Alberta NDP promises to bring back digital tax credit; wins endorsement from Nenshi

The Alberta NDP says it would bring back a tax credit for the digital media sector aimed at diversifying the economy if it wins Monday’s election.

The party brought in the Interactive Digital Media Tax Credit during its previous term in office from 2015 to 2019, but the United Conservative government later axed it.

It offered a 25 per cent credit on wages, salaries and bonuses paid to employees working to create video games, training simulation, film special effects and other digital products.

It also had an additional five per cent top-up to companies hiring from under-represented groups.

Meanwhile, Naheed Nenshi – the high-profile former mayor of Calgary who has made non-partisanship a major part of his personal brand – writes in a column for CTV News that he’s lending his vote to the NDP this election.

He writes that he’s never endorsed a candidate before and he’ll hold whoever wins to account.

“I truly believe (United Conservative Leader Danielle) Smith is an existential threat to our province. There’s never been anyone like her in power in Alberta before,” he wrote Friday.

“We simply have no idea what she will do as premier, and that scares me more than a few years of a potentially not-great NDP government.”

NDP Leader Rachel Notley was making numerous campaign stops Friday around Calgary, a key battleground in the campaign.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 26, 2023.