Yukon Party

Yukon Party
Parti du Yukon
Active territorial party
Leader Darrell Pasloski
President Pat McInroy
Founded 1991 (1991)
Preceded by Progressive Conservative Party
Headquarters Whitehorse, YT
Ideology Conservatism
Yukon regionalism
Political position Centre-right
Colours Blue
Seats in Legislature
6 / 19
Website
www.yukonparty.ca

The Yukon Party (French: Parti du Yukon) is a conservative political party in Yukon, Canada. It is the successor to the Yukon Progressive Conservative Party.

Formation

With Prime Minister Brian Mulroney's Progressive Conservative federal government's decreasing popularity, the Yukon Progressive Conservatives decided to sever its relations with the federal Conservatives, and renamed itself the "Yukon Party" prior to the 1992 election.

However, two Progressive Conservative MLAs, Bea Firth and Alan Nordling, quit the party in protest and sat as independent MLAs until 1996. Nordling later returned to the party, and was defeated as a Yukon Party candidate in the 1996 election, while Firth retired from politics.

After seven years in power, the NDP was defeated in 1992 and the Yukon Party's John Ostashek became Premier of Yukon. (Note: Ostashek used the title Government Leader, never Premier.) His government became very unpopular by increasing taxes and cutting services. Ostashek was voted out of office in 1996 after only one term. The Yukon Party won only three seats, falling to third place for the first time behind the Yukon Liberal Party.

Since 2000

The party's fortunes continued to decline at the 2000 general election. The Yukon Party was reduced to a single seat in the legislature as the right wing vote moved to the Yukon Liberal Party, putting the Liberals in power for the first time in the territory's history.

Liberal Premier Pat Duncan's government was plagued with internal dissent, however, and despite having won an outright majority of seats in the general election, defections and resignations reduced the Liberals to a minority government within two years. Premier Duncan called a snap election for 4 November 2002, in an effort to regain her majority, but the early election call backfired.

The Yukon Party had elected Dennis Fentie, a rural Member of the Yukon Legislative Assembly (MLA), who had defected from the NDP, as its new leader in June 2002. Despite being caught by surprise by the election call, the party was able to win a majority government with 12 seats compared to five for the NDP. The Liberals were reduced to a single seat. Fentie became the second Yukon Premier from a rural riding.

On 10 October 2006, the Yukon Party was re-elected, holding 10 seats in the Legislative Assembly. The Yukon Liberals won five seats and the Yukon New Democrats won three.

2011 leadership election

On May 28, 2011, a leadership election was held to replace Dennis Fentie. Darrell Pasloski was chosen after only one ballot.[1]

Candidate Votes Percentage
Darrell Pasloski 767 61.3%
Rod Taylor 436 34.9%
Jim Kenyon 48 3.8%
TOTAL 1,251 100.0%

Election results

Election Leader Votes % Seats +/– Position Government
1992 John Ostashek 35.9
7 / 17
Increase 7 Increase 1st Minority
1996 John Ostashek 4,366 30.1
3 / 17
Decrease 4 Decrease 2nd Opposition
2000 John Ostashek 3,466 23.3
1 / 17
Decrease 2 Decrease 3rd Opposition
2002 Dennis Fentie 5,650 40.3
12 / 18
Increase 11 Increase 1st Majority
2006 Dennis Fentie 5,503 40.6
10 / 18
Decrease 2 Steady 1st Majority
2011 Darrell Pasloski 5,503 40.6
11 / 19
Increase 1 Steady 1st Majority
2016 Darrell Pasloski 6,272 33.4
6 / 19
Decrease 5 Decrease 2nd Opposition

Leaders

See also

References

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