CALGARY \u2014 Former Alberta premier Jason Kenney says it’s high time federal MPs take a stand and fight against those who wish to see Canada torn apart.<\/p>\n
Kenney, also a former federal cabinet minister, shared a stage at the University of Calgary on Monday with an unlikely ally \u2014 Calgary Liberal MP Corey Hogan.<\/p>\n
“We may just be 150 days away from a huge rupture in our lives together \u2026 in our economy, in our political community, in our society,” Kenney said at the Case for a United Canada event.<\/p>\n
“Federalists need to start kicking it into gear here. I think we’ve allowed the separatists to almost completely dominate the debate on the process for the past year.”<\/p>\n
Kenney said the problem is there are those in Alberta who find the prospect of a vote on separation “unpleasant” and know someone who supports it. Separating, he said, is attractive to Albertans who feel disrespected by Ottawa.<\/p>\n
“A large number of Albertans have concluded this is an opportunity to send a message to get leverage \u2014 to replicate Quebec’s knife to the throat strategy, and I say to them be careful for what you ask for,” he said.<\/p>\n
Hogan, a one-time deputy minister in Kenney’s provincial government and the current parliamentary secretary to the federal energy minister, said time is running out for the federal government to respond.<\/p>\n
He said it’s still not confirmed whether a vote on Alberta independence will go ahead, as the matter is currently held up in court.<\/p>\n
“We don’t even technically have a referendum question right now. We’re in a very strange situation,” Hogan said. “You never want to be arguing against something that isn’t real, but unfortunately it’s starting to feel pretty real.<\/p>\n
“We have five months to a referendum.”<\/p>\n
Hogan said it’s important for Alberta MPs of all stripes to speak out ahead of a possible vote.<\/p>\n
“If this goes ahead, I think all Alberta MPs are going to need to stand up and fight for this country. The prime minister is from Alberta and I would certainly counsel to him that he use that voice as an Albertan.”<\/p>\n
Carney has said the federal government is working in the spirit of “co-operative federalism” to address issues for the benefit of Albertans and Canadians as a whole.<\/p>\n
Ottawa and Alberta have been negotiating an energy deal, and Premier Danielle Smith told reporters she felt far more confident about a deal getting inked after meeting with Carney last week.<\/p>\n
Kenney said he will continue to speak out against Alberta’s separatist groups and that there can’t just be one leader of any federal campaign.<\/p>\n
He said he believes federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is a federalist and points out his slogan in last year’s Alberta byelection was Canada First, Canada Last, Canada Always.<\/p>\n
“I have zero doubts in his unqualified patriotism and I think he will find his voice on that. He grew up in Alberta, he represents an Alberta riding,” Kenney said.<\/p>\n
“I would love to see a version of Mr. Poilievre this September that reminds some of us of Jean Charest in 1985 and I think that’s possible. If this thing goes forward, I fully expect him to take a leadership role.”<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 11, 2026.<\/p>\n
Bill Graveland, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CALGARY \u2014 Former Alberta premier Jason Kenney says it’s high time federal MPs take a stand and fight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":41511,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13449,17,17696,18084,16551,18085],"class_list":["post-41510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-alberta-independence","tag-canada","tag-corey-hogan","tag-federal-cabinet-minister","tag-jason-kenney","tag-united-canada"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41510"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41510\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}