In the 1974 federal vote, only nine women were elected to the House of Commons out of 264 MPs. But just two years later, Flora MacDonald mounted a strong effort to win the leadership of the Progressive Conservative (PC) Party of Canada, at the time the main alternative to the governing Liberals of Pierre Trudeau. Robert Stanfield, a former Nova Scotia premier, had led the PC Party since 1967. After losing the 1974 election, he announced his decision to step down. 

Flora MacDonald was born in Cape Breton in 1926. From 1956, she held a variety of roles in the PC Party. She worked in Prime Minister John Diefenbaker’s office. She worked on Stanfield’s PC leadership campaign in 1967. She was elected MP for Kingston and the Islands in 1972. She was viewed as a moderate who opposed capital punishment and supported equal rights for women. MacDonald also believed that the government has a role to play in the economy. She died in 2015 at the age of 89.

The 1976 PC leadership convention was held in Ottawa from February 20 to 22. There were 2,581 delegates. They........

© National Observer