Canadian Alliance leadership elections

The Canadian Alliance, a conservative political party in Canada, held two leadership elections to choose the party's leader. The first was held shortly after the party's founding in 2000, and the second was held in 2002. The party merged with the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada in 2003 to form the Conservative Party of Canada.

The 1987 founding convention of the Reform Party of Canada elected Preston Manning as party leader by acclamation. Manning was re-ratified as leader at every subsequent convention of the party without opposition.

The Reform Party became the "Canadian Reform Conservative Alliance" (better known as the "Canadian Alliance") in 2000 and had its first contested leadership election. Canadian Alliance leadership votes were conducted via a pure one member, one vote system in which each party member cast a ballot with equal weight.

In the CA's system, the leader was the candidate who received 50% plus one of all votes cast (i.e., an absolute majority). If no candidate had an absolute majority on the first ballot, the top two candidates participated in a run-off election several weeks after the first ballot.

2000 leadership election

First Ballot -- June 24, 2000

DAY, Stockwell Burt 53,249 44.17%
MANNING, Ernest Preston 43,527 36.10%
LONG, Tom 21,894 18.16%
MARTIN, Keith P. 1,676 1.39%
STACHOW, John 211 0.18%
Total ballots cast 120,557 100%

Second Ballot -- July 8, 2000

DAY, Stockwell Burt 72,349 63.4%
MANNING, Ernest Preston 41,869 36.6%
Total ballots cast 114,218 100%

2002 leadership election

March 20, 2002

First Ballot

HARPER, Stephen Joseph 48,561 55.0%
DAY, Stockwell Burt 33,074 37.5%
ABLONCZY, Diane 3,370 3.8%
HILL, Grant 3,223 3.7%
Total ballots cast 88,228 100%

During the early campaign, Toronto drag queen Enza Anderson also declared her candidacy for the leadership, although she dropped her bid before the official registration deadline.

See also