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| Alison Redford, Alberta's first elected female Premier! |
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| Danielle Smith, Alberta's new opposition leader! |
On Monday Albertans made their final decisions on who to vote for, and the Progressive Conservatives came out on top, winning the party's 12th majority government in a row! In case you haven't already heard the results, the PCs won 61 seats, the Wildrose 17, the Liberals 5, and the NDP 4.
Wildrose supporters are naturally disappointed that their party did not get elected into government, and many are angry at the results. I saw some fairly undignified comments on facebook last night (the funniest and most ridiculous one being "ugh redford isn't fit to run a hotdog stand"). Thankfully, Wildrose leader Danielle Smith remained very positive in her post-election speech. As a Wildrose supporter, I too am taking a positive view of this election – it is too bad that the PCs were not ousted from government, but I consider this election a victory for the Wildrose nonetheless. The party will get a chance to gain some experience and the trust of Albertans before (hopefully) coming into office in the next election (in 2016).
I am no fan of the Progressive Conservative party; however, Premier Redford is an experienced and relatively competent leader. Because of this, I am proud to have her as my province's first elected female premier (by the way, the CBC has a good profiles on all the party leaders in their Alberta Votes 2012 feature). Many of the PC's votes were probably from Liberal and NDP supporters who decided to vote for the PC party in order to keep the Wildrose party out of power. Despite this "strategic voting", four former cabinet ministers lost their seats in the election, showing that although the party was elected, there are a large number of Albertans who are discontent with the PCs.
The Alberta Liberal Party declined in popularity this election, winning five seats (down from 8 before the election). The party's leader, Raj Sherman, was elected as a Progressive Conservative in 2008 but was soon kicked out of caucus for publicly criticizing the PC's health care policy. Fortunately for Mr. Sherman, many of his constituents decided to vote for him again, and he was re-elected (although only by 118 votes).
The Alberta New Democratic Party (NDP) ran a successful campaign and were rewarded with four seats (up from a mere two seats before the election). Their leader Brian Mason was among those elected. From his performance at the leaders debate, Mr. Mason seems like a strong leader and I believe he will be a good voice to have in the Legislature.
The new Alberta Party (yes, they don't have the most original name) failed to get a seat in the Legislature, but their leader Glenn Taylor is trying to stay positive, telling the press, "I feel we accomplished what we set out to. Our goal was to introduce ourselves to Albertans, and from that perspective, it was a smashing success."
Voter turnout was a marginally successful 57%, up from the measly 41% of voters who bothered to cast a ballot in the last election.
I was happy to hear that some of my favourite MLAs were re-elected, specifically Rob Anderson (a Wildrose MLA who gained my support after standing up for diversity in education choices in a recent Education Act debate) and Doug Griffiths (my favourite candidate in the PC leadership election last year).
This election is a step in the right direction, but not as big a step as many Albertans had hoped for. I will conclude with a quote from Danielle Smith, regarding the election results: “Am I surprised? Yeah. Am I disappointed? Yeah. Am I discouraged? Not a chance.”
