page_title: Alberta New Democratic Party
section_title: Wipeout and recovery
hierarchical_section_title: Alberta New Democratic Party / History / The Alberta NDP in opposition (1962–2015) / Wipeout and recovery
caption_attribution_description: English: Edmonton-Highlands-Norwood MLA and Alberta NDP leader Brian Mason at the Alberta Legislature participating in a rally organized by RETA against the Heartland Transmission project.
context_page_description: The Alberta New Democratic Party, commonly shortened to Alberta's NDP, is a social-democratic political party in Alberta, Canada. It is the provincial Alberta affiliate of the federal New Democratic Party of Canada, and the successor to the Alberta section of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and the even earlier Alberta wing of the Canadian Labour Party and the United Farmers of Alberta. From the mid-1980s to 2004, the party abbreviated its name as the "New Democrats".
  The party served as Official Opposition in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1986 to 1993. It was shut out of the legislature following the 1993 election, returning in the 1997 election with two seats. The party won no more than four seats in subsequent elections until the 2015 election, in which it won 54 of the 87 seats in the legislature and formed a majority government. Until 2015, Alberta had been the only province in western Canada — the party's birthplace — where the NDP had never governed at the provincial level.
context_section_description: In the 1993 election, their popular vote fell by more than half to 11%, and they were shut out of the legislature altogether. This was mainly due to the anti-PC vote consolidating around the Liberals.  Both the Liberals and Tories were preaching the need for fiscal conservatism at the time. Ray Martin resigned as leader and was succeeded first by Ross Harvey and then by Pam Barrett. The party regained its presence in the legislature by winning two seats in the 1997 election. Barrett resigned her position as party leader in 2000 after claiming a near-death experience in a dentist's chair. She was succeeded by Raj Pannu. The party retained its two seats in the 2001 election.
  In 2004, the party reverted to the traditional "NDP" abbreviation and the colour orange. That same year Raj Panu resigned as leader and was replaced by Brian Mason. In the 2004 Alberta general election the party doubled its seats from two to four - which re-elected then leader Brian Mason and Raj Pannu, returning former leader Ray Martin, and newcomer David Eggen. The party received 10% of the vote province-wide.
  In the 2008 election the party was reduced to two seats. Brian Mason was re-elected as was newcomer Rachel Notley. Ray Martin and David Eggen were narrowly defeated. The party received 8.5% of the popular vote.
caption: Brian Mason was elected leader in 2004 and is currently the longest serving Alberta NDP MLA in the party's history[8]
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