British Columbia Conservative Party - The BC Progressive Conservative Party

The BC Progressive Conservative Party

In October 1951, the Liberal Party decided to dissolve the coalition and Premier Johnson dismissed his Conservative ministers including Anscomb and continued as a minority government. The Conservatives refounded their party calling themselves the "Progressive Conservatives" as the federal party had adopted the "Progressive" prefix in 1942. In the ensuing 1952 provincial election the Liberals were reduced to six seats, the Conservatives to four and Johnson and Anscomb both lost their seats while the Social Credit Party was able to form a government under Bennett that would rule the province for the next two decades.

W. A. C. Bennett, a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), ran for the leadership of the Tories and lost. Bennett had been elected and re-elected as a BC Conservative MLA in the 1941, 1945, and 1949 provincial elections. After losing the BC Conservative leadership, Bennett left the party and joined the small Social Credit League, becoming its leader. Bennett dropped the party's social credit monetary reform policy, and adopted a populist conservative platform.

The coalition government, whose raison d'être had been to keep the CCF out of power, had introduced an instant-runoff voting system for the 1952 election in the hope that Conservatives and Liberal supporters would list the other party as their second choice and keep the CCF out of power.

This worked to the benefit of Social Credit, who were able to take advantage of divisions between the Liberals and Conservatives, as well as the desire for change. Bennett's party was able to win a slim minority government with 19 Social Credit MLAs compared to 18 CCFers, one Labour, six Liberals, and four Tories.

It was clear to those who wanted to keep the CCF out of power that only the Social Credit Party would be able to accomplish that task. In the 1953 election, Liberal and Tory supporters transferred their support to Bennett's party, sweeping it to power with 28 out of 48 seats. Having a majority government the Social Credit government changed the electoral system back to first past the post in order to cement their base. Social Credit became, in effect, the new centre-right coalition party, and both the Liberals and the Tories became marginalised.

The Progressive Conservatives won only four seats in 1952, one in 1953, and were completely shut out of the legislature between 1956 and 1972 as conservative-minded voters moved to Social Credit. The Tories managed to win two seats in the 1972 election (Oak Bay and Saanich and the Islands), and one in the 1975 election (Oak Bay).

George Scott Wallace was elected in the 1969 general election as a Social Credit Member of the British Columbia Legislative Assembly for Oak Bay]. Wallace crossed the floor to join the British Columbia Progressive Conservative Party in 1971 and was reelected as a Tory in the 1972 general election. He was elected leader of the party in 1973, after the previous party leader lost his seat, and led it through the 1975 general election in which he was the only Tory MLA to win a seat. He stepped down as party leader in July 1977 and retired from the Legislature on December 31, 1977 in order to return to his medical practice.

With most Conservatives in the province supporting Social Credit, the federal Progressive Conservative Party kept its distance in order to avoid alienating Social Credit Party supporters:

"When the federal and provincial general election campaigns overlapped in 1979, the federal Conservative leader was clearly at some pains to avoid any contact with Vic Stephens, the leader of the provincial party."

Wallace's successor was the last BC Progressive Conservative MLA to be elected: Victor Albert Stephens in the 1978 Oak Bay by-election. The last MLA to represent the BC Progressive Conservative Party was Prince Rupert MLA Graham Lea, who had been elected as a New Democrat in 1983 but crossed the floor after losing the 1984 New Democrat leadership convention to become the sole member of the United Party. He then became a Progressive Conservative on March 26, 1986 before quitting politics altogether in October 1986 when the legislature was dissolved for the 1986 general election.