THE CANADIAN PRESS/Amanda Erickson
And when Albertans head to the polls Monday to vote on whether to hold a future referendum on separation from Canada, they'll also be answering five separate questions on immigration being pushed by the government of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith.
Those questions include:
— Should the province should have more say over economic immigration?
— Should provincially funded services should be restricted to citizens, permanent residents and those with "Alberta-approved" immigration status?
— Should non-permanent immigrants should be charged a fee for accessing health care and education services?
— Should non-permanent residents should have to reside in Alberta for at least 12 months before qualifying for provincially funded social supports?
— Should voters should have to present proof of citizenship when voting provincially?
Jason Kenney, a former Alberta premier and federal immigration minister, said Canada needs a broader debate on immigration policy based on facts.
"We do need a serious debate on immigration because demography is destiny. There are very few things that are more important," Kenney told The Canadian Press in an interview.
"But we have to do it in a disciplined and respectful, thoughtful way, as much as possible, based on evidence and data and experience around the world."
Former Alberta premiers Rachel Notley, left, and Jason Kenney discuss their assessment of the possible economic cost of Alberta's referendum at an Edmonton Chamber luncheon in Edmonton on Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Ulan
Kenney warned that debates on immigration policy can easily become sidetracked by more extreme political views — by accusations of racism from the far left and by actual racism on the far right.
While Kenney said he doesn't see the immigration questions on the Alberta ballot as race-based or xenophobic, the Alberta separatist movement itself is something else entirely.
"If you listen to the key separatist leaders like Mitch Sylvestre, who's the leader of the primary separatist organization, he says that in his republic of Alberta, no one will have citizenship unless you're born there," Kenney said.
"So I do think there are some currents on the extreme right of Alberta politics that we should all be concerned about. I do not think that necessarily means we cannot have an adult, grown-up conversation about immigration policy."
But the immigration questions on the ballot are not sitting well with some diaspora communities in the province.
Lawyer Avnish Nanda, co-founder of the advocacy group Our Alberta Advantage, is campaigning for people to vote "no" on the immigration-related questions.
Stampede Princess Breanna Correia carries the Canadian flag as the national anthem is sung prior to rodeo action at the Calgary Stampede in Calgary, Alta., Friday, July 4, 2025.THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh
He said reactions to the questions from Alberta's cultural communities and from individuals who have considered running for the United Conservative Party have been overwhelmingly negative.
"They view these questions as targeting them, their journey here and the roots they've established over the past 60 years," he said.
"There's fear, there's confusion and anger at this government. They think this is not necessary. They think it's wrapped up in the separatism effort. They think that Danielle Smith is scapegoating them to continue to maintain the support of the more extreme separatist elements that brought her to power."
Nanda said the referendum is bringing out some ugly undercurrents in Alberta. He said his parents were recently "jeered by a couple of white guys in a car" while out for a walk — something that had never happened to them since coming to Canada in the 1970s.
"There's a notion that it impacts us all, whether you're a citizen or not, these questions," he said. "Because the people who are mobilized around this issue, in support of it, a lot of them don't differentiate between people who have been here 40 years [and] people who came here a week ago, because we all look the same to them."
Nanda said if the immigration ballot measures pass on Monday, they could undermine Canada's multicultural identity, while restricting access to provincial services would make it harder for newcomers to integrate.
Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon speaks to supporters after winning the provincial election in Montreal on Monday, Oct. 5, 2026.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes
Across the country in Quebec, the new minority Parti Québécois government campaigned on a promise to tighten immigration controls. Quebec has maintained far more control over the immigration system than other provinces since 1991.
The PQ immigration platform included, among other things, promises to reduce annual permanent resident admissions from 45,000 to 35,000, to impose a moratorium on permanent immigration from outside Quebec, to prioritize permanent status for temporary residents already in the province, and to tighten the selection criteria for temporary workers.
Catherine Xhardez, a political-science professor at the University of Montreal, said the outgoing Coalition Avenir du Quebec government politicized Quebec's immigration debate by introducing restrictions the new government now wants to strengthen.
"Before that, they have kind of a consensus between political parties, how migration is good for the economy … good for demography, but even for French language," she said.
Xhardez said before 2018, Quebec's main parties generally agreed on the positive role immigration played in strengthening francophone culture by prioritizing certain immigrants.
