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British Columbia general election, 1953

The 24th general election for the Province of British Columbia, Canada was called on April 10, 1953, and held on June 9, 1953. The new legislature met for the first time on September 15, 1953.

This was the second and last election to use the alternative voting system. Rather than marking the ballot with an X, numbers were to be placed opposite the names in order of choice. If, after the first count, no candidate received an absolute simple majority, the candidate with the least number of votes was dropped, and the second choices distributed among the remaining candidates. This process continued until a candidate emerged with the requisite majority vote. Some voters only indicated a first choice (plumping), and others did not utilize the full range available. Consequently as the counts progressed, some ballots would be exhausted and total valid votes would decline, thereby reducing the absolute majority required to be elected. In multi-member ridings, there were as many ballots as members to be elected, distinguished by colour and letters.

The minority government formed in 1952 by the conservative Social Credit of Premier W.A.C. Bennett lasted only nine months before new elections were called. Social Credit was re-elected with a majority in the legislature to a second term in government with almost 38% of the popular vote.

The social democratic Co-operative Commonwealth Federation formed the official opposition with the only significant opposition caucus (14 seats).

The British Columbia Liberal Party lost two of its six seats despite and maintined its 20% share of the popular vote.

The Progressive Conservative Party lost three of its four seat in the legislature, as its share of the popular cvote fell from almost 17% to under 6%.

One seat was won by a Labour candidate.

Party Party Leader # of candidates Seats Popular Vote
Previous After % Change First count % Change Final count %
Social Credit W.A.C. Bennett 48 0 28 - 274,771 37.75% +10.55% 300,372 45.54%
Co-operative Commonwealth 47 18 14 -22.2% 224,513 30.85% +0.07% 194,414 29.48%
Liberal 48 6 4 -33.3% 171,671 23.59% +0.13% 154,090 23.36%
Progressive Conservative 39 4 1 -75.0% 40,780 5.60% -11.24% 7,326 1.11%
Labour Tom Uphill 1 1 1 - 1,601 0.22% +0.06% 1,793 0.27%
Labour Progressive 25 0 0 - 7,496 1.03% +0.70% 816 0.12%
Christian Democratic 14 0 0 - 5,036 0.69% -0.24% 752 0.12%
Independent 6 0 0 - 1,951 0.27% 0.10% - -
People's 1 n.a. 0 n.a. 20 x n.a. - -
Total 229 48 48 - 727,839 100% - 659,563 100
Sources: Elections BC

Note:

n.a. - not applicable: party not recognized at the previous election

x - less than 0.005% of the popular vote

Preceded by:
1952 BC election

List of British Columbia elections

Followed by:
1956 BC election

Last updated: 06-06-2005 04:13:47
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