Question: Should section 36(2) of the Constitution Act, 1982, Parliament and the government of Canada’s commitment to the principle of making equalization payments, be removed from the Constitution?
By a large margin, eligible electors who could have cast their ballot for the referendum question in 2021 did not. There were 2,822,303 names on the April 2021 electors count list. Of that number, 1,041,670 chose to vote yes or no to the referendum question. An additional 50,969 Albertans rejected or declined their ballots.
In Calgary the number of electors who stayed away from the polls was smaller. Of the 847,556 electors in the city, 392,780 either cast or refused a ballot. An additional 454,776 electors—or 54 per cent—did not vote.