October 23 2025

The National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE), representing 450,000 workers across Canada—including members of our Alberta component, the Health Sciences Association of Alberta (HSAA)—stands in unwavering solidarity with Alberta’s 51,000 teachers and the 750,000 students affected by the province-wide strike.

NUPGE strongly condemns Premier Danielle Smith’s plan to introduce back-to-work legislation and her government’s readiness to invoke the notwithstandingclause to impose a settlement.

“Premier Smith’s threat to use the notwithstanding clause is a deliberate attack on the charter-protected rights of Alberta’s teachers,” said NUPGE President Bert Blundon. “By choosing to override the constitution rather than bargain in good faith, the Alberta government is undermining the very democratic rights on which our country is built.”

The Smith government has already taken the procedural steps to table back to work legislation with changes to debate rules to allow it to be rushed through the Alberta Legislature. The move follows three weeks of striking by Alberta Teachers’ Association (ATA) members over wages, classroom conditions, and government underfunding.

The government’s current offer falls far short of addressing Alberta’s chronic funding shortfall and the crisis of overcrowded classrooms. Alberta continues to spend less per student than the national average, forcing teachers to do more with less while students pay the price.

“Teachers’ working conditions are students’ learning conditions,” said Blundon. “Premier Smith’s approach punishes teachers for standing up for public education and ignores the root causes of the crisis. Legislating teachers back to work won’t fix the classroom.”

NUPGE calls on the Alberta government to withdraw its back-to-work bill, respect collective bargaining rights, and return to the negotiating table to reach a fair, negotiated settlement that truly invests in Alberta’s public education system.

NUPGE also warns that the growing misuse of the notwithstanding clause poses a grave threat to democracy and the rights of all Canadians. What is happening in Alberta is part of a disturbing pattern across the country, with governments invoking the clause not as a last resort, but as a political tool to silence opposition and sidestep the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Each time a government uses the notwithstanding clause to override fundamental rights, whether labour, education, or equality rights, it weakens the constitutional protections that safeguard us all. If governments can strip away workers’ rights with the stroke of a pen, no one’s rights are secure. “As we saw in Ontario, when the Ford government tried to impose a contract on education workers using the same clause, the entire labour movement stood united and it worked,” Blundon added. “We will do the same for Alberta’s teachers. Their fight is Canada’s fight.”