NDP want minimum wage hike

By Lethbridge Herald on September 25, 2025.

Nathan Reiter
Lethbridge Herald
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

The Alberta NDP is raising the alarm about the minimum wage in the province.

In an interview with the Herald on Wednesday, NDP opposition leader Naheed Nenshi said the provincial government should have been more proactive with the issue.

“They ought to have been doing this for years. When the NDP government was in power, I believe we’re the first jurisdiction in Canada to put in a situation where the minimum wage is indexed to inflation; now every other province indexes into inflation except for Alberta. The minimum wage here has not increased in seven years. On October 1st, it will be the lowest in Canada.”

According to the Retail Council of Canada, Alberta will have the lowest minimum wage in the country as of Oct. 1. Alberta was tied with Saskatchewan for the lowest minimum wage, but Saskatchewan is raising its minimum wage from $15to $15.35. All other provinces will have updated their minimum wage in 2025, while Alberta minimum wage has been at $15 an hour since 2018. 

“Had the government indexed inflation, we would have been in a situation where businesses knew exactly what was happening, they’d be able to plan for it, and low wage earners would be able to look forward to getting that increase.” Nenshi explained. “In Saskatchewan, we’ve known for months how much that minimum wage will be increased on Oct. 1. Because the government hasn’t done that, they’re behind the eight ball now. They haven’t consulted with business or minimum wage workers. They don’t have a plan of any kind. We’re in an affordability crisis, so as a result, minimum wage workers are falling further and further behind.”

During a media availability earlier this week, Nenshi declined to provide a specific number to raise the minimum wage to when asked by a reporter and was very adamant in his response. He explained that the business community and workers would need to be consulted with before a precise number could be decided.

“If you just jump in with the number now that business is not expecting, it’s going to be very difficult for folks who’ve already budgeted for the year and so on, but we know it has to go up. Ideally what you want to do is talk to business about how much we can increase at a time without adding to the affordability crisis. I certainly have an idea on what it should be and how to get there. However, I think it’s really important that we talk to people who are earning minimum wage and we talk to people who are employing the minimum wage workers to ensure that it is predictable and everybody knows that it’s not sort of a shock to the system to have a number announced all at once.”

The legislature is not scheduled to sit until the week of Oct. 27. Nenshi says the NDP plans to bring forward other means of affordability during the session.

“Our theme for the fall is protecting your paycheque. I can’t say too much because there are parliamentary rules around talking about private members bills before they get introduced and so on. We’re really looking at the critical things that Albertans have told us that they need to do in order to attack this cost of living. Part of it is protecting people’s paychecks, making sure that people have decent income. the other parts are really attacking directly the areas that the provincial government has control over, which include auto insurance, utilities, and the cost of housing. Believe it or not, we’re gonna try a little something to help manage the price of groceries.”