Canadian federal election, 1979

Canadian federal election, 1979

1974 ← May 22, 1979 → 1980

outgoing members ← → elected members

282 seats in the 31st Canadian Parliament 142 seats needed for a majority Turnout 75.7% (4.7pp)   First party Second party   Leader Joe Clark Pierre Trudeau Party Progressive Conservative Liberal Leader since February 22, 1976 April 6, 1968 Leader's seat Yellowhead Mount Royal Last election 95 seats, 35.46% 141 seats, 43.15% Seats before 98 133 Seats won 136 114 Seat change 38 19 Popular vote 4,111,606 4,595,319 Percentage 35.89% 40.11% Swing 0.43pp 3.04pp   Third party Fourth party   SC Leader Ed Broadbent Fabien Roy Party New Democratic Social Credit Leader since July 7, 1975 March 30, 1979 Leader's seat Oshawa Beauce Last election 16 seats, 15.44% 11 seats, 5.06% Seats before 17 9 Seats won 26 6 Seat change 9 3 Popular vote 2,048,988 527,604 Percentage 17.88% 4.61% Swing 2.45pp 0.46pp

Popular vote map showing seat totals by province

Prime Minister before election Pierre Trudeau Liberal Prime Minister-designate Joe Clark Progressive Conservative

Pierre Trudeau
Liberal

Joe Clark
Progressive Conservative

The Canadian federal election of 1979 was held on May 22, 1979, to elect members of the Canadian House of Commons of the 31st Parliament of Canada. It resulted in the defeat of the Liberal Party of Canada after 11 years in power under Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. Joe Clark led the Progressive Conservative Party to power, but with only a minority of seats in the House of Commons. The Liberals, however, did beat the Progressive Conservatives in the overall popular vote by more than 400,000 votes.

The Trudeau Liberals had become very unpopular during their last term in government because of broken promises to the left made in the previous election. Although elections in Canada are normally held four years apart, Trudeau deferred calling an election until five years after the previous election in the hope that the Liberal Party would be able to recover some of the support that it had lost. The effort was unsuccessful, however, and the Liberals lost 27 seats due to the resulting vote splitting on the left. Several high-profile cabinet ministers were defeated, and the Conservatives were elected in what was a sort of an accident of protest. Trudeau resigned as Liberal leader following the election.

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