Rachel Notley: Alberta's progressive politics giant prepares to step aside

Toward the end of the 2015 Alberta election campaign, NDP Leader Rachel Notley summoned her four-member caucus to an Edmonton hotel room with little explanation.

"I thought, 'Oh my God, what's happening?'" said David Eggen, who was campaigning to keep a north Edmonton seat.

"And she said, 'I think we're going to win.' And that was just the jaw-dropping moment."

As Notley, a colossus of Alberta progressive politics, prepares to step away from party leadership, colleagues and ideological foes say she has fundamentally changed the province's political landscape — and far beyond that underdog 2015 election win.

Nearly a decade after disrupting an 80-year streak of right-wing governments in Alberta, Notley, now 60, is in her final week as NDP leader.

Party members will welcome a new leader in Calgary on Saturday.

Electoral choice is one of the greatest gifts Notley has given to the province, Eggen said.

That might sound like a given to other Canadians, but before 2015 was foreign to Albertans, who had elected consecutive Progressive Conservative governments since 1971.

But in May 2015, Notley and the NDP handily defeated Jim Prentice and his PCs, scooping up 54 of 87 seats in an upset win that saw the Wildrose form the Official Opposition.

In an interview last week, Notley remembered the final days of the 2015 campaign as a mix of excitement and overwhelming panic. She said she realized the NDP's strategy had to pivot from hosting rallies for loyal supporters to preparing to govern Alberta.

Jason Kenney, who would succeed Notley as premier in 2019, liked to refer to the "accidental NDP government" Albertans chose in 2015.

But other politicians and pundits from across the spectrum say what Notley built was far more deliberate and structural: she created a viable option for voters on the left of the spectrum, a party that could legitimately contend for power.

Conditions for a historic win

A confluence of factors created the conditions for the NDP to win in 2015. 

Melanee Thomas, a political science professor at the University of Calgary, cited "economic voting" by Albertans worried about the PC government's management of the economy and provincial coffers at a time when oil prices were sliding precipitously.

Voters were disillusioned with the Wildrose after leader Danielle Smith and eight other MLAs crossed the floor in late 2014 to join Prentice's PCs.

Support for the Liberals had cratered, allowing Notley to shoo progressives into her tent.

Doug Horner, a former PC finance minister, recalls driving past arrays of orange "Notley" campaign signs in Spruce Grove, west of Edmonton, in 2015. The leader had become the party's brand.

"It was a combination of protest vote, and they really sold Rachel's passion," Horner said.

Once sworn in, the NDP had ambitious promises to keep. Notley had pledged to increase health and education spending, yet the collapse in oil and gas revenues was hammering provincial coffers.

Faced with a glut of oil, few ways to export it and drastically lower prices, Notley hunted for "social licence" to expand the TransMountain (TMX) pipeline to the B.C. coast while clashing with premiers cool to the prospect of new pipes and their environmental risks.

"She can be like a dog with a bone," former NDP leader Brian Mason said of her TMX battle.

"It would have symbolic value. That was really important to show that Alberta could have clout with the federal government."

Notley introduced the Climate Leadership Plan, which aimed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with a consumer carbon tax, and a cap on oilsands emissions, among other measures.

If an oil-promoting NDP premier sounds unexpected, it was. Notley was emphatic that she saw things differently than her federal NDP colleagues. Horner said her approach helped retain voter confidence.

"She was able to show Albertans on that spectrum that she can be pragmatic and she can move to the centre."

But it was a farm employee safety bill that triggered the most backlash, mainly from rural Albertans.

Notley said although the changes were necessary to bring worker rights in line with the rest of Canada, she regrets not consulting and explaining the changes more thoroughly.

"That was a huge fail on our part," she said last week.

It was likely that bill and carbon tax that lost the NDP the 2019 election, because they made such easy targets for conservative opponents, said Evan Menzies, vice-president of Crestview Strategy and a past Wildrose staffer.

Although Kenney's government later reversed many of Notley's policy changes, some NDP environmental initiatives remain today, including methane emissions reduction goals and the phasing out of coal-fired power plants.

"I wouldn't have been able to do that without a premier who said, 'Yeah, go do it,' " said Shannon Phillips, Notley's environment minister.

Among Notley's other points of pride are reducing child poverty, introducing affordable child care, and raising the minimum wage to the highest in the country, although it has since fallen behind.

Time to build

Kenney and the UCP – a mash-up of the legacy PC and Wildrose parties – scored a decisive win in the 2019 election, relegating Notley's NDP to 24 seats.

But behind the Opposition benches, the NDP political machine was gaining momentum and strength. No longer busy governing, the party had time to build.

The oldest daughter of Grant Notley, who led the Alberta NDP from 1968 until his death in 1984, Notley grew up watching political organizers.

When she and her husband returned to Alberta from B.C. in the early 2000s, Notley found a provincial NDP in need of professional polish. She was elected MLA for Edmonton-Strathcona in 2008 and six years later won the party leadership.

As leader, she pushed MLAs to charge higher prices for fundraising events, and insisted on hiring a permanent staff member to run party operations instead of relying on volunteers.

In 2008, the Alberta NDP raised $231,000. By 2023, the party pulled in $6.1 million. That's on par with the amount the federal NDP raises annually.

Conservative strategist Menzies says the NDP's evolution under Notley was impressive.

"Despite losing the [2023] election campaign, it was obvious to any campaigner watching that the NDP ran probably the most organized, most well-financed campaign in in their history," he said. "She knew what she was doing."

Strength through diversity

The strength of the party's position is evidenced by the number of strong contenders vying to replace Notley as leader, Menzies said. That makes the NDP a "serious electoral threat" in any election, he said.

Several people interviewed about Notley's legacy pointed to Alberta's once-conservative dynasty evolving into a two-party state with a viable progressive option.

The NDP won 38 of 87 seats in 2023, making it the largest Official Opposition in the province's history.

Colleagues and staffers attribute some of that growth to Notley's intentional steps to diversity New Democrats.

"She's changed the whole face of the party," Mason said. "It was an older, pretty white sort of membership."

Anne McGrath, now principal secretary to federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, was a senior Notley government staffer. She said Notley was relentless about recruiting candidates who were gender, racially and culturally diverse.

If staff asked a racialized woman if she was interested in being an NDP candidate and she turned them down, Notley told them to go back and ask again.

"It's hard to say no to Rachel Notley," McGrath said. "Maybe impossible."

Women to the front bench

Notley said she has turned down male candidates with impressive resumes to make room for people who are historically underrepresented in government.

Political science professor Thomas says it's not the only way Notley pushed for gender equity.

Notley appointed the first gender-balanced cabinet in Canadian history in 2015. She also created the province's first standalone status of women ministry, which helped focus attention on how decisions would affect women.

Thomas said allowing citizens to nominate themselves for government agencies, boards and committees also helped diversify the government's patronage picks.

MLA Christina Gray, who was Notley's labour minister, said she wouldn't have had that role if it wasn't for Notley.

"She made it a genuine focus to make sure we were recruiting women in winnable seats," Gray said. "That didn't just happen. That was a choice made by a leader of a party who saw a better way forward."

Among the current NDP caucus of 38, women outnumber men, 13 members are non-white and at least two MLAs identify as 2SLGBTQ+.

Notley will stay on as the MLA for Edmonton-Strathcona after June 23, but she will be liberated of leadership duties.

"I'm sure I'll miss it," she said. "I'm sure I'll be a bit verklempt. I'm very happy to be able to make this decision on my timeline and very proud to be able to be leaving the party in such incredibly good shape."