1999 Ontario general election

June 3, 1999
103 seats in the 37th Legislative Assembly of Ontario 52 seats needed for a majority
First party Second party Third party   Leader Mike Harris Dalton McGuinty Howard Hampton Party Progressive Conservative Liberal New Democratic Leader since May 12, 1990 December 1, 1996 June 22, 1996 Leader's seat Nipissing Ottawa South Kenora—Rainy River Last election 82 30 17 Seats won 59 35 9 Seat change 23 5 8 Popular vote 1,978,059 1,751,472 551,009 Percentage 45.1% 39.9% 12.6% Swing 0.3pp 8.8pp 8.0pp
Popular vote by riding. As this is an FPTP election, seat totals are not determined by popular vote, but instead via results by each riding.
Premier before election Mike Harris Progressive Conservative Premier after election Mike Harris Progressive Conservative

The 1999 Ontario general election was held on June 3, 1999, to elect members of the 37th Legislative Assembly of the Canadian province Ontario.

The governing Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario, led by Premier Mike Harris, was re-elected to a second majority government.

The last time the Legislative Assembly of Ontario had experienced a reduced number of seats heading into an election was in 1934. Previously, the province's riding boundaries were different from those used in federal elections. In the 1999 election, as a consequence of an Act passed in 1996,^[1] provincial riding boundaries were redrawn to precisely match federal ridings, resulting in 27 fewer seats in the legislature. Notably, in a number of ridings this resulted in incumbent MPPs directly facing each other in the new seats; in a few ridings, incumbent MPPs from the same party even had to compete against each other for their own party's nomination.

Campaign

The Ontario Legislature after the 1999 election.

According to a poll released on the eve of the election, the Liberal Party entered the campaign with a lead over the Progressive Conservatives. This poll's accuracy was disputed by many, however, and even Liberal leader Dalton McGuinty cast doubt on it: noting that most polling companies claim to be accurate 19 times out of 20, he suggested that this might have been the 20th. Subsequent polls taken in the early period of the campaign showed the Progressive Conservatives with a commanding lead over the Liberals, in a manner more consistent with pre-election numbers.

Harris' government had delivered large tax cuts and significantly reduced the deficit, but they had also severely cut spending in the process. They had the support of the legendary Tory political machine, bolstered by a group of American experts imported from the United States' Republican Party. They targeted Dalton McGuinty as inexperienced ("Dalton McGuinty is not up to the job" was a Tory campaign slogan), and attacked him for lacking a clear vision. This was successful due to McGuinty having a reputation for being uncomfortable and stiff in the media. During the leader's debates, McGuinty had a poor performance, being unable to explain his party's platform clearly and being compared to fictional serial killer Norman Bates by NDP leader Howard Hampton.

The extensive use of attack ads and wedge issues by the Tories was a new development in Canadian politics, and some commentators worried the election process was becoming Americanized.

The third major party, the Ontario New Democratic Party led by Howard Hampton, spent much the campaign battling the memory of Bob Rae's unpopular government in the early 1990s. Despite Hampton's efforts to reach out to labour, the NDP were substantially weakened as the major unions deserted them in favour of the Liberals, hoping to defeat the Tories by strategic voting.

The province was enjoying strong economic growth at the time which also vindicated the Conservatives' deficit-cutting measures in the public. The Liberal Party managed to recover some support late in the campaign, but it was not enough and the Tories were re-elected with a second consecutive majority government.

Opinion polls

Results

Summary of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario election results

Party		Party leader	Candidates	Seats				Popular vote
				1995	Dissol.	2011	Change	#	%	Change
	Progressive Conservative	Mike Harris	103	82	82	59	23	1,978,059	45.06%	0.09
	Liberal	Dalton McGuinty	103	30	30	35	5	1,751,472	39.89%	8.84
	New Democratic	Howard Hampton	103	17	17	9	8	550,807	12.55%	7.99
	Independent	—	62	1	1	–	1	26,980	0.61%	0.19
	Green	Frank de Jong	58	–	–	–	–	30,781	0.70%	0.36
	Family Coalition	Giuseppe Gori	37	–	–	–	–	24,216	0.55%	0.93
	Natural Law	Ron Parker	74	–	–	–	–	19,454	0.44%
	Freedom	Lloyd Walker	14	–	–	–	–	4,831	0.11%
	Libertarian	Sam Apelbaum	7	–	–	–	–	2,337	0.05%	0.10
	Communist	Hassan Husseini	4	–	–	–	–	814	0.02%
	Confederation of Regions	—	2	–	–	–	–	282	0.01%	0.09
	Reform	—	1	–	–	–	–	174	–	New
Total			568	130	130	103	27	4,390,207	100.00
Rejected, unmarked and declined ballots								40,404
Turnout								4,430,611
Registered voters / turnout %								7,598,407	58.31%	3.79

Among the independent candidates were slates fielded by several unregistered parties:

• 27 candidates were affiliated with the Communist Party of Canada - Marxist-Leninist. These candidates won a total of 7,194 votes.
• Three were members of the Humanist Party of Ontario.

It is possible that some independent candidates were actually members of these or other unregistered parties.

Constituency results

Expenditure entries are taken from official candidate reports as listed by Elections Ontario. The figures cited are the "Total Candidate's Campaign Expenses Subject to Limitation", and include transfers from constituency associations.

The official returns incorrectly list Ray as a candidate of the Ontario Communist Party, rather than the Communist League.

By-elections

Six by-elections were held between the 1999 and 2003 elections.

See also

• Politics of Ontario
• Independent candidates, 1999 Ontario provincial election
• Independent Marxist–Leninist candidates, 1999 Ontario provincial election
• List of Ontario political parties
• Premier of Ontario
• Leader of the Opposition (Ontario)
• Natural Law Party candidates, 1999 Ontario provincial election

References