When the election was called, it was expected to be anticlimactic, with Klein cruising to his fourth straight majority, the tenth for his Progressive Conservative Party.
Shortly after the drop of the writs, Klein's mother died and all parties suspended their campaigns for several days. After the campaign resumed, Klein avoided making any policy announcements and attended few events. One commentator called it "Kleinfeld: the campaign about nothing" (a reference to the television sitcomSeinfeld). The Liberal Party, which had hoped to hold onto the five seats it had and regain the two seats that it had lost to resignations, began to pick up momentum and became far more optimistic.
In the end, the Conservatives were re-elected, despite losing 11 seats and 15% of the popular vote. The Liberals more than doubled their seats by electing 17 MLA's on election night while dominating Edmonton, and making strong inroads in Calgary. The Alberta New Democrats (NDP) held on to their two seats and gained two more, all in Edmonton. The Conservatives swept rural Alberta except for one seat that went to the Alberta Alliance, which placed second in a number of rural ridings. The Green Party gained in the popular vote, jumping from 0.3% in the 2001 election to 2.8%, and placed third in some places. It was unable to win any seats, however. Social Credit placed third in a number of ridings, and its leader tied for second in Rocky Mountain House. The Conservative, Liberal and NDP leaders all easily held onto their own seats.
1 "Edmonton" corresponds to only the city of Edmonton. (Only the ridings whose names begin with "Edmonton".) The four suburban ridings around the city as listed below are grouped with Central Alberta in this table.
Alberta's electoral laws fix the number of legislature seats at 83. As a result of the Alberta Electoral Boundary Re-distribution, 2004, Calgary gained two seats. Edmonton lost one seat, and one "special consideration" division was eliminated. Dunvegan-Central Peace is the sole remaining "special" division - due to its isolation, it is allowed to have a population below 75% of the provincial average. Lesser Slave Lake is now considered to be a standard rural division as its boundaries were re-drawn so that its population is slightly above 75% of the provincial average. One urbanized division outside Calgary and Edmonton was added, and two rural seats were eliminated.
In the 2001 election, the Progressive Conservatives recorded a result that was comparable to those achieved in their years of dominance under Peter Lougheed. The Tories received 627,252 out of 1,013,152 votes cast and won 74 seats, gaining 11 seats over and above their 1997 result at the expense of the Liberals. This result was achieved due to a resurgence of the party in Edmonton, where the Tories won a majority of seats for the first time since 1982. Premier Ralph Klein easily retained his Calgary-Elbow seat.
On April 8, 2002, Doug Griffiths retained the Tories' seat in Wainwright in the only by-election held since the 2001 election, albeit with a substantially reduced plurality. The Tories lost only one seat since the 2001 election, after Edmonton-Norwood MLA Gary Masykcrossed the floor to join the Alberta Alliance. As expected, the Tories nominated a full slate of candidates for the 2004 election.
The 2001 election was generally regarded to be as a disaster for the Liberals. Although the Liberals retained Official Opposition status and received 276,854 votes, the party lost 11 seats to the Tories and won only seven seats, six of them in Edmonton. Leader Nancy Macbeth even lost her own seat in Edmonton-McClung - she resigned days after the election and was replaced by Ken Nicol, the Opposition's sole representative outside the capital.
Nicol eventually resigned as MLA for Lethbridge-East and as Leader of the Opposition to run (unsuccessfully) for the Liberals in the federal election, as did Edmonton-Ellerslie MLA Debby Carlson. These seats remained vacant through dissolution. The Liberals were led in the 2004 election by Edmonton-Riverview MLA Kevin Taft, who was elected to the position in March 2004. The Liberals had 82 candidates in the 2004 election - they were absent from the ballot in Drumheller-Stettler after failing to file papers for their expected candidate, Don McMann before the deadline.
In 2001, the New Democrats were unable to claim Official Opposition status from the floundering Liberals, but Leader Raj Pannu managed to hold the party's two existing seatsâ€"Pannu's own in Edmontonâ€"Strathcona and Brian Mason's seat in Edmonton Highlands (later merged into Edmonton Highlands-Norwood). The "NDs", as they were then known, received 81,339 votes. Pannu resigned the leadership in July 2004, with Mason filling the role of interim leader before being elected to that position in September 2004. The party has also ceased abbreviating its name as "ND in favour of the more traditional "NDP" abbreviation. The NDP nominated a full slate of candidates for the 2004 election.
