1956 British Columbia general election
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52 seats of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia 27 seats were needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The 1956 British Columbia general election was the 25th general election in the Province of British Columbia, Canada. It was held to elect members of the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia. The election was called on August 13, 1956, and held on September 19, 1956. The new legislature met for the first time on February 7, 1957.
The conservative Social Credit of Premier W.A.C. Bennett was re-elected with a majority in the legislature to a third term in government with over 45% of the popular vote.
The social democratic CCF formed the official opposition.
The British Columbia Liberal Party lost two of its four seats despite winning over 20% of the popular vote.
The Progressive Conservative Party lost its single seat in the legislature, and would not win a seat again until the 1972 election.
One seat was won by a Labour candidate, Tom Uphill of Fernie.
This election was first after BC switched from Alternative Voting (IRV) (in both single and multi-member districts) back to its historic system that used First Past The Post in single-member districts and Block Voting in multi-member districts.
Results[]
Party | Party leader | # of candidates |
Seats | Popular vote | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1953 | Elected | % Change | # | % | % Change | ||||
Social Credit | W.A.C. Bennett | 52 | 28 | 39 | 39.3% | 374,711 | 45.84% | +8.09% | |
CCF | Bob Strachan | 51 | 14 | 10 | -28.6% | 231,511 | 28.32% | -2.53% | |
Liberal | Arthur Laing | 52 | 4 | 2 | -50.0% | 177,922 | 21.77% | -1.82% | |
Labour | Tom Uphill | 1 | 1 | 1 | - | 1,321 | 0.16% | -0.06% | |
Progressive Conservative | Deane Finlayson | 22 | 1 | - | -100% | 25,373 | 3.11% | -2.49% | |
Labour Progressive | 14 | - | - | - | 3,381 | 0.41% | -0.62% | ||
Independent | 6 | - | - | - | 3,005 | 0.37% | +0.10% | ||
1 | * | - | * | 173 | 0.02% | * | |||
Total | 199 | 48 | 52 | 8.3% | 817,397 | 100% | |||
Source: Elections BC |
Note:
* Party did not nominate candidates in the previous election.
Results by riding[]
See also[]
- List of British Columbia political parties
- Elections in British Columbia
- 1956 elections in Canada
- 1956 in British Columbia
- September 1956 events