer’s tour of Smith’s hand-picked Alberta Next panel, one of the proposals the government was asking for feedback on was the province taking more control over immigration.
With the province facing a budget deficit of at least $6.4 billion because of falling world oil prices, one way the Alberta Next panel also proposed to save money was “withholding social programs to any non-citizen or non-permanent resident who does not have an Alberta-approved immigration status.”
“It was the number one issue that we heard in the Alberta Next panel, is that it was putting too much pressure on our social services, on our job market, on our housing market, on food prices,” said Smith.
“We need to get back to the kind of more rational policy that we had under Stephen Harper, where we had a reasonable amount of newcomers that were able to integrate easily into the society that they chose, especially because they came with a good-paying job,” Smith added.
“I think the question of whether Alberta should have more autonomy on federal immigration is the wrong question to ask,” said Triandafylidou, “because the immigration surge in Alberta is not so huge if we look at numbers.”
According to Statistics Canada, the number of international immigrants to Alberta peaked in 2023-24 and has fallen sharply since then.
“I think the federal government started realizing that they’ve been pushing too strongly on the population growth through different types of migration, international migration,” said Christopher Worswick, an economics professor at Carleton University in Ottawa.
More recently, we’ve seen caps on the number of international students coming to Canada and we’ve seen a cutback on the number of temporary foreign workers being allowed in, added Worswick.
“I think that needed to be done because the program was growing just way too fast,” he said.
However, he believes there is still room for improvement.
“Maybe the best way to go is to focus on skilled trades, for example, if those are the individuals who are going to have the highest earnings when they get to Alberta or Canada more generally,” he said.
“Focusing on the earnings outcomes when selecting immigrants is going to lead to, in general, a stronger, more successful group of economic immigrants.”
However, Worswick takes exception to McAllister’s comments placing a higher value on immigrants with Judeo-Christian values.
“I think it’s terrible to see. I always try to focus on the economics. That’s my discipline. It goes against Canadian values of treating everyone fairly and equally and not prioritizing one culture over another,” Worswick added.
“You know, I think there’s reasons why Alberta might want to have more say on their immigration program that are based in economics and not based on culture or other considerations.”
More on the premier’s province-wide address can be read here.
— With files by Karen Bartko, Global News
Immigrants will vote Liberal, so would I if you have me free housing food and medical care.
Lol, unlike when the past liberal government totally didn’t weaponize immigration when they brought in millions. At least Carney is getting it somewhat under control, I don’t think it’s far enough but it’s a start
Any well-hung bum pirate communists in the greater Calgary area? My crack is loose and waiting.
We have to get these AI-generated stories out before our parent company, Corus Entertainment Inc goes bankrupt.
That’s exactly what that SOB did today.