Stampede Stomp! Farkas and Smith duel over party tents and beer prices, Nenshi finally shifts to affordability
Summer-time silly season begins in Alberta politics
Danielle Smith’s row with Calgary Mayor Jeromy Farkas over weeknight music tent hours ended with the Premier getting Stampede stomped over her government’s plans to increase the minimum price of a pint of beer days ahead of the start of the Calgary Stampede. Smith backed down and beer minister Dale Nally ordered the Alberta Gaming, Liquor & Cannabis crown corporation to abandon the price increase.
Farkas can now do a victory lap as a hero of both Stampede beer drinkers and local residents worried about the giant Cowboys party tent being erected in their neighbourhood.
This is a new dynamic in Alberta politics. Smith’s United Conservative Party government has been eager to elbow its way into municipal decisions around bike lanes, LRT routes, neighbourhood infill, and woke snowplows, but this development shows what happens when a premier with a 39 per cent approval rating takes on a big city mayor with an 81 per cent approval rating in the most electorally important region of the province?
The crowing about music tents and beer prices is entertaining but it’s all a big distraction, of course, which Smith is very skilled at creating.
As long as we’re talking about the “fun police,” beer tents, or Alberta separatism, we’re not talking about affordability, cost of living, and health care — which are big and complex issues at the top of mind for a lot of Albertans. They are issues that all governments — including Smith’s UCP — are vulnerable.
The cost of groceries, the cost of home and auto insurance, the cost of utilities and electricity, the cost of rent and mortgages, and rising inflation continue to hit many Albertans hard. The cost of living is on everybody’s mind but, so far, Smith has largely avoided becoming the target of Albertans’ unhappiness.
Smith’s biggest saving grace was likely Naheed Nenshi choice to not make talking about affordability a priority from the moment he became leader of the Alberta NDP in 2024. Nenshi has recently shifted gears on affordability, but the NDP are still playing catchup on the most important issue facing Albertans.
Smith has tried to change the channel once again by forcing Albertans to vote in a separation referendum on October 19, a decision that has dragged her public approval ratings below 40 per cent for the first time since she entered the Premier’s Office.
She tried to channel her own version of Ralph Klein’s ‘Ralphbucks’ as a solution to Albertans affordability challenges, but “Dani Dollars” have largely been panned as unserious and missing the mark.
Smith’s decision to have Albertans sign up for a one-time $100 rebate cheque, instead of implementing the provincial government’s gas price reduction law that would see the $0.13 gas tax removed for three months, earned her jeers from right-wing Postmedia columnist Lorne Gunter, who called it a “slap in the face.”
One hundred dollars isn’t nothing, but it feels out of touch. And it’s not much when you consider how quickly Smith and Nally moved to keep minimum beer prices low for the Calgary Stampede. Why couldn’t they do the same for the price of milk or skyrocketing auto insurance?
Alberta NDP finally talking about affordability, grocery prices
I wrote last year that NDP MLAs should should start every day by asking themselves the question “how can we make life more affordable for working-class Alberta families?” and then they should spend the rest of their day talking all about it, all the time. I still believe this today.
Nenshi’s NDP have now started talking more about pocketbook issues with the launch of their Alberta Affordability Agenda, which is a good start. The party has been spending a lot of energy focusing on the separation referendum through its For Alberta For Canada campaign, but it can’t afford to ignore other important issues with a provincial election only 15 months away at the latest.
In their new suite of affordability policies, the NDP promises to cut electricity bills by 10 per cent, increase minimum wage to $18, and to reduce grocery prices by increasing competition, ending shrinkflation, and appointing a grocery watchdog.
The NDP also proposed removing the $0.13 per litre provincial gas tax while gas prices remain high — something that will make even Lorne Gunter happy.
Standing behind a lectern with the message keeping money in your pocket at a stall at the Old Strathcona Farmer’s Market in Nenshi’s Edmonton-Strathcona riding, the NDP leader largely focused his message on grocery affordability challenges in Calgary.
The former Calgary mayor won a by-election in Edmonton last June but is expected to run in a Calgary riding in the next provincial election.
“We know in Calgary that one in three families are struggling with food security,” Nenshi said, referencing reports from last year. “In this rich place, one of three families in that city don’t have enough to eat every month.”
