An expert believes Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s proposed immigration policies, which are going to a referendum this fall, could harm the province.
The CEO for the Institute for Canadian Citizenship, Daniel Bernhard, says Alberta would be shooting itself in the foot if it moves forward with the proposed policies.
The changes include requiring certain immigrants to pay fees to access health care and education, or making non-permanent residents ineligible for certain services until they’ve lived in the province for a year.
Bernhard insists it would only make life harder for newcomers, some of whom work in the sectors Smith says are being overwhelmed by population growth, including nurses, support workers for the elderly and early childhood teachers.
“Immigration is not a gift that we give to immigrants. It is (a) service that we do to ourselves to ensure that we have the talent to deliver the public services that we need and to fuel business growth,” said Bernhard.
“If (Smith) thinks that your grandma doesn’t deserve care, then she should just say so directly.”
Bernard expects other provinces will use the issue as an opportunity to attract immigrants away from Alberta.
“We bring them here legally, (and) they want to contribute, they want to give back to the country, to the community, but on the other hand we are kind of blaming them for a lot of issues that exist no matter with or without immigration,” said Sally Zhao, CEO of The Immigrant Education Society of Calgary, in an interview with Global News.
While Smith couldn’t provide a specific dollar amount for how much people with non-permanent legal immigration status cost the public purse each year, Mount Royal University political scientist Lori Williams said her attempts to blame immigrants for much of the province’s financial troubles don’t necessarily hold water.
She said, when migration to the province peaked in 2023-2024, Smith’s government posted a multi-billion surplus at the end of the same fiscal year.
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“We know that the real problem is the drop in the price of oil,” said Williams.
“I doubt if you added up all of the costs of all of these concerns about immigration put together, (you would see) figures to show that there’s going to be some kind of net gain or a solution to the problem of the deficit.”
Data from Statistics Canada shows immigration and migration levels to Alberta have dropped considerably since 2023-2024, when the province gained 220,000 residents. Of that total, just over 100,000 were non-permanent residents, such as international students, temporary foreign workers and family members.
The following year, Alberta saw 120,000 net new residents through immigration and migration, with just under 22,000 being non-permanent residents.
In the first quarter of the current fiscal year, the province saw just under 12,000 new residents, despite a net loss of nearly 11,000 non-permanent residents.
Williams said it’s a time-honoured strategy for Alberta politicians to lay the blame for deficits on Ottawa, but that the referendum deflects attention from things Smith does have control over.
“Challenges in health care, with affordability, with education — those problems long predated the spikes in immigration that Danielle Smith is associating with the problems,” said Williams.
NDP Leader Naheed Nenshi accused Smith of “blaming and scapegoating” immigrants.
“This exercise is simply about distraction after distraction after distraction to avoid talking about how bad the Conservatives are with money, how bad they are with the budget, how bad the are with economy,” said Nenshi.
Asked if the referendum would be binding, Smith didn’t provide a yes or no answer and said: “I’m not asking these questions with the intention of ignoring what Albertans tell us.”
…with files from Global News.
If you are NOT a Canadian citizen, why SHOULD you have access to Canada’s resources?
Immigrants are one thing. Immigrants doing nothing all day in this city is another. If anyone has any doubt. Drive to Marlborough or Sunridge mall and take a look inside. It’s a mini Minnesota. In fact, start at the east end LRT station. Someone must’ve thought, hey we already have tons of drug addicts & drunks… why not import some zombie looking people (who look like they’re not even from this planet) with their ninja wives and 10 kids and make Calgary super diverse.
And I need to protect this tush because i’m trying to attract the attentions of a handsome young (67) man across the hall from me in this care home.
Distract! Distract I say! This AHS contracting scandal is starting to bite my prodigious tush.
Your attention to this matter is appreciated
Danielle QAnon Smith
More like the idiot is shooting herself in the mouth.
Don’t you just love who we define as “experts”? Start up some fringe, far-Left political club and make yourself the “CEO” and we’ll interview you as an expert in another failed attack piece on the Alberta premier. Then we sell the story to Global for pennies, just like the stock of their parent company Corus Entertainment Inc., who will soon be in receivership.
Her deficit will bring harder times, and that means the newbies get pinched.
She’s saying no to all the unvetted people brought in by the LPC that bring no marketable skills to the table. Left voters in this country lack the ability to see the forest for the trees.