Conservative Party vote share in Sask. spiked by 16% in federal election

Many Conservative Party MPs saw a huge increase in their vote tallies across Saskatchewan during this week's federal election.

On top ofwinning all 14 federal ridings, all Conservative MPs received more votes than in the 2015 election, many of them significantly more.

For example, in the riding of Regina-Lewvan, the Conservatives saw their share increase by more than 10,000 votes from the last election held in 2015.

"One really good way to get people out to vote is to trigger emotion," said professor Loleen Berdahl, head of political studies at the University of Saskatchewan.

"I think the the Conservative campaign definitely worked on the emotional level in Saskatchewan and we might have seen some people showing up to vote based on that."

One of the most significant examples was in the riding of Regina-Wascana, a seat once held by veteran Liberal MP Ralph Goodale.

In 2015, the Conservative Party received 12,931 votes in the riding and the Liberal Party received 23,552 votes.

In 2019, the vote count saw a virtual reversal. The Conservative Party received 22,186 votes while Liberal support collapsed to 14,998.

"The Conservatives devoted a lot of resources to flip that riding," said Berdahl.

"They were able to to trigger some people to say, 'You know what? As much as individually they might like Ralph Goodale, they disliked the Trudeau Liberals more,' and they were able to mobilize that sentiment."

In total, Conservative MPs captured 64.3 per cent of the province's vote in 2019, an increase of 16per cent from the previous election.

In terms of total number of votes, Conservatives got366,611 in Saskatchewan this election, compared to267,937 last time around, an increase of 36.8 per cent.

The trend extended into rural ridings that have traditionally already voted Conservative. In the riding of Carlton Trail-Eagle Creek, the party's ballot count increased by 8,810 votes from the previous election.

The northern riding of Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River saw the lowest increase in Conservative votes, with the party earning 1,711 more ballots than the previous election.

While the federal carbon tax was often talked about in the campaign, Berdahl isn't sure it was the only issue people were voting on.

"When people are polled, they are supportive of wanting to do things that protect and advance the economy, and at the same time, they want climate action," she said. "We have this this real tension in Saskatchewan politics."

She said it was still too early to say whether these results will be a long-term trend in the province.

"I think what we're seeing already from from Premier Moe is is a willingness to keep pushing these buttons," she said. "I don't seethat necessarily stopping."