Tag: Alberta Electoral Map

Five questions about the MLA committee drawing Alberta’s new electoral boundaries

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date April 19, 2026

1. Why is the government doing this?

The only reason for the UCP government to introduce this is that UCP MLAs didn’t like what the majority of the commissioners, including the government-appointed chairperson, recommended in the final report.

Premier Danielle Smith’s UCP caucus is dominated by rural MLAs and sweeping the ridings outside of Calgary and Edmonton is key to the UCP winning re-election in 2027. It’s very likely that UCP MLAs did not like the prospect of having to challenge each other for their party’s nominations in newly redrawn rural ridings ahead of the next election — a situation that would cause tension in any caucus. The addition of competitive urban seats in cities where the population has grown the fastest also risks slimming the UCP’s majority.

I’m willing to bet that’s the main reason why the UCP government has intervened to send the map back to the drawing board.

Back to the drawing board! UCP scrapping Alberta boundaries commission and appointing MLA committee to draw new electoral map

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date April 18, 2026

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith (source: Danielle Smith / Facebook)

Every day is a new round of chaos in Alberta politics

The United Conservative Party government surprised the opposition, political watchers, and probably a few of their own MLAs with plans to introduce a motion in the Legislature to scrap the final report of the bipartisan Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission and replace it with an MLA committee and advisory panel tasked with redrawing riding boundaries ahead of the next provincial election.

The motion placed on the Order Paper by UCP Government House Leader Joseph Schow would create a Special Select Committee on Electoral Boundaries, composed of Leduc-Beaumont UCP MLA Brandon Lunty as chairperson and 3 UCP MLAs and 2 NDP MLAs. The MLA committee would oversee a new advisory panel that would include a government-appointed chairperson, two UCP-appointees and two NDP-appointees.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Alberta’s new electoral map will be a fight

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date April 3, 2026

Divided boundaries commission gives us a level-headed majority report and drastically different minority report

The final report of the bi-partisan Electoral Boundaries Commission usually settles where the lines are drawn on Alberta’s electoral map, but like most decisions in Alberta politics these days — an injection of polarization and partisanship threatens to tear apart a system that has worked pretty well for the past thirty years.

Alberta is getting a new electoral map for the next provincial election that increases the total number of ridings from 87 to 89 but what that map looks like will depend on what MLAs decide to do when the United Conservative Party government introduces the next version of the Electoral Divisions Act into the Legislature.

With duelling maps included in the final report, it’s unclear what the government’s bill will include and how active MLAs will be in redrawing the map themselves.

A fairly level-headed majority report was supported by government-appointed chair Dallas K. Miller (a retired Judge of the Court of Queen’s Bench of Alberta) and NDP-appointed commissioners Greg Clark (former Alberta Party MLA for Calgary-Elbow and former UCP-appointed chair of the Alberta Balancing Pool) and Susan Samson (former mayor of the Town of Sylvan Lake).

A drastically different and much more controversial minority report was supported by UCP-appointed commissioners John Evans (a Lethbridge-based lawyer) and Julian Martin (a Professor Emeritus from the University of Alberta and former federal Conservative government senior staffer).

Read all about it on the Daveberta Substack

Tags Airdrie-East, Airdrie-West, Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission, Alberta Electoral Map, Alberta NDP, Alberta Politics Substack, Banff-Kananaskis, Barrhead-Westlock-Athabasca, Calgary-East, Calgary-Elbow, Calgary-Falconridge-Conrich, Calgary-Glenmore-Tsuut’ina, Calgary-West-Elbow Valley, Canada Election Substack, Canmore-Banff, Cardston-Taber, Carston-Siksika, Central Peace-Notley, Cochrane-Springbank, Dallas Miller, Danielle Smith, Daveberta Substack, Edmonton-Beaumont, Edmonton-Enoch, Edmonton-Glenora-Riverview, Edmonton-Riverview, Edmonton-Strathcona, Electoral Boundaries Commission Act, Gerrymandering in Alberta Politics, Greg Clark, High River-Vulcan-Siksika, John Evans, Julian Martin, Kyle Hutton, Lac Ste. Anne-Parkland, Lacombe-Clearwater, Lacombe-Ponoka, Lesser Slave Lake, Lethbridge-East, Lethbridge-West, Mountain View-Kneehill, Nathan Neudorf, Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills, Red Deer-North, Red Deer-South, Scott Sinclair, Spruce Grove, St. Albert-Sturgeon, Susan Samson, United Conservative Party, West Yellowhead, Wetaskiwin-Ponoka-Maskwacis

Alberta Politics

Will Danielle Smith call an early election in Alberta?

