British Columbia Social Credit Party

British Columbia Social Credit Party
Founded1935
Dissolved2023
HeadquartersUnit 101 – 8091 Granville Avenue,
Richmond, BC, V6Y 1P5
Ideology
Political positionCentre-right[2] to right-wing[3]
ColoursBlue and red

The British Columbia Social Credit Party was a conservative political party in British Columbia, Canada. It was the governing party of British Columbia for all but three years between the 1952 provincial election and the 1991 election. For four decades, the party dominated the British Columbian political scene, with the only break occurring between the 1972 and 1975 elections when the British Columbia New Democratic Party governed. Party members were known as Socreds.

Although founded as part of the Canadian social credit movement, promoting social credit policies of monetary reform, the BC Social Credit Party later discarded the ideology and became a political vehicle for fiscal conservatives and later social conservatives in British Columbia.

The party collapsed within one term of its 1991 defeat. It was not represented in the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia after 1996, and only existed in a nominal fashion after 2001. In 2013, the party was deregistered for failing to nominate more than two candidates in two consecutive provincial elections. The party re-registered in June 2016[4] to participate in the 2017 election, but only nominated the minimum of two candidates. It did not nominate any candidates in the 2020 election, and was again deregistered as a party on February 1, 2023.[5]

Former Canadian prime minister Kim Campbell started her political career in the BC Social Credit Party.

  1. ^ Denis Pilon (2015). "British Columbia: Right-Wing Coalition Politics and Neoliberalism". In Bryan M. Evans; Charles W Smith (eds.). Transforming Provincial Politics: The Political Economy of Canada's Provinces and Territories in the Neoliberal Era. University of Toronto Press. p. 288. ISBN 978-1-4426-9593-1.
  2. ^ Donald Blake (1996). "The Politics of Polarization: Parties and Elections in British Columbia". In R. Kenneth Carty (ed.). Politics, Policy, and Government in British Columbia. UBC Press. p. 67. ISBN 978-0-7748-5365-1.
  3. ^ Helliwell, J. (2010). A Province Defined: An Analysis of the Political Ideology of the 1952-1972 Social Credit Government of British Columbia. On Politics, 4(1), 61-75. Retrieved from https://journals.uvic.ca/index.php/onpolitics/article/view/4192
  4. ^ "Annual Financial Report - Political Party: British Columbia Social Credit Party" (PDF). Elections BC. Retrieved April 16, 2017.
  5. ^ "Volume CLXIII, No. 6". The British Columbia Gazette. Government of British Columbia. 9 February 2023. Retrieved 16 September 2023.