"But then (the CAQ) broke this consensus between the parties by saying it was too much, too quickly, they needed less," she said.
Asylum seeker Mahamed Yusef Niazi, from Afghanistan, carries his seven-month-old daughter Sahaba across the border at Roxham Road from New York into Canada on Friday, March 24, 2023 in Champlain, N.Y.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz
Xhardez said there's a key difference between the Quebec and Alberta immigration debates — the debate in Alberta is built around populist pushback blaming social service shortages on immigrants, while the debate in Quebec puts identity and culture at the forefront.
She added immigration has also become a bargaining chip for the Quebec government in its engagements with Ottawa.
Premier Smith wants a bargaining chip of her own. In a video released Wednesday, Smith encouraged Albertans to vote in favour of the nine immigration and constitutional questions in the referendum to "send Ottawa a message." She said the goal of one question on the ballot is to "give us the same power as Quebec to recruit economic migrants."
During a pro-unity campaign stop in Calgary on Thursday, Prime Minister Mark Carney urged his audience to vote "no to the nine" — repeating a phrase that has become a rallying cry among those opposed to separatism.
Prime Minister Mark Carney attends a Forever Canadian rally in Calgary on Thursday, Oct. 15, 2026.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh
Kenney said he's a "skeptic when it comes to greater provincial control" over a "sensitive" matter like immigration policy. He said provincial governments lack the federal government's ability to detect fraud and are inclined to focus solely on local issues — not on how immigration affects the national economy.
"In the western provinces, very typically, the permanent residents that they recommend have been low-skilled temporary foreign workers who they're flipping into permanent residency because the local MLAs get tired of being browbeaten by the Tim Hortons franchise owners," Kenney said.
Reflecting on his time as Alberta's premier, he said "certain premiers" told Ottawa after the COVID-19 pandemic that their biggest priority was to increase immigration — despite early evidence of the housing and youth unemployment challenges currently driving the immigration debate.
"When you don't have social permission to discuss these issues, again, that creates the kind of conditions where popular opinion gets totally detached from elite opinion. And if you want to know what that looks like, look at the politics of Europe today," Kenney said.
"So if you want to avoid (Alternative für Deutschland), Front National, U.K. Reform-style politics, then yes, we need a proper, open debate about these issues."
People march as they take part in an anti-ICE protest near the U.S. Consulate in Montreal on Sunday, Feb. 1, 2026.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes
Xhardez, who is originally from Belgium, said the Canadian political scene is very different from Europe and the U.S. — Canada has no mainstream anti-immigrant political party at the federal level. But public feelings about immigration have shifted — and no one knows for certain how that will affect Canada's politics going forward.
"Canada is maybe not so exceptional, we don't know. Or maybe it will become exceptional as being just less politicized, but it's not true that there is still this consensus and strong public support," Xhardez said.
Nanda said some of the loudest voices opposing the immigration questions in Alberta have been chambers of commerce, which represent businesses that have been struggling to recruit staff.
He said someone in politics needs to champion the idea that immigrants lift up economies, expand the tax base and help to fund social programs and services.
"What they're experiencing in their communities around affordability is because of failed government policies around investing in education, investing in health care, and the same immigrants that people are scapegoating as their reasons [are] a way to reverse that," he said.
"If you go to rural Alberta hospitals or long-term care facilities, most nurses and support staff are immigrants because we can't find local workers to work there. The same is true in many educational facilities."
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2026.
By David Baxter | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.
The 35-year-old Vancouver fan wasn’t bluffing. Having already travelled to Las Vegas to see her teenybopper crushes, she's now preparing to fly across the country for two Toronto concerts, spending roughly $600 on tickets alone.
And she's hardly the only millennial willing to pay a tidy sum to party like it’s 1999.
Nearly three decades after their commercial peak, the Backstreet Boys have booked a staggering 12 shows at Toronto’s Rogers Centre in 2027, citing “overwhelming demand.” The run doubles the venue’s previous record of six shows, set by Taylor Swift during her Eras Tour in 2024.
While some current major artists are cancelling tours amid sluggish ticket sales, the once-baggy-jeaned quintet is proving nostalgia is a hell of a drug.
“I haven’t seen a Top 40 artist in so many years,” says Smith, a self-described “Y2K-era girlie” who made two trips to the Backstreet Boys’ Las Vegas Sphere residency last year.
