Minority Government     from TCE Standard

A minority government is one that does not have a majority of MPs attending its caucus. A minority parliament (in which no party can claim a majority of MPs) need not result in a minority government if 2 or more parties are willing to form a coalition government, but since 1867 no peacetime coalition governments and only one wartime coalition (1917) have existed. Since 1921 there have been 8 minority parliaments (1921, 1925, 1957, 1962, 1963, 1965, 1972 and 1979) and 9 minority governments (the 1925 parliaments had both Liberal and Conservative governments), 4 of them Conservative, 5 of them Liberal. Of the former (1926, 1957-58, 1962-63 and 1979-80), none endured for more than a few months and only one (1957-58) did not fall on a vote of confidence. Of the 5 Liberal governments, one (1925-26), under Mackenzie King, left office following the refusal of the governor general to grant a dissolution. A second Liberal government (1972-74) was defeated on its budget, but it is generally agreed that it sought defeat in the correct belief that it could win a majority in an election. The remaining Liberal minority governments (1921-25, 1963-65 and 1965-68) were able to gain the support of the third parties.

The balance of power in minority parliaments in Canada has been held by reformist parties of the broad left (Progressives, CCF, NDP) or, occasionally, by a regional French Canadian party (Créditistes) - parties that have feared and distrusted the intentions of the Conservative Party, which was, in any event, unable to compromise its policy positions to accommodate them. The Liberal Party, however, has always been willing to accommodate them, at least minimally. For example, the King government's ability to retain the confidence of the Commons from 1921 to 1925 depended partly on the strong antitariff policy favoured by the PROGRESSIVE PARTY. The Pearson minority governments of 1963-65 and 1965-68 and the Trudeau minority government of 1972-74 wooed the NDP by enacting, or by committing themselves to enact, the Canada Pension Plan, the Canada Assistance Plan, the Guaranteed Income Supplement for old-age pensioners, universal medicare, nonpartisan redistribution of seats in the House of Commons, regulation of election expenses and the establishment of Petro-Canada.

Perhaps the Liberal governments would have enacted these measures anyway, but undoubtedly the possibility of being hanged within a fortnight concentrated their minds and imparted an urgency to their legislative programs. In contrast, immediately following the election of the Conservative minority government of 1979-80, PM Joe Clark announced he would govern as if he had a majority. He tried, even to the extent of allying with the Liberal Party and NDP, to deprive the Créditistes of their standing as a recognized political party in the House of Commons, although his government depended for its existence upon the votes of those same Créditistes. As a result, the Créditistes lost their collective right to speak in all matters before the House as well as their right to public funding for their caucus research office. In the non-confidence vote of December 1979, the Créditistes withheld their support for the government despite their chances of re-election being slim.