NDP TOOK IN MOST DONATIONS

Unions put party slightly ahead before election writ was dropped

In the six days leading up to the spring provincial election call, the NDP narrowly led the three major parties in fundraising — with the help of union donations.

The latest political donation figures from Elections Alberta show that all three main provincial political parties pulled in more than a quarter of a million dollars each at the beginning of the second quarter of 2015, but the NDP emerged a narrow winner with donations of $ 269,730. The Wildrose collected $ 269,356, and the PCs earned $ 259,636.

The totals included donations from corporations and unions, which have since been banned by legislation introduced by the NDP.

In donations over $ 250, which require donors to be identified, the NDP raised $ 17,500 from eight unions, and $ 7,500 from three corporations.

The PCs, however, raised $ 173,025 — more than half the total amount collected — from 30 corporations, and $ 3,750 from a union, while the Wildrose raised $ 41,015 from 13 corporations in the last quarter.

Elections Alberta documents show the PCs received a number of large corporate donations, including $ 25,000 from TIW Western Inc., and $ 15,000 apiece from Hokanson Capital Inc., MLA Group Inc., Don Wheaton Ltd. and Raywalt Construction Company Ltd.

Only $ 19,186 of the $ 259,636 raised by the Tories came from contributions of $ 250 or less, compared to small donations totalling $ 165,712 for the NDP and $ 144,291 for the Wildrose.

The money raised by the three parties was actually collected in the first six days of April.

Political donations to candidates on and after April 7 — when the May 5 provincial election was called — don’t have to be reported to Elections Alberta until Sept. 8, and political parties have two months after that to file their finances, an Elections Alberta spokesman said Monday.

Going in to the election period the other parties were far behind the big three in fundraising.

During the first six days of April, the Alberta Liberals raised only $ 13,643.74; the Alberta Party raised $ 5,300.32; and the Green party, $ 2,410.

The PCs collected $ 825,318.25 in the first quarter of 2015, compared with $ 406,883.36 for the NDP, $ 355,091.61 for the Wildrose, $ 110,764.52 for the Liberals, $ 109,272.59 for the Alberta Party and $ 4,284.50 for the Green party.

Donations from unions and corporations were banned effective June 15, the day Bill 1, An Act to Renew Democracy, was introduced in the Alberta legislature.

“Bill 1 will put democracy back in the hands of Albertans,” Justice Minister Kathleen Ganley said in a statement Monday. “It will ensure elected officials are accountable to the citizens of Alberta instead of those with the biggest wallets.”

Alberta became the fourth province after Quebec, Manitoba and Nova Scotia to ban corporate and union donations.

Political analyst Chaldeans Mensah said the ban is going to force all parties to focus on ordinary party members for donations.

Mensah, a professor of political studies at Edmonton’s MacEwan University, said the NDP and Wildrose are well- conditioned to thrive under the new system, but the PCs have lost ground in terms of individual donations.

“The PCs’ loss of their traditional corporate backers makes it critical for the party to develop strong individual support across the province — something that’s going to be difficult to achieve in the short term given the party’s loss of power and the attendant loss of morale by its members after the May election defeat,” he said.

“While the NDP may suffer somewhat from the loss of union donations, the party can still benefit from indirect appeal to union members to contribute individually.”

Mensah noted the Wildrose has always done well on the donations front with individual donors due to its strong grassroots approach to politics.

But he said all the parties have to change their approach to donations to focus more on the cultivation of individual support, which also means the development of constituency associations, social media and a donations database.

PC Leader Ric McIver said Monday his party is already working on bolstering its individual donations.

“We think we’ll be able to do that,” he said.

McIver said the party has already cut its operations since losing the election.

“We’re hanging in there,” he said. “We have undergone a significant makeover with staff reductions and expense reductions across the board. We think that’s going to set us up in a way that we can succeed into the future.”

McIver declined to say at this point whether the party that ruled Alberta for almost 44 years is in debt.

“A report will come out,” he said. “I’m sure we will have comments when the report comes out.”

Bill 1 will put democracy back in the hands of Albertans. It will ensure elected officials are accountable to the citizens of Alberta instead of those with the biggest wallets.