Canada's electoral history from 1867 to today

New Brunswick's linguistic rift of the 1990s on the right

by Maurice Y. Michaud (he/him)

Alternative scenariosOn October 13, 1987, after four consecutive majority governments, the Progressive Conservative Party of New Brunswick, led by Richard Hatfield, suffered a fate that only one other incumbent government in the British Common­wealth had suffered. Not only was it shut out of the legislature, but the winner of the election — the Liberal Party, led by Frank McKenna — won every seat. The only other time that a legislature was formed without an opposition was on July 23, 1935, when the Liberal Party of Prince Edward Island pulled the same feat at the expense of that province's Conservative Party. Thus began a difficult decade for the Progres­sive Conservatives and the right-of-centre in New Brunswick.

It can be argued that, from the 1950s into the 1980s, the gap between the centre-left and the centre-right was narrower than it is today. However, a polarization began on the right in the '80s, between those who espoused some progressive values — often referred to as "Red Tories" — and those who were more socially conservative — "Blue Tories." The latter decried how governments, in their view, had degenerated into "nanny states," and many were not warm (to say the least) to how English and French bilingualism had been enshrined in the late '60s.

Bilingualism has always been controversial in New Brunswick, where one-third of the population is francophone, a community that, well into the '60s, was disadvantaged compared to the anglophone majority. New Brunswick of the '60s and '70s was, after all, where the mayor of the second largest city at the time openly opposed bilingualism in any sphere of public life, despite the city's demographics reflecting exactly that of the province. It is not surprising, therefore, that the dissent that surfaced on the right by the '80s was over bilingualism.

The inevitable soul searching began on the right after the humiliation of 1987, but then the unlikely happened. In Western Canada, the Confederation of Regions Party, or CORe, had splintered from the Social Credit Party. But after that party had enjoyed modest but encouraging success in New Bruns­wick during the 1988 federal election, Arch Pafford formed a provincial wing of the party the following year. Running in the 1991 election on the right of the PCs, CORe advocated for the repeal of the federal Official Languages Act of 1969, and proposed providing government services in French only in areas with a large francophone population. The Liberals had remained popular by the end of their first mandate but, to the surprise of many observers, the election resulted in CORe becoming the official opposition.

New Brunswick New Brunswick
52 → 1991 :: 23 Sep 1991 — 10 Sep 1995 — Majority Majority  LIB 
Summary Government Opposition Unproductive votes
Party Votes Seats Party Votes Seats Party Votes
# % % # # % % # # %
Parliament: 52   Majority Majority
Majority=30  Ab.Maj.: +17  G.Maj.: +34
Population [1991]: 723,900
Eligible: 518,011  Particip.: 80.06%
Votes: 414,728  Unproductive: 3,988
Seats: 58   1 seat = 1.72%
↳ Elec.Sys.:  FPTP: 58  
↳ By acclamation: 0 (0.00%)
Plurality: Votes  LIB  Seats  LIB 
Plurality:  +106,634 (+25.91%)
Plurality:  Seats: +38 (+65.52%)
Position2: Votes  COR  Seats  COR 
Candidacies: 224 (✓ 58)   m: 172 (✓ 48)   f: 52 (✓ 10)
 LIB  58   COR  48   PC  58   NDP  58   IND  2  
LIB
193,890 47.11 79.31 46
COR
PC
NDP
87,256
85,210
44,384
21.20
20.70
10.78
13.79
5.17
1.72
8
3
1
IND
REJ
ABS
850
3,138
103,283
0.21
0.76
——
 !!!  5 (8.62%)

But what would have happened if the right had not splintered? What if, instead, Pafford and his followers had managed to pull the Progressive Con­ser­va­tives to their way of thinking and had run under that single banner?

To find the answer, let's:

  1. Consider  COR  the party causing the vote splitting and  PC  the one affected by it.
  2. Set aside the 28 ridings where the person elected:
    • had a clear majority (50%+1) and represented neither  COR  nor  PC 
    • or represented  PC  and thus wasn't affected by vote splitting,
    which leaves us with 30 ridings.
  3. Transfer the votes received by  COR  to  PC  if the latter did not already win the riding.
  4. Recalculate the results in each of those 30 ridings to find the ones where the winning party would have been different.

