Progressive Conservative Party of Saskatchewan

Progressive Conservative Party of Saskatchewan

The Progressive Conservative Party of Saskatchewan (before 1942 known as the Conservative Party of Saskatchewan) ran in its first election in 1917, twelve years after the province of Saskatchewan was formed. Their best performance in the first half of the twentieth century was in 1929 when they received 36% of the vote and 24 out of 63 seats. Despite having fewer seats than the Liberals the Conservatives were able to form a coalition government with Progressives and independents with Tory James T.M. Anderson as Premier. Due largely to a controversy over the government's School Act the Co-operative government, as it was called, was defeated in the 1934 election with the Conservatives being completely wiped out. A contributing factor to the party's showing was the unpopularity of the federal Conservative government of R.B. Bennett.

With the rise of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation politics in the province became polarized between the Liberals and the CCF (which became the NDP in 1961) with the Conservatives being frozen out for decades.

The provincial Tory party did not elect another MLA until thirty years later when they won a single seat in 1964 only to lose that foothold three years later. The Tories returned to the legislature in the 1975 election when the collapse of the Liberal government of Ross Thatcher. The Progressive Conservatives elected 7 seats to 15 for the Liberals and 39 for the NDP. In 1978 the Liberals were wiped out and the Tories became the Official Opposition with 17 seats to the governing NDP's 44.

In 1982, the Progressive Conservatives under Grant Devine formed a majority government for the first time. They were re-elected in 1987 but defeated in 1991 due to unsuccessful economic policies which generated large deficits as well as a growing corruption scandal.

In the years following their defeat 14 Conservative members of the legislature and two caucus workers were convicted of fraud and breach of trust for illegally diverted hundreds of thousands of dollars from government allowances in a phoney expense-claim scam

The party was destroyed by this scandal winning only five seats in the 1995 election behind both the NDP and the Liberals and finally disbanding in 1997. Most former members and supporters now support the Saskatchewan Party.