Alberta NDP inches past UCP with donations
Alberta's NDP broke a party record and collected more cash than the governing UCP last year, according to numbers filed with Elections Alberta.
New Democrats and United Conservatives each raised just over $5 million in 2020, with the NDP ahead by $15,656. The NDP recorded its best effort ever outside of an election year by raising $2.3 million in the fourth quarter. At the end of the year, it had 17,009 donors — 3,859 of whom were donating to the party for the first time.
Mount Royal University political scientist Duane Bratt said conservative parties always have a fundraising advantage because they tend to attract pro-business donors, so the fact that the NDP was keeping pace with the UCP was “remarkable.”
“It is a big deal that the NDP is ahead — it would have been a big deal if the NDP was within $100,000,” Bratt said Friday, adding it should be a clear warning sign to the UCP.
The NDP said it saw a surge in donations on the last day of the quarter amid reports then-municipal affairs minister Tracy Allard travelled abroad during the holidays. But the full fallout of the UCP travel scandal, including the resignation of Allard from her cabinet post, wasn't clear until January.
“I would think the first quarter of 2021 is going to be even worse for the UCP,” said Bratt.
NDP Leader Rachel Notley said in a statement that Albertans are frustrated and angry with Premier Jason Kenney.
“Jason Kenney and the UCP failed to take action to control the second wave of COVID-19, they have done very little to support people and businesses throughout this pandemic, and they have no plan to recover our economy once this is all over,” said Notley Thursday.
In the second quarter, the UCP put a stop to many of its fundraising activities during the pandemic out of respect for its donors, it said. At the same time, the UCP collected the federal wage subsidy for eight of its employees, while the NDP did not, a move criticized by both the NDP and the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
But the UCP also saw a surge in donations in the fourth quarter, pulling in just over $1.9 million.
UCP president Ryan Becker said the party faced fundraising challenges amid the oil price war and pandemic, but was still overwhelmed by the generosity of its supporters in 2020.
Becker said despite those obstacles, supporters put United Conservatives in a “solid position” to look forward to the next election in 2023.
“Our party was formed knowing that the NDP is a serious threat to form government every election unless all free-enterprise Albertans work together under one tent. We're not taking anything for granted and the work is well underway to put our donor dollars to work now so we can win another majority government in 2023,” Becker said.
While every NDP MLA contributed to the party, four UCP MLAS are not listed as donors in the year-end reports, including Drew Barnes, MLA for Cypress Medicine Hat, Richard Gotfried, MLA for Calgary-fish Creek, David Hanson, MLA for Bonnyville-cold Lake-st. Paul, and Jeremy Nixon,
MLA for Calgary-klein.
Meanwhile, the rest of the political field continued to lag far behind the NDP and UCP in fundraising.
The Alberta Party reported $126,233 in contributions in 2020, while the Alberta Liberals received $100,213.
The newly formed Wildrose Independence Party (WIP) raked in a total of $78,340 for the year. The Independence Party of Alberta collected $6,655, and the Alberta Advantage Party received $5,672.
Bratt said it's important to note that despite increasing support for third-party alternatives like the Wildrose Independence Party in some political polls, supporters are not following through with cash.
“People are just parking their vote or telling pollsters they're parking their vote, but they're not committing to these parties. If there was a surging Wexit movement, you would see a lot more money flowing into those parties,” said Bratt.
In the 2019 election year, party and constituency donations for the UCP totalled $7.37 million, and for the New Democrats, $5.5 million.