Election trail sees increase in female candidates
Getting more women to run for political office in Alberta comes down to persistence, Rachel Notley says.
With women making up 52 per cent of its provincial election slate, Notley’s NDP has far outstripped the province’s four other major parties in putting forward female candidates.
So how did they do it? There’s no magic formula, says Notley.
“It comes down to how you approach recruitment. The path of least resistance is not equity, because my experience is I find men are more likely to say ‘yes’ earlier,” she says.
Women often need to be asked twice or sometimes more — either because political life seems daunting or because they don’t think they can do the job.
“With some of the candidates that I’ve recruited, I didn’t take ‘no’ as an answer,” Notley says. “I went back at them a few more times and spent some time talking about the ways we could make sure it would work and why they would be good.”
Overall, Albertans will have more women to choose from when they cast their ballots on May 5. In the 2012 election, women made up 26 per cent of the candidates fielded by the province’s five major parties. In 2015, that number is up slightly to 30 per cent.
Among the province’s five major parties, the NDP, Wildrose and Alberta Party saw their ratio of women candidates increase in 2015 from 2012, albeit slightly.
The Wildrose still trails the pack, with 19 per cent in 2015 compared to 13 per cent in the 2012 race.
The Progressive Conservatives and Liberals both remained static at 23 per cent.
“It really helps the health of our democracy to make sure a wider range of people’s views get represented. Women are half the population and should be represented in our decision-making process,” says Lana Cuthbertson, chair of the Alberta north chapter of Equal Voice, a national multi-partisan advocacy organization that works to get more women elected to all levels of government.
Across Canada there’s been an incremental rise in the number of women running for political office, said Nancy Peckford, national spokeswoman for Equal Voice.
Working toward gender parity in the country’s legislatures isn’t simply political symbolism, she says.
“There’s just no way we can do justice to women’s experience when they remain a minority in almost every political institution we have,” Peckford says.
Women made up one-quarter of the Alberta legislature when PC Leader Jim Prentice called an election one year earlier than expected. Peckford pointed out the two provinces with the largest ratio of women — British Columbia and Ontario — both still have women premiers.
Just a few years ago, Canada had achieved parity among its provincial leaders, but with the resignations of some and the electoral defeat of others, only Ontario’s Kathleen Wynn and B.C.’s Christy Clark are still in power.
In Alberta, Alison Redford resigned in March 2013 amid a scandal over government excess. A year and a half later, her biggest opponent — Danielle Smith — left her high-profile position as leader of the province’s official Opposition to lead a parade of Wildrose MLAs to the Tory government. The move spelled the beginning of the end of her political career as she was defeated during her Tory nomination battle in Highwood last month. Both women garnered widespread criticism — in some cases blatantly sexist vitriol — for their perceived political missteps.
Laurie Blakeman, the veteran Liberal MLA for Edmonton-Centre, said the reaction to Smith and Redford had an impact on how other women view politics.
“What people have told me is that they’re worried about being attacked,” says Blakeman. “I think women were really shocked at the way everybody talked about those two women. A lot of women looked at that went, ‘Holy, you make one little mistake and the world comes down on your head.’ ” mibrahim@edmontonjournal.com Twitter.com/mariamdena