Political Career
MacKay was the New Democratic Party's candidate for the division of Wolseley in the 1973 provincial election. On election night, official results showed that he had received the same number of votes as Liberal Party leader Izzy Asper. Jim Maloway, the returning officer, cast a tiebreaking vote for MacKay and declared him as the elected member; a subsequent recount, however, determined that Asper actually won by four votes. Herb Schulz's memoirs indicate that MacKay would have been appointed as Justice Minister in Edward Schreyer's government, had he been elected.
Asper resigned his seat in 1975, and MacKay contested a by-election to replace him. He finished third against Progressive Conservative candidate Robert Wilson in a close three-way contest. He contested Wolseley for a third time in the 1977 provincial election, and lost to Wilson by only 74 votes.
MacKay was a founding member of the Progressive Party, which was created by former NDP cabinet minister Sidney Green in 1981. He again sought election in Wolseley in the 1981 provincial election, and was resoundingly defeated.
Read more about this topic: Murdoch Mac Kay
Famous quotes containing the words political and/or career:
“A political leader must keep looking over his shoulder all the time to see if the boys are still there. If they arent still there, hes no longer a political leader.”
—Bernard Baruch (18701965)
“He was at a starting point which makes many a mans career a fine subject for betting, if there were any gentlemen given to that amusement who could appreciate the complicated probabilities of an arduous purpose, with all the possible thwartings and furtherings of circumstance, all the niceties of inward balance, by which a man swings and makes his point or else is carried headlong.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)