From accusations of gerrymandering to doing away with diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, Alberta NDP deputy leader and MLA Rakhi Pancholi discusses the start of the fall 2027 sitting of the Alberta legislature with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Michael Higgins: Let’s start on this contentious issue of electoral boundaries. Why did your party push this into the spotlight, escalate dialogue, debate, before the actual report is tabled and becomes public? Rakhi Pancholi: For the first time in Canadian history, the UCP government completely rejected an independent commission’s report that laid out fair boundaries for Albertans based on our population growth and where things have moved. They completely rejected it and set up what has never been done before in Canadian history, which is an MLA panel, which has a majority of the UCP government on it. It’s taken out of the independent realm once that’s happened. The report has been already discussed in public, and what we know is that the UCP government has decided to reject a fair map developed through an independent process and put into place a map that will absolutely gerrymander the boundaries of Alberta’s electoral districts. It will make it easier, especially in Lethbridge and Calgary, for UCP MLAs to be re-elected. The government can choose who their voters will be, rather than voters choosing who they want to represent them. This is something we’ve seen in the United States. We’ve never seen it to this degree in Alberta. Where those boundaries are set could determine who will be in government for the foreseeable future. And so, it is really important that this process be independent. But the government has guaranteed that it will not be. It will absolutely be packing in certain voters in some ridings, splitting Lethbridge into four ridings, we understand, and Calgary will certainly see some major changes so that it’ll be easier for the UCP government to win in future elections. No Albertan should want that. Boundaries should not be set in a partisan way. Michael Higgins: Should the UCP, given its majority, accept and pass whatever the recommendations are in the report, what does your party do then? Rakhi Pancholi: We will certainly have a very spirited debate in the legislature this week when that report is tabled with the legislature by Nov. 2. I certainly anticipate the UCP will use the same anti-democratic tools they’ve used in the past to limit debate and to force this through quickly. Albertans, like all Canadians, have a constitutional right under the Charter to have effective representation under Section Three. And, if we believe that the final report, as it’s tabled and is passed by the UCP government, does not meet that need, there will be a lot of legal action that will be taken to consider what to do next, because Albertans deserve a fair electoral map. Michael Higgins: Diversity, equity, inclusion (DEI) all in the spotlight this week. The first bill to be tabled seeks to ban consideration of DEI in the hiring decisions of public entities. How do you see this impacting the hiring practices of everything from school boards to municipalities? Rakhi Pancholi: It’s deeply ironic to hear the UCP government acting like they are concerned about merit, as they have appointed a number of people within their inner circles who are donors, who are friends of the party, into key roles in government for years now. I don’t understand how this is the priority for this government right now. They just came out of a referendum where Albertans rejected a significant amount of their agenda. They should be focused on the priorities that Albertans continue to set, which is not around anti-woke, DEI. This continues to be this kind of culture war, politics, division and distraction that the government has continued to show. You would think they would know better, after this referendum that Albertans aren’t interested in it. At the end of the day, to suggest that people don’t meet merit requirements or are not qualified to be there simply because they’re also diverse individuals is deeply insulting. This government needs to get back to focusing on the priorities of Albertans. Michael Higgins: What do you see the government accomplishing with the introduction of legislation amending the Education Act to standardize report cards and shed light on professional development (PD) days for teachers, among other changes? It’s a move the government says is to help families stay informed. Rakhi Pancholi: I’m a parent of two kids in school. Whenever I’ve had questions about their report cards, I go to their teachers. I can go to their principals, and I know I can ultimately go to the school board if I have questions. This is again a ridiculous distraction by the UCP. Parents right now in Alberta are concerned about class sizes. They want to see schools built in their communities, which have been fast growing for many, many, many years. My own constituency has some of the most over-capacity schools in Edmonton. They have been calling on this government for almost eight years to build the schools we need. I have not seen an outcry of parents whose top priority is report cards or what’s happening on PD days. This is an ongoing effort by the UCP to pit parents against teachers and to interfere in local decision making, whether it’s on school boards or municipalities. This government bloat keeps continuing to grow. They want to reach into and micromanage every single thing happening in this province, rather than focusing on the things they’re actually responsible for, which is building schools, building hospitals, providing cost of living relief to Albertans, and making sure that young Albertans in particular see a bright future ahead with the jobs that they need. Michael Higgins: A final question: Should Albertans expect to learn the full cost of the referendum at some point through this fall sitting? Rakhi Pancholi: They should absolutely feel entitled to know the full cost, but I believe the government will try to hide that for as long as possible. What’s been really interesting in the legislature this session is it’s only been about 10 days since that referendum took place – an unprecedented and a very incredibly expensive, unnecessary referendum that divided Albertans – and yet the UCP is very eager to change the channel, because they lost on a number of their nine questions, four out of nine. They lost on the referendum question because they were the ones who brought forward a separatist agenda into our political discourse in this province, and they deeply lost on that. And nobody believes they’re on the side of Canada. The cities of Edmonton and Calgary have overwhelmingly rejected all nine of the questions that the UCP brought forward. So, understandably, the UCP doesn’t want to talk about it. Calgary MLAs are hiding at every opportunity. They won’t answer whether or not they’re going to listen to their constituents or listen to their premier. We have a UCP MLA who is a declared separatist still sitting in government caucus, and so they certainly don’t want to be talking about the referendum anymore because it was a failure for them. But Albertans deserve to know why their government dragged them through this process that nobody wanted, and they definitely deserve to know what the cost of it is. And we will certainly be asking those questions.