The Alberta Alliance was registered in October 2002 and held its founding convention in February 2003. Its leader, Randy Thorsteinson had led Social Credit through a modest rebirth before quitting that party in April 1999. The party's sole MLA, Gary Masyk (Edmonton-Norwood) crossed the floor from the governing Progressive Conservatives on June 29, 2004. The Alliance nominated a full slate of candidates for the 2004 election, the only other party besides the Tories and the NDP to do so.
Also known as the "Green Party of Alberta", the Alberta Greens ran 10 candidates in the 2001 election, who combined for 2,850 votes. In the 2004 election, the Greens nominated 49 candidates - more than 4 times the highest number of candidates they had previously run in an election.
Prior to the 2001 election, the Social Credit Party was in turmoil following the departure of Leader Randy Thorsteinson. Under Lavern Ahlstrom, the party nominated 12 candidates in the 2001 election (down from 70 in 1997), and received 5,361 votes (down from 64,667). The party had 42 candidates for the 2004 election.
The Separation Party of Alberta was founded in June 2004 taking over the rights of the Alberta First Party. Bruce Hutton became interim leader. As a separatist party, it is the separatist successor to the Alberta Independence Party, which ran some independent candidates in the 2001 election, but never achieved official party status. The separatist cause was first taken up by the Western Canada Concept in the early 1980s when Gordon Kesler won a by-election. The Separation Party had 12 candidates in the 2004 election. See Alberta Separatism.
The The Equity Party ran no candidates in this election, The party was de-registered after the Alberta government amended the Elections Act to force a party to run at least one candidate, the party failed to field a candidate and was de-registered.
The Alberta Party, Equity Party and the Reform Party did not run any candidates in the 2001 election. The Equity Party and Reform Party were also absent from the ballot in 2004. The party was de-registered after the Alberta government amended the Elections Act to force a party to run at least one candidate, the party failed to field a candidate and was de-registered.
De-registered parties
The Natural Law Party of Alberta was de-registered by Elections Alberta in 2001, after they stopped filing financial statements. In 2001 The Natural Law Party did not nominate any candidates.
Independent candidates
29 independent candidates ran in the 2001 election. These candidates won a total of 10,528 votes. 10 independents ran in 2004.
October 31 - Premier Klein's mother, Florence Gray dies at the age of 80 following a year-long illness. All major parties announce they will suspend their provincial campaigns while the premier mourns.
November 4 - Global Television re-iterates that they will not invite Alberta Alliance leader Randy Thorsteinson to their leaders debate, because his party did not elect any members in the previous election and their sole MLA crossed the floor. The decision sparks anger amongst Alliance members and even disappoints the other three leaders.
November 8 - Close of nomination]s and the Global television leaders debate involving Klein, Taft and Mason.
November 13 - NDP leader Mason releases a brochure entitled Health Care for Dummies in an effort to mock the premier's reluctance to discuss health care in detail during the campaign.
November 22 - Voting day for the 26th Alberta general election. * 8:00 p.m. local time: Polls close (03:00, Nov 23 UTC) * 8:36 p.m.: CBC projects a PC majority (03:36, Nov 23 UTC)
December 9 - The Court of Queen's Bench rules that Chris Kibermanis (Lib.) won the election in Edmonton Castle Downs by three votes, upholding the result of the initial, election-night result. The PC candidate, Thomas Lukaszuk, appealed to the Alberta Court of Appeal.
January 24 - The Alberta Court of Appeal rules that Lukaszuk won the election in Edmonton Castle Downs by three votes, overturning the result of the first vote-count, which had given the seat to Kibermanis of the Liberals. Kibermanis accepted defeat and did not appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada.
*Ipsos-Reid, 2004-10-29: PC 50%, Lib 26%, NDP 10%, AAP 9%, Green 4% *COMPAS Inc. / Calgary Herald, 2004-11-3, 2004-11-4: PC 61%, Lib 19%, NDP 16%, Green 3%, Separation 1%, Other 1%. Interestingly, the pollsters only prompted for the three "major" parties yet Green and Separation showed up over 1% in the results while the Alliance, which is contesting every riding and holds a seat in the legislature, did not. [1] *Cameron Strategy Inc. / Global News / Calgary Herald, 2004-11-8-11-16: PC 47%, Lib 21%, NDP 11%, AAP 9%, Green 5% *Ipsos-Reid, 2004-11-12-11-17: PC 44%, Lib 29%, NDP 12%, AAP 9%, Green 4% (800 adults, MoE 3.5%)