Thus we could conclude that there would have been 24 differences.

Seats won due to vote splitting    LIB  16    Seats won by the spoiler party   COR  8
Riding Alternative LIB COR PC NDP IND        
Election → 46 8 3 1 0
Details
NB
Transfer
Beverly Brine +687 (41.00%)
 COR   PC    7 4            
NB
 PC  COR  +581 (54.90%)
Allison DeLong +700 (42.95%)
 LIB   PC  45   5            
NB
 PC  COR  +726 (56.25%)
Fred Harvey +131 (42.11%)
 LIB   PC  44   6            
NB
 PC  COR  +464 (51.86%)
Bruce Smith +426 (43.64%)
 LIB   PC  43   7            
NB
 PC  COR  +49 (47.04%)
L. Reid Hurley +719 (45.79%)
 LIB   PC  42   8            
NB
Transfer
Ed Allen +2,188 (49.29%)
 COR   PC    6 9            
NB
 PC  COR  +1,286 (48.70%)
Russ King +1,289 (38.03%)
 LIB   PC  41   10            
NB
 PC  COR  +2,242 (55.90%)
Georgie Day +129 (32.04%)
 LIB   PC  40   11            
NB
 PC  COR  +858 (47.85%)
Laureen Jarrett +2,409 (42.05%)
 LIB   PC  39   12            
NB
 PC  COR  +2,242 (62.48%)
John McKay +10 (33.45%)
 LIB   PC  38   13            
NB
Transfer
Ab Rector +161 (40.17%)
 COR   PC    5 14            
NB
 PC  COR  +170 (51.02%)
Doug Tyler +86 (46.47%)
 LIB   PC  37   15            
NB
 PC  COR  +338 (51.12%)
Vaughn Blaney +338 (41.94%)
 LIB   PC  36   16            
NB
Transfer
Gordon Willden +24 (35.14%)
 COR   PC    4 17            
NB
 PC  COR  +1,225 (46.46%)
George Jenkins +135 (32.27%)
 LIB   PC  35   18            
NB
 PC  COR  +1,688 (55.57%)
Stuart Jamieson +180 (31.52%)
 LIB   PC  34   19            
NB
 PC  COR  +147 (41.64%)
Leo McAdam +803 (38.64%)
 LIB   PC  33   20            
NB
 PC  COR  +503 (45.08%)
Jane Barry +1,056 (39.46%)
 LIB   PC  32   21            
NB
Transfer
Brent Taylor +156 (44.45%)
 COR   PC    3 22            
NB
 PC  COR  +107 (49.91%)
Ann Breault +691 (47.14%)
 LIB   PC  31   23            
NB
Transfer
Max White +1,319 (51.40%)
 COR   PC    2 24            
NB
 PC  COR  +390 (50.64%)
Larry Kennedy +1,190 (44.55%)
 LIB   PC  30   25            
NB
Transfer
Greg Hargrove +1,638 (50.06%)
 COR   PC    1 26            
NB
Transfer
Danny Cameron +853 (43.94%)
 COR   PC    0 27            
Redistribution → 30 0 27 1 0

The result was that 16 more Liberals than would have been expected were the first past the post. However, it was also clear that the Progressive Conservatives had still not recovered from their pummelling four years earlier, winning only three seats but managing to get just enough of the popular vote to obtain official party status in the legislature. But had the PCs and CORe been a single united party, the division of seats among parties would have been a blend traditional for New Brunswick, with the Liberals still obtaining a majority but of only two seats.

The legislative inexperience of the elected CORe members and ongoing infighting within their party led them to be an ineffective opposition. These factors helped the PCs to banish CORe from the legislature in the 1995 election, but the disarray within the latter had rubbed off on the entire right, leading the Liberals to being even more popular and winning their third consecutive majority.

