Forever Canadian pro-unity group signs compliance agreement with Elections Alberta

Forever Canadian, the Thomas Lukaszuk-led group supporting Alberta remaining in Canada, has entered into a voluntary compliance agreement with Elections Alberta regarding contributions and referendum advertising.

Advertisers seeking to influence Alberta's October 19 referendum on separation are required to register with Elections Alberta and abide by financial reporting requirements. Contributions to referendum advertising are capped at $5,000 annually by law.

Forever Canadian has been touring the province for several months with concerts, rallies, and speaking events promoting Canadian unity. The group registered as an advertiser in June but recorded no contributions until last week. Elections Alberta initially determined that general messages about unity did not necessarily fall under advertising rules so long as they did not explicitly promote one of the ballot options.

However, Elections Alberta identified two late-August events where Forever Canadian crossed that line. On August 20, a "Unity Bus" tour stop featured a speaker who made a specific reference to the referendum question on Alberta separation and took a position. On August 23, a YouTube event recorded at West Edmonton Mall featured unidentified speakers promoting or opposing a referendum question.

Separatist advertisers had accused Forever Canadian of running a de facto campaign to encourage Albertans to vote to stay in Canada without disclosing funding. Under the compliance agreement, Forever Canadian must now report expenses for those two events and distinguish on its website between referendum advertising contributions (limited to $5,000 annually) and other contributions unrelated to referendum advertising. The agreement remains in force until Forever Canadian completes all referendum advertising and financial reporting requirements.

Lukaszuk said the agreement was voluntary and involved no discipline. "There is no broken rules," he told Postmedia. "Elections Alberta simply said, 'Okay, starting now, we are going to pivot to … become an active third-party advertiser that takes a position on one of the questions on the referendum,' and now we are entering into a compliance agreement that we will start reporting our revenues."

Forever Canadian changed strategy last month to directly support the stay-in-Canada option on the October ballot.