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2 Leaders of the Ontario Liberal Party 3 External link |
Ontario politics in recent times have been dominated by the Progressive Conservatives. The Liberals have formed the Government only five out of the past sixty years. For forty-two years, from 1943 to 1985 the province was governed by the Tories. During this period the Liberal Party often was further to the right of the moderate Conservative administrations.
The Ontario Liberal Party first broke this hold in 1985 under the leadership of David Peterson who served as premier of a minority government until 1987 due to an accord signed with the NDP in which the NDP exchanged its support for the implementation of several NDP policies. As the result of an election held once the accored expired, Peterson was returned with a majority government which was in power from 1987 to 1990.
Peterson's government ruled in a time of economic plenty where occasional instances of fiscal imprudence were not much remarked on. Peterson was a close ally of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney on the Meech Lake Accord but opposed Mulroney on the issue of free trade. The election of 1990 was a shock defeat to the Liberals, who had gone in with strong poll numbers. They were defeated by the New Democratic Party under Bob Rae. The Liberal defeat was in part caused by voter anger at going to the polls just three years into the government's mandate. The campaign was also bady run with a mid-campaign proposal to cut the provincial sales tax a particularly bad blunder. The party had also underestimated the impact of the Patti Starr fundraising scandal as well as allegations surrounding the Liberal government's links with land developers.
In 1995 the Liberal party was expected to replace the unpopular NDP, but a poorly run campaign under Lyn McLeod saw the party beaten by the Conservatives under Mike Harris. In the 1999 election the Conservatives started the campaign behind in the polls, but an advertising strategy focusing on attacking new Liberal leader Dalton McGuinty as well as a weak campaign by the Liberals saw the Tories returned to power.
The 2003 Ontario election, however, saw the Tories run the poor campaign, and the Liberal party held onto its earlier support and even increased it, eventually winning a landslide victory and once again forming the government of Ontario.
See also: List of Ontario Premiers
++Hepburn resigned as Premier in October 1942 after deignating Gordon Daniel Conant as his successor and Conant was sworn in as Premier. The Ontario Liberal Association (particularly supporters of William Lyon Mackenzie King) demanded a leadership convention and one was finally held in May 1943 electing Harry Nixon. Technically, Hepburn did not resign as Liberal leader until the convention. History
Leaders of the Ontario Liberal Party
+Even though Sinclair led the party through two elections he was never formally elected as leader by the Ontario Liberal Association which, due to its state of disorganization, did not organize a leadership convention until 1930.