New Brunswick New Brunswick
53 → 1995 :: 11 Sep 1995 —  6 Jun 1999 — Majority Majority  LIB 
Summary Government Opposition Unproductive votes
Party Votes Seats Party Votes Seats Party Votes
# % % # # % % # # %
Parliament: 53   Majority Majority
Majority=28  Ab.Maj.: +21  G.Maj.: +41
Population [1995]: 750,692 (est.)
Eligible: 517,132  Particip.: 76.04%
Votes: 393,250  Unproductive: 34,274
Seats: 55   1 seat = 1.82%
↳ Elec.Sys.:  FPTP: 55  
↳ By acclamation: 0 (0.00%)
Plurality: Votes  LIB  Seats  LIB 
Plurality:  +80,903 (+20.76%)
Plurality:  Seats: +42 (+76.36%)
Position2: Votes  PC  Seats  PC 
Candidacies: 226 (✓ 55)   m: 179 (✓ 46)   f: 47 (✓ 9)
 LIB  55   PC  55   NDP  55   COR  36   OTH  17   IND  8  
LIB
201,150 51.63 87.27 48
PC
NDP
120,247
37,579
30.87
9.65
10.91
1.82
6
1
COR
OTH
IND
REJ
ABS
27,684
1,267
1,635
3,688
123,882
7.11
0.33
0.42
0.94
——
Difference since the previous general election: -3 seats
 OTH  NLP  17
 !!!  9 (16.36%)

Some optimistic Progressive Conservatives may have tried to overcome their disappointment by spinning these results — that they got twice as many seats and increased their share of the popular vote by 50% compared to the previous general election — but the fact remained that the Liberals had emerged even stronger than in the previous legislature. To what extent did the 7.11% of the votes that remained loyal to CORe hurt the PCs?

To find the answer, let's:

  1. Consider  COR  the party causing the vote splitting and  PC  the one affected by it.
  2. Set aside the 31 ridings where the person elected:
    • had a clear majority (50%+1) and represented neither  COR  nor  PC 
    • or represented  PC  and thus wasn't affected by vote splitting,
    which leaves us with 24 ridings.
  3. Transfer the votes received by  COR  to  PC  if the latter did not already win the riding.
  4. Recalculate the results in each of those 24 ridings to find the ones where the winning party would have been different.

Thus we could conclude that there would have been 10 differences.

Seats won due to vote splitting    LIB  10    Seats won by the spoiler party   COR  0
Riding Alternative LIB PC NDP COR IND NLP      
Election → 48 6 1 0 0 0
Details
NB
 PC  COR  +443 (50.69%)
Harry Doyle +907 (43.91%)
 LIB   PC  47 7              
NB
 PC  COR  +81 (50.08%)
Eric Allaby +90 (46.91%)
 LIB   PC  46 8              
NB
 PC  COR  +504 (49.90%)
LeRoy Armstrong +44 (42.87%)
 LIB   PC  45 9              
NB
 PC  COR  +780 (51.83%)
David Olmstead +975 (41.43%)
 LIB   PC  44 10              
NB
 PC  COR  +925 (55.10%)
Hollis Steeves +725 (39.76%)
 LIB   PC  43 11              
NB
 PC  COR  +40 (41.79%)
Stuart Jamieson +184 (41.12%)
 LIB   PC  42 12              
NB
 PC  COR  +154 (47.68%)
Reg MacDonald +901 (45.50%)
 LIB   PC  41 13              
NB
 PC  COR  +585 (52.78%)
Larry Kennedy +7 (43.78%)
 LIB   PC  40 14              
NB
 PC  COR  +266 (50.07%)
Ann Breault +1,324 (46.08%)
 LIB   PC  39 15              
NB
 PC  COR  +439 (49.40%)
Bruce Smith +248 (43.61%)
 LIB   PC  38 16              
Redistribution → 38 16 1 0 0 0

Indeed, this time, the Liberals finished first in 10 ridings thanks to vote splitting, but even if those seats had gone to the PCs, their majority would still have been +11 instead of +21. By the 1999 general election, CORe had lapsed into insignificance: it presented only 18 candidates out of a possible 55, and garnered only 0.71% of the popular vote. In fact, this showing was so poor that it in no way hindered the PCs, by then led by Bernard Lord, in forming the province's strongest Conservative government since Confederation.



© 2019, 2024 :: PoliCan.ca (Maurice Y. Michaud)
Pub.: 25 May 2023 07:56
Rev.: 28 May 2023 10:24 (but data presented dynamically)