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date January 22, 2026

Minister of Hospital and Surgical Health Services Matt Jones and Premier Danielle Smith at a government press conference in December 2025 (source: Alberta Newsroom / Flickr)

After months of speculation, Premier Danielle Smith said during her 2025 year-end interviews that she isn’t planning to call an early election in 2026, but anyone who pays attention to politics knows: circumstances change.

The next provincial general election is scheduled to happen in October 2027 but there continues to be wide speculation that an early election could be called — and there are plenty of reasons to believe why.

Smith’s UCP remains ahead of Naheed Nenshi’s Alberta NDP in the polls and the governing party continues to raise large amounts of donations. And there is little doubt that Smith remains one of the most effective and shrewd political communicators in Alberta and in Canada’s conservative movement.

Read all about it on the Daveberta Substack

Tags Abi Johnson, Abigail Johnson, Alberta Election 2026, Alberta Election 2027, Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission, Alberta Electoral Map, Alberta Health Services, Alberta NDP, Alberta Politics Substack, Alberta Prosperity Project, Alberta Separation Referendum, Alberta Separatism, Athana Mentzelopoulos, Avi Lewis, Battle River-Crowfoot, Ben Shapiro, Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul, Calgary-Bow, Calgary-Bow MLA Recall Campaign, Calgary-Shaw, Calgary-Shaw by-election, Canada as the 51st State, Canada Election Substack, Coal Mining, Coal Mining Referendum, Corb Lund, Danielle Smith, Daveberta Substack, Dawn Farrell, Demetrios Nicolaides, Dodgy Contracts Scandal, Donald Trump, Doug Wylie, Edmonton Riverbend by-election, Edmonton-Riverbend, Edmonton-Strathcona, Federal NDP leadership race 2026, Forever Canadian, Grant Hunter, Greenland, Heather McPherson, Major Projects Office, Mark Carney, Matt Jeneroux, Matt Jones, Mickey Amery, Minister of Hospital and Surgical Health Services, Mitch Sylvestre, MLA Recall in Alberta, Naheed Nenshi, Nathan Cooper, Nicholas Maduro, Pierre Poilievre, Rebecca Schulz, Recall Act, Rob Ashton, Taber-Warner, Tanille Johnston, Thomas Lukaszuk, Tony McQuail, United Conservative Party

Alberta Politics

Alberta is getting a new map for the next provincial election

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date December 11, 2025

Alberta is getting a new electoral map and the commissioners tasked with the job of redrawing the province’s political boundaries released their interim report in October.

The Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission is now collecting input about the interim map before the commissioners go back to the drawing board to sketch out their final report, which will be submitted to Speaker Ric McIver by March 28, 2026.

The new map would be used for the next provincial election if it is approved by the Legislature and if a provincial election isn’t called next spring, as some political watchers suspect could happen.

Alberta Politics

Former Speaker David Carter warns of too many Alberta MLAs

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date August 15, 2025

Former Calgary PC MLA David Carter, who served as Speaker of the Legislative Assembly from 1986 to 1993, wrote to the commission expressing his concern about increasing the total number of MLAs from 87 to 89:

“This will result in crowding. Including potential hinderance in the event of fire or evacuation from the Chamber. In my opinion, these additional seats are an ill-advised intrusion by the government and should be regarded architecturally as the absolute limit to the number of seats within the Chamber. I recommend this limitation be noted in the report.”

UCP MLA Glenn van Dijken on the “Unique Burden of Rural Representation”

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date August 14, 2025

Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock UCP MLA Glenn van Dijken asked the commission to consider what he described as the “Unique Burden of Rural Representation” when redrawing Alberta’s electoral map.

The three-term MLA urged the commission to lower the population averages in rural ridings so that rural MLAs will not have an increasingly large geographic region and more municipalities to represent in the Legislature, even if that means increasing the population averages in urban ridings.

Former Calgary mayor Al Duerr asks commission to respect city’s municipal boundaries

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date August 14, 2025

Former Calgary mayor Al Duerr argued in his written submission to the commission that lumping rural and commuter communities into Calgary ridings would be impractical, unfair and a detriment to effective representation.

The former four-term Calgary mayor, who served from 1989 to 2001, wrote that Calgary residents share different interests than people in neighbouring communities and they access different services and go to schools in wholly different school systems…

Former Medicine Hat MLAs Rob Renner and Bob Wanner want big changes to provincial ridings

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date August 13, 2025

East of Lethbridge, two former Medicine Hat MLAs are asking the commission to redraw the Medicine Hat ridings after the city was divided into two large rural-urban ridings when the riding boundaries were last redistributed in 2017.

Different submissions from Rob Renner, who was the Progressive Conservative MLA for Medicine Hat from 1993 to 2004, and Bob Wanner, who represented Medicine Hat as an NDP MLA from 2015 to 2019, argued that pairing the Medicine Hat with the City of Brooks in the current Brooks-Medicine Hat riding doesn’t well-serve the interests of Alberta’s sixth largest city.

