The spike in Albertans’ separatist sentiments seen in INNOVATIVE’s post-Federal election deep dive is now beginning to subside.
These results come from an online poll conducted between May 12th and May 22nd, 2025 of 2,517 Canadian citizens, 18 years or older. This survey was sponsored by INNOVATIVE Research Group Inc. and weighted to n=1,500 based on age, gender, region, education, and self-reported past federal vote to ensure the overall sample reflects the population according to Census data.
In the aftermath of the election on April 28, 2025, our post-election survey saw a marked increase in support for Alberta separation, with 34% of respondents saying they would probably or definitely support independence.
This week we see a small but significant softening of support for separation. Support for Alberta independence has slipped from 19% definite/15% probable to 14% definite/14% probable. Net support for staying in Canada has risen from +27% to +32%. This softening of the immediate post-election response is also visible in the doubling of those responding ‘don’t know’ from 6% to 12%.
Canadians in general, and Albertans in particular, have a strong expectation of change from the Trudeau years. If that expectation is met, then separatist sentiment may continue to ebb – though the reverse is also true. We will be watching self-identified Conservative and UCP voters carefully to see if they continue moving toward their pre-election state of being more likely to support staying in Canada than separation, or stay at their current plurality of support for some degree of separatism.
