Ballot questions on immigration drew strong support, but HR teams are told to hold steady until additional legislation lands
Roughly 74.6 per cent of Albertans voted on Monday, October 19 against separation from Canada, according to Elections Alberta, but five of the referendum's ballot questions have left employers and lawyers parsing what comes next.
The non-binding immigration questions drew strong support, and while no legislation has been drafted, the results have opened a practical question for employers across the province: what, if anything, should they be doing now?
"The referendum itself strikes me as a distraction. It's an exercise that creates uncertainty without solving anything," said Randy Bauslaugh, a pensions and benefits lawyer at Toronto-based Bauslaugh Pensions and Benefits Law, in a statement. "It's a bit like staging a fire drill when there's no material risk or possibility of fire. Everyone runs around, alarms go off, and when it's over, we're no closer to fixing the core issues that matter to Canadians or Albertans."
Sarah Di Liello, a lawyer at Nelligan Law in Ottawa who focuses on employment and labour law, takes a different view. Not on the politics, but on what the results mean at the workplace level. The separation vote, she said, is settled for now and changes nothing for day-to-day workplace policy in Alberta as the existing legislative framework holds.
What does the referendum change for employers?
The real shift, she added, sits with the other ballot questions. She emphasized employers will need to think harder about labour market impact assessments (LMIA) and whether they can demonstrate that no qualified Albertan is available before looking beyond the province’s workforce.
“It seems clear that slightly more than three quarters of Albertans are not interested in the prospect of separating from Canada at this time,” she said. “In terms of the actual workplace policies, it really does continue as business as usual.”
Di Liello’s core message to employers is restraint. She underscored that the referendum results, at this stage, don’t create any new legal obligation to verify immigration or citizenship status, and any employer who starts doing so on their own initiative would be courting trouble.
“It would be really risky for employers to get ahead of their skis a little bit,” she said. “If employers were starting to get into that realm, they would risk potentially human rights complaints at this stage,” she said. “Until further direction about compliance is communicated, it's best to ensure that they're maintaining a respectful workplace, getting ahead of employee disputes or arguments as they're arising in the workplace, and then following their disciplinary policies as appropriate.”
With political tensions from the referendum likely to surface at work, Di Liello said employers should get ahead of the problem. She said recirculating respectful workplace policies now, or drafting fresh communications, is a practical step, particularly where staff hold strong views on the ballot questions. Political conversation itself is not the issue.
“Disrespecting colleagues or starting to stray into racist or discriminatory rhetoric, that’s generally where the line needs to be drawn,” she said.
While the first referendum question drew majority support for giving Albertans priority on employment opportunities, Di Liello said the mechanics of implementation remain unclear. What is clear, though, is the compliance trail it will leave.
“Employers will have to ensure that they’re keeping very strong records of their recruiting processes when they’re looking to hire newcomers,” she said, emphasizing that means building a paper trail around every hiring decision and showing how the employer assessed whether a qualified Albertan was available before turning to candidates from outside the province.
Could Alberta’s talent pipeline take a hit?
Di Liello also acknowledged the situation is still developing but flagged a talent pipeline risk. Skilled workers who weren’t born in Alberta may think twice about relocating to the province if they perceive a hostile political environment around immigration.
Additionally, employers who depend on international recruitment will need to track whatever new policies emerge and be prepared to demonstrate clearly why they needed to look beyond the local labour market to fill a role.
Meanwhile, Bauslaugh argued that the referendum’s underlying premise – that Alberta would be better off pulling away from national frameworks – ignores how economies actually function. He underscored that no single company or sector can absorb systemic risks, like geopolitical instability or climate change because that’s what governments are for.
Progressive taxation, in his view, is the engine that funds the workforce, infrastructure and social safety net a market economy depends on.
“I’m a capitalist who doesn’t object to progressive taxation because social investment is essential to making capitalism thrive,” he said in a statement.
“Social programs and human-rights protections aren’t ideological add-ons. They’re the most efficient way to ensure everyone can participate and contribute to the best of their ability in our economy as a whole,” he added.
