Alberta's New Petition Rules: Blackout, Fees, Deepfakes

Alberta's government is shaking up its citizen petition rules again. This is the third

tweak in under a year. Justice Minister Mickey Amari dropped a new bill that blocks starting

constitutional or policy referendums one year before or after provincial. Elections,

creating a two-year blackout window. Existing petitions stay safe, and their referendum

deadlines get scrapped. They say it's to keep elections focused, without these initiatives

stealing the spotlight from voters.

The United Conservative Party crew has been fine-tuning the system, like dropping signature

thresholds last year, stretching collection times, clearing paths for tricky referendums,

and jacking up application fees to $25,000 from $5,000. Right now, petitions are buzzing.

One pushing Alberta to split from Canada needs about 178,000 signatures by May 2nd. An

anti-separate's drive succeeded back in December under old rules, while pushes against public

funds for private schools flopped in February, and another banning new coal mines on the Eastern

Rockies has until June 10th. The bill also simplifies the sunshine list for public salaries,

dropping the bar to $130,000 base pay to cut red tape, and duplication. Plus, it targets

deepfakes, slapping fines up to $10,000 on people, or $100,000 on groups for misleading

election fakes. All this aims to streamline democracy, protect fair votes, and handle

new tech threats head on, with more laws brewing on deepfake harms.

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