Carney says Alberta is 'essential' to Canada as province plans vote on separation

A day after Alberta announced it will hold a referendum on whether it should remain in Canada or hold a binding vote on separation, Prime Minister Mark Carney called the western province an "essential" part of the country.Speaking on Friday, Carney praised the "huge contributions" the province has made and said his government is working to improve Canada, Alberta included."We're renovating the country as we go, and Alberta being at the centre of that is essential," Carney said as he toured work being done on Canada's parliament building. The vote on Alberta's future is the first significant test of the country's unity in decades. There has been a growing separatist movement in recent years in the oil-rich province, fuelled in part by a belief that it is overlooked by decision-makers in Ottawa.Opinion polls suggest that the majority of Albertans would vote against separating, with about 25% saying they support independence. A pro-unity petition gathered some 400,000 signatures earlier this year.Still, pressure had been building on Alberta's leader, Danielle Smith, to hold an independence referendum this year. A petition calling for separation recently gathered more than 300,000 signatures - enough needed to trigger a vote.But a successful legal challenge earlier this month by First Nations groups in the province halted the process of verifying petition signatures and placed the plebiscite in limbo.