Harper heads another Minority Government

Prime Minister Stephen Harper on October 30 appointed a new federal Cabinet charged with protecting Canadians in a time of increasing global economic instability.

The new 37-member Conservative cabinet will have more experience, more women and a House leader with a more gentlemanly reputation than his hyper-partisan predecessor.

The 11 women in Harper's new cabinet fall short of the record 16 appointed by Jean Chretien.

But the move pushes the percentage of women in cabinet to 29.8 per cent, higher than in the United States and closer to European countries such as France, Germany and Britain. Harper appointed Leona Aglukkaq to Health, Lisa Raitt to Natural Resources, and Prince Edward Island's Gail Shea to Fisheries.

“While the fundamentals of Canada’s economy remain stronger, more stable and more durable than those of many other nations, it is clear that we are not immune to what happens outside our borders,” said the Prime Minister. “That is why the central responsibility of our new mandate will be to ensure that Canada’s businesses and families have the security they need to weather any global economic storm.”

As part of the strong economic focus of the new Cabinet, the Prime Minister announced that key economic portfolios would remain in the hands of cabinet veterans, including Jim Flaherty, who will remain Minister of Finance. At the same time, the Prime Minister welcomed several first-time Cabinet ministers who will bring a broad range of experience to the Cabinet table.

“This will be an experienced, economically focused Ministry that is prepared to immediately get to work in the interests of Canadians,” said the Prime Minister. “This is the right team for these times. We will build a foundation of strength that will protect the earnings, savings and financial security of Canadians and ensure that Canada emerges from this time of global turmoil stronger than ever before.”

Election Results

"Harper had called the election on September 7, appealing for a stronger mandate to manage the economy in uncertain times. He won more seats, but not clear control, although as he took the stage in Calgary for his victory speech, he appeared elated, not disappointed, with his larger minority — and struck perhaps the most non-partisan, co-operative tone of his political career," writes Campbell Clark in Globe and Mail.

Harper, "a shrewd, dour economist" from Alberta, has led Canada since his right-of-center party unseated the long-serving Liberals in February 2006. His minority government was the longest in the country's history until he called an election 38 days ago.

A bright spot in this election is the record number of women who have been elected tot he House of Commons. The 68 women elected comprise 22.1% of current MPs, which marks a record for both the number of women and their proportion of the overall House. 

The 2008 election was a real success for the Conservative Party winning 143 seats, gaining 16 more seats the party had in the previous Parliament but.shy of the majority of 155 seats in the 308-seat House of Commons. The Liberals, the official opposition led by Stephane Dion, a political scientist from Quebec, had won 77 seats. They were followed by the Bloc Quebecois, the secessionist party from the province of Quebec with 49 seats, and the New Democrats, with 37 seats. The Green Party won no seats but this is the only party to have increased its actual number of votes in the face of a largely decline in turnout. Green votes grew by a substantial 277,000.  

Conservatives won 38%, Liberals 26%, NDP 18%, Bloc Quebecois 10%, Green 7% and others 1% of the votes cast.

The Liberal Party, Canada's top party, forming the government for most of Canada's 141 years, suffered a severe drubbing, dropping to 77 seats from 95 in the previous Parliament. 

Liberals garnered the lowest share of popular vote the party had ever tallied — lower than the 28 per cent the John Turner-led Liberals garnered in 1984.

Stéphane Dion, being ousted as leader after a loss, would be just the second Liberal leader to fail to become Canada's prime minister. The only other was Edward Blake, who led the party to defeat in the 1882 and 1887 elections.

Voter turnout was 58.8 percent, the lowest in Canadian history and down six points from the 2006 election.

The main factor in Conservative success was the big drop in turnout among Liberal supporters. While the Green Party managed to split the Conservative's opposition by capturing a number of defecting Liberals and NDPers, the Conservatives benefited even more from the hundreds of thousands of disenchanted Liberals who simply stayed home on election day. 

The Conservatives picked up 11 seats in Ontario with an impressive gain in popular vote from 35 to 48%. However, the Conservatives won hardly any more votes in Ontario compared to 2006. Their gain in vote share came about because 500,000 Ontario voters went AWOL between the two elections, most of them Liberal, leaving the Conservative candidates better supported in comparison. The Conservatives were not able to capitalize on the drop in Bloc support across Quebec, because they received 120,000 fewer votes in that province themselves. The only province where the Conservatives made many gains thanks to a substantial increase in votes was British Columbia.