Responding to Smith’s quarrel with Farkas, Nenshi chastized the UCP for spending “the last five days screaming about whether music tents should be allowed an hour later on a Wednesday night,” and “[doing] nothing about affordability, they do nothing about grocery prices.”
Nenshi left Edmonton-Gold Bar MLA Marlin Schmidt, who recently announced his plans to not for re-election, to explain the NDP’s grocery plan, which would create an independent grocery price watchdog, abolish restricted covenants on former grocery stores, and introduce shrinkflation laws to mandate transparent labeling on products.
“This watchdog would monitor and track food price trends, review complaints, and provide regular public reporting,” Schmidt said of the independent grocery monitor. “Most importantly, the watchdog will provide transparency to Albertans on food pricing to ensure that prices are fair and not driven by anti-competitive practices or hidden mark-ups.”
Restricted covenants have been a particularly annoying challenge for mature neighbourhoods in Edmonton that have been stuck without a local grocery store after stores owned by the country’s big grocery corporations relocated to larger locations. It’s something on Edmonton City Council’s radar too.
Councillor Michael Janz introduced a motion at city hall in February 2026 asking Mayor Andrew Knack to lobby Alberta’s government to introduce legislation similar to a Manitoba law that prevents grocery stores from creating new restricted covenants.
The NDP have not yet released their plans to lower the cost of auto insurance for Albertans as part of their affordability policy. It’s a skyrocketing cost that would be unwise to ignore, but we do have some idea about the direction the party might head. Edmonton-South West NDP MLA Nathan Ip introduced a motion in the Legislature last year to tie the auto insurance rate cap to CPI, which was voted down by the UCP, and Nenshi said in 2024 that it was time for Alberta to consider a public option .
Nenshi’s party is now playing catch up on a top issue that they should have spent the last year or more tackling much more aggressively. Affordability is an issue that Smith’s UCP should be vulnerable on if the NDP can take advantage of it.
Calgary-Shaw UCP nomination vote today
UCP members in Calgary-Shaw will choose the candidate to raise their party’s banner in the upcoming by-election to fill the Legislature seat vacated by UCP MLA Rebecca Schulz.
Current city councillor Dan McLean is considered the establishment favourite in this race. The second-term councillor was re-elected last October and has maintained close public ties to the UCP since he ran against Schulz for the nomination in this riding in 2018.
McLean’s decision to jump into provincial politics so soon after the October 2025 municipal election has made him a target of criticism from former councillor Jeff Davison.
McLean faces Mike Derry, an oil and gas industry talent company owner who has the support of well-known right-wing political organizer Craig Chandler.
Another candidate, Stuart Jeanes, had planned to run but did not qualify to enter the nomination race. Jeanes had been endorsed by separatist leader and Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul UCP constituency president Mitch Sylvestre.
The nomination vote is being held from 3:00 pm to 8:30 pm at the Cardel Rec South.
The NDP are expected to nominate Kyle Campbell at a meeting on June 26 at 7:00 pm at the Cardel Rec South.
A full list of nominated and nomination candidates running in the next Alberta election can be found on this page:
More Alberta politics
Among Canadians living outside Alberta, three in four say they want Alberta to remain part of Canada. That includes 63% who say they strongly want Alberta to stay, according to a recent survey from Abacus Data.
Just 4% say they would prefer Alberta leave Canada.
The Calgary Chamber of Commerce says that nearly half of businesses represented by the organization say they are prepared to leave Alberta and relocate their business to another province if Albertans vote to begin the formal process towards separation from Canada.
Who says the NDP haven't been talking about affordability? People may not have been listening but that's not Nenshi's fault. I think back to Nenshi's Family Laundromat video, what, a year ago? That was all about affordability. I remember statements on auto insurance, electricity and energy pricing, grocery costs; program cuts. If you're saying this is the first time the NDP have released an affordability *platform*, then I think you're correct. Those are usually done closer to elections, no?
And, yes, the NDP have had other issues to focus on as wel,l such as UCP corruption: healthcare; gerrymandering; education and indeed, separatism. Those persons who asked "where's Nenshi" never mention last year's "Better Together" tour, as extensive as Smith’s "Alberta Next" campaign, but with negligible coverage.
There were also the minor issues of by-elections and internal reorganization.
If your criticism was the NDP has hitherto failed to generate interest in their message, that's valid. To imply they haven't been sending the message out is disingenuous, imho.
( It might also be argued there's such a thing as not peaking too early. The proof will be in the election pudding).
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