Glen Hart
Glen Philip Hart is a Canadian provincial politician. He was a Saskatchewan Party member of the Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan and represented the constituency of Last Mountain-Touchwood from 1999 to 2020.
Political history
Hart was first elected in the 1999 general election, the first for the fledgling Saskatchewan Party, then under the leadership of former Reform [Party of Canada|Reform Party] Member of Parliament Elwin Hermanson. Hart and the Saskatchewan Party ultimately spent two terms in Opposition, and during those terms Hart served as critic for higher education, highways, the environment, and labour. The Saskatchewan Party won the 2007 general election under the leadership of Brad Wall; Hart was re-elected in 2007, and again in the 2011 and 2016 elections. While the Saskatchewan Party formed government, Hart was a backbencher who served on several caucus committees.In January 2019, Hart announced that he would not be running for re-election in the 2020 provincial election.
In the lead-up to the 2024 general election, Hart joined fellow former Saskatchewan Party MLA Mark Docherty and former party staffer Ian Hanna in endorsing Carla Beck and the Saskatchewan New Democratic Party instead of the Saskatchewan Party. Hart stated that his former party "were putting the interest of the Sask. Party ahead of the interest of the people of the province", citing in particular its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and the healthcare system. The trio of former Saskatchewan Party members all argued that the party had moved further to the right in recent years, which encouraged them to look more closely at Beck's NDP.