She suspects millennials are seeking comfort in the past.
“I feel like during COVID we all retreated back to our nostalgia,” says the customer support professional.
“Times are tough. You're going back to when it was simpler and just living in that moment.”
WHEN QUEEN STREET WENT BACKSTREET
Bill Welychka remembers when the Backstreet Boys could bring downtown Toronto to a standstill.
At the height of the boy-band craze in the late '90s, the former MuchMusic VJ watched thousands of screaming teenagers descend on the channel's Queen Street West headquarters, hoping to glimpse the five American heartthrobs.
“There were certain bands where we knew we'd have to hire security, where we would have to close the street down. The Backstreet Boys were certainly one of those bands,” he recalls.
“I think they fed off of that energy and the applause and the screams and the tears.”
The Toronto residency is dubbed “Into the Millennium — Homecoming: Live in Canada,” fittingly so: Canada was the first North American market to embrace the group.
Welychka remembers the frenzy spreading from Europe to Quebec, then across Canada, with MuchMusic putting their videos into heavy rotation.
Members of the Backstreet Boys from left, Kevin Richardson, AJ McLean, Howie Dorough talk to media at a press conference in Toronto on May 21, 1999. (CP PHOTO/Rene Johnston)
“We latched on to them very, very early on,” he says.
But the boy-band bubble eventually burst. As tastes shifted in the 2000s, the Backstreet Boys faded from the charts, trading stadium-scale hysteria for more theatres and casinos.
Now, with their original fans approaching middle age, Welychka reckons they're yearning for a time when their biggest responsibility was keeping a Tamagotchi alive.
“It's a different day and age now. It's a lot more frustrating,” says Welychka, citing unemployment and the cost-of-living crisis.
“A lot of people want to get those feelings back you once had. If you're a 45-year-old woman and screaming and crying, nothing wrong with that.”
SAME CRUSHES, BIGGER ALLOWANCES
Eleni Papamichelakis knows the feeling. The 39-year-old Durham Region mother drifted away from the Backstreet Boys as adulthood took over, only to rediscover her teenage obsession when she caught their Sphere residency last year. Now she's taking her 11-year-old daughter to see the group, just as she did at that age in 1998.
Part of the appeal is revisiting a pre-smartphone era, when having fun just required a CD and some friends to dance with.
“The world and, like, life has changed and it's become so digital and sometimes a little bit impersonal,” says the mortgage agent.
“We lived in such a fun era where we had to kind of entertain ourselves.”
Eleni Papamichelakis poses at a show during the Backstreet Boys' Las Vegas residency at the Sphere in this undated handout photo.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Handout - Eleni Papamichelakis (Mandatory Credit)
A grown-up bank account helps, though: “We have the money to go and see these concerts in a better seat than when we were younger.”
Not every artist is benefiting from that spending power.
The concert industry has been grappling with so-called “blue dot fever,” named for the unsold seats dotting Ticketmaster seating charts.
This year, Meghan Trainor scrapped her tour, Zayn Malik cancelled his U.S. dates and Post Malone scaled back his stadium run. Though the artists cited varying reasons, the cancellations have fuelled speculation about sluggish ticket sales.
The Backstreet Boys, meanwhile, are once again larger than life at the box office. Their Toronto residency could draw nearly half a million concertgoers, with tickets ranging from around $100 to well over $1,000 for VIP packages.
Nostalgia has always sold concert tickets. But Scott Henderson, a professor of popular culture at Trent University, says it's becoming an increasingly vital draw for major venues amid an uncertain touring market.
“It's kind of fuelling the industry in ways it never used to,” Henderson says. “That used to be a separate market, that nostalgia market. Now it's what big venues like the Rogers Centre are going to have to look for.”
Sentimental millennials, he says, now have deeper pockets and a willingness to splurge on premium tickets.
“That's your guaranteed audience."
For Vanessa Capozi, a 39-year-old Montreal-area mother of two, the Backstreet Boys offer something priceless: a break from adulthood.
“Life has taken over right now,” says the special education technician. “Rarely do people my age take time for themselves.”
But when her favourite boy band hits the stage, she gets to be 15 again.
“For those two hours, nothing else exists. I'm just there as me, that teenager, watching the Backstreet Boys.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2026.
By Alex Nino Gheciu | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.