NDP promises to axe proposed plan to quit CPP if it wins 2027 Alberta election
Alberta’s long road to quitting the Canada Pension Plan would run smack into the scheduled 2027 provincial election, with Opposition New Democrats promising to kill the idea if they win.
Opposition finance critic Samir Kayande says an NDP government would cancel the plan at that late date as a last resort, regardless of whether Albertans vote in favour of ditching the CPP in a referendum.
Kayande says Albertans have already made their voices heard that they don’t want Premier Danielle Smith’s United Conservative Party government touching Canada’s $575-billion retirement nest egg.
“We’re not going to support the cancellation of the CPP,” Kayande told reporters Friday.
“We don’t need a referendum. People have already spoken. They don’t like the idea.
“If it is still alive in 2027 when we’re having the next election, I would absolutely love to fight an election on this issue.”
Kayande’s comments come a day after Smith announced that her government will consult with Albertans, with an eye to holding a referendum on whether to leave the CPP and create a separate Alberta pension plan.
The Alberta government website timeline suggests at this point that any referendum would come sometime in 2025.
Leaving CPP requires three years’ notice, and the next Alberta election is set for May 31, 2027.
Smith’s government wants to take more than half the CPP fund with it if it leaves, based on a third-party report it commissioned that says the province is due $334 billion should it pull out in 2027.
But analysts say that number is based on flawed mathematical assumptions and interpretations of the underlying legislation.
They say even if it were accurate, Ottawa and other provinces wouldn’t agree to 12 per cent of Canada’s population
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