2013 Nova Scotia general election


The 2013 Nova Scotia general election was held on October 8, 2013, to elect members to the Nova Scotia House of Assembly.
The result of the election was a [Nova Scotia Nova Scotia Liberal Party|Liberal Party|Liberal] victory under the leadership of Stephen McNeil, with the party winning its first election since 1998. The Progressive Conservatives, under the leadership of Jamie Baillie, improved on their 2009 results and formed the Official Opposition, despite winning fewer votes than the New Democratic Party. The NDP, which had won power for the first time in 2009 under the leadership of Darrell Dexter was reduced to third place and became only the second one-term government in the province's history, and the first since 1882. Dexter himself was defeated in Cole Harbour-Portland Valley by Liberal candidate Tony Ince.

Timeline

Redistribution of ridings

In September 2012, the Electoral Boundaries Commission released its report which recommended changing the number of electoral districts from 52 to 51, including the abolition of the four protected districts of Argyle, Clare, Preston and Richmond. That move sparked significant controversy and debate. The Nova Scotia Legislature subsequently passed, taking effect upon the next election.
Several amendments were passed before the election:
  • to make minor boundary adjustments:
  • to rename certain electoral districts:
The net effect of the above changes is summarized thus:

Campaign

The election campaign began the week after Labour Day, when the legislature would normally have been expected to return to work, had there been no election campaign. As criticism or defence of government policy would dominate the agenda, and by convention electoral mandates are understood to last about four years, despite a lack of fixed election dates, the timing was not controversial.
The Muskrat Falls or Lower Churchill Project, its associated Maritime Link, and electricity policy generally, immediately emerged as the key issue in the early campaign. . Liberals emphasized Nova Scotia Power's dominance of power generation, and its ability to exclude alternatives through its near-monopoly ownership of the distribution network, covering 129/130 Nova Scotians. They also promised to remove a conservation charge, named for demand response programs that never materialized – instead proposing that NSPI pay for it from its return. Liberals and Conservatives criticized NSPI's unaccountable 9.2% guaranteed rate of return even for unwise investments. Conservatives acknowledged that it was under pressure to meet a tough renewable standard but also promised to freeze rates. The NDP government continued to defend Muskrat Falls as the only viable alternative to replace coal-fired power, even though this project was before the Nova Scotia Utilities Review Board as of the election call, remained unchanged and this was reflected in their campaign materials – they criticized the Liberal plan as likely to lead to higher power rates. The basis for these criticisms was unclear. However, a similar attempt to open generation competition in New Brunswick failed, in part because New Brunswick Power retained monopoly control of the distribution and transmission network, which intimidates competitors and makes it easy in practice to exclude them.
Other issues in the campaign:
  • A proposed passenger ferry from Yarmouth, Nova Scotia to Portland, Maine, re-instituting summer service that ran for decades until the 1990s, replacing a car-focused service that ran to Bar Harbor, Maine until the NDP government cancelled it. This was of particular interest to South Shore candidates, especially Yarmouth. Associated issues include the collapse of all public transit on the South Shore and a general lack of transport strategy, that could leave some of the 130,000 passengers per year stranded. It remained unclear as of election time whether an announced deal to resume service May 1, 2014, had held, and what other transport policy applied Darrell Dexter had referred to stories from Yarmouth about the impact of the loss of ferries a "mythology" which effectively made this a campaign issue before the campaign had begun.

Retiring incumbents

;The following incumbent MLAs did not run for re-election:
;Liberal
;New Democratic

Nominated candidates

Legend
bold denotes party leader
† denotes an incumbent who is not running for re-election or was defeated in nomination contest

Opinion polls

Polling FirmLast Day of PollingLinkNDPLiberalPCGreen
Election 201326.8445.7126.310.85
Forum Research2648233
Forum Research2847232
Abacus Data2646271
Forum Research2847232
Abacus Data2748241
Forum Research2846242
Abacus Data2846251
Corporate Research Associates3147202
Corporate Research Associates2952172
Abacus Data2850221
Corporate Research Associates2754172
Abacus Data2651231
Corporate Research Associates2855162
Corporate Research Associates2756152
Corporate Research Associates2457172
Corporate Research Associates2656172
Corporate Research Associates2655162
Corporate Research Associates2756162
Corporate Research Associates2953172
Corporate Research Associates2751202
Corporate Research Associates2949202
Corporate Research Associates2949212
Corporate Research Associates2948212
Corporate Research Associates2947212
Corporate Research Associates2847232
Corporate Research Associates2848232
Corporate Research Associates3141253
Corporate Research Associates2645263
Corporate Research Associates3239245
Corporate Research Associates2941273
Corporate Research Associates3141225
Corporate Research Associates3533284
Corporate Research Associates4427253
Corporate Research Associates4522294
Corporate Research Associates4126304
Corporate Research Associates4222314
Corporate Research Associates3435264
Corporate Research Associates3831264
Corporate Research Associates3735217
Corporate Research Associates3735244
Corporate Research Associates 4626225
Corporate Research Associates5322214
Corporate Research Associates6018166
Election 200945.2427.2024.542.34

Analysis

On election night, the Liberal Party formed a majority government by a comfortable margin. This was the first time the Liberals had formed government in Nova Scotia since 1999, and their first majority government victory since the 1993 election. From mid 2012, the Liberals had led every public poll and entered the campaign with a 20-point lead over the New Democratic Party.
While the Liberals had been relatively successful in the Annapolis Valley and on Cape Breton Island during the 2009 election, they were completely shut out of the South Shore, Fundy, and Central Nova Scotia. More importantly, the NDP had dominated the Halifax metropolitan area, winning 14 out of 20 seats. In 2009, the NDP had been able to count on a large number of ridings in and around Halifax, while achieving historic gains across the province, including in traditionally [Nova Scotia Nova Scotia Progressive Conservative Party|Progressive Conservative Party|Progressive Conservative] and Liberal areas of rural Nova Scotia. In 2009, the PCs fell from first place to third place in the Legislature, and were completely shut out of the Halifax metropolitan area.
In the 2013 election, NDP support collapsed across the province, as it lost all of its seats in Central Nova Scotia, three of its seats in Fundy, and three of its seats on the South Shore. However, the most important shift was in the Halifax metropolitan area, where NDP support dropped from 54.07% in 2009 to 31.29% in 2013. The party wound up losing 13 of its seats, as the Liberals won 18 of 20 seats in and around Halifax. Strong NDP areas in 2009, like Dartmouth, Central Halifax, and suburban areas north and east of the Harbour swung from the NDP to the Liberals. Among the casualties was Dexter, who lost his own seat to Liberal challenger Tony Ince by 21 votes. He was the first premier since Ernest Armstrong to be defeated in his own riding.
The NDP had very poor vote concentration in the 2013 election. In Halifax, where it won 31.29% of the vote, it won only two seats. While the party finished second in the popular vote ahead of the PCs, its support was spread out around the province and not concentrated in enough areas to translate into seats. Combined with its collapse in Halifax, this left the NDP with only seven seats to the Tories' 11.