UCP MLA Nathan Neudorf wants Lethbridge carved into 3-4 big rural-urban ridings

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date August 13, 2025

Minister of Affordability and Utilities Nathan Neudorf speaks at a government press conference in Edmonton on April 10, 2025 (source: Alberta Government / Flickr)

I read all 197 submissions to Alberta’s Electoral Boundaries Commission so you don’t have to

The City of Lethbridge could be carved into four provincial ridings that sprawl into the surrounding rural areas if a local United Conservative Party MLA gets his wish. Lethbridge-East MLA Nathan Neudorf submitted a written proposal to the Electoral Boundaries Commission calling for the southwest Alberta city to be reconfigured into “three or four complementary ridings that create a cohesive “agri-innovation corridor.”

Neudorf’s submission, which is one of 197 written submissions received by the commission and posted on its website, proposes a dramatic change in the electoral map he says would give “producers, processors, researches, and urban businesses a unified voice in the Legislature.”

Read all about it on the Daveberta Substack

Tags Al Duerr, Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission, Alberta Electoral Map, Alberta NDP, Alberta Politics Substack, Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock, Bob Wanner, Brandon Lunty, Brooks Arcand-Paul, Brooks-Medicine Hat, Cameron Mills, Canada Election Substack, Cardston-Siksika, Craig Coburn, Cypress-Medicine Hat, Dallas Miller, Danielle Larivee, Danielle Smith, Daveberta Substack, David Carter, Edmonton-West Henday, Glenn van Dijken, Greg Clark, Gwen Day, Jeff Acker, Jeff Coffman, John Evans, John Middleton-Hope, Justin Wright, Kalen Hastings, Leduc-Beaumont, Lesser Slave Lake, Lethbridge-Cardston, Lethbridge-East, Lethbridge-Little Bow, Lethbridge-Livingstone, Lethbridge-Taber, Lethbridge-West, Lisa Reis, Michael Janz, Nathan Neudorf, Rob Miyashiro, Rob Renner, Robert Woolf, Searle Turton, Spruce Grove-Acheson, Spruce Grove-Stony Plain, Susan Samson, Tom Ikert, United Conservative Party, University of Lethbridge, Wheatland County

Alberta Politics

Oh, Grant Hunter. Where do I start?

Post author By Dave Cournoyer
Post date March 1, 2018
8 Comments on Oh, Grant Hunter. Where do I start?

Grant Hunter and Jason Kenney (source: Facebook)

Photo: Cardston-Taber-Warner MLA MLA Grant Hunter and UCP leader Jason Kenney. (source: Facebook)

While announcing his plans to run for re-election in the new Taber-Warner district, United Conservative Party MLA Grant Hunter is reported to have compared the New Democratic Party’s 2015 election win to the 2004 Tsunami that ravaged southeast Asia and is estimated to have killed upwards of 280,000 people.

Hunter offered an apology to anyone was offended by his comments, but this is just the sort of ridiculous anti-NDP hyperbole that we have become accustomed to hearing from some Wildrose/UCP MLAs over the past three years.

But when talking about his decision to run in the new Taber-Warner district, rather than challenging his caucus colleague Dave Schneider for the UCP nomination in the new Cardston-Siksika district, he made another statement that caught my attention.

“…the NDP have put us in a bad position in this southern part here, in that when the boundaries were redrawn, they split Cardston-Taber-Warner into two different ridings.”

The Cardston-Taber-Warner district Hunter currently represents will see significant changes when the next election is called. While he may have legitimate concerns about the redistribution of the electoral boundaries in southern Alberta, it is misleading to blame the NDP for putting him “…in a bad position…”

The new district boundaries for the 2019 election were drawn by a commission composed of an independent chairperson (Justice Myra Bielby), two NDP Caucus appointees (Bruce McLeod of Acme and Jean Munn of Calgary) and two Wildrose Caucus appointees (Laurie Livingstone of Calgary and Gwen Day of Carstairs). The commission was appointed in October 2016 and held public hearings and received hundreds of submissions from Albertans throughout 2017.

Of the Wildrose appointees, Livingstone supported the final report recommending the new electoral map, including the changes to Hunter’s district, and Day submitted a minority report opposing changes to rural district boundaries.

The bi-partisan commission submitted recommendations for a new electoral maps to the Legislative Assembly for debate and it were voted into law by 40 NDP MLAs and Alberta Party MLA Greg Clark last December.

The process used to redraw Alberta’s electoral boundaries certainly has its flaws (I will write more about this soon), but with Hunter’s own party’s handpicked appointees deeply involved in the process it is misleading for him to blame the party in power for changes he might not like.

Note: 25 MLAs voted against the new electoral map, including two NDP MLAs, Colin Piquette and Eric Rosendahl.