Elections 101: Alberta premier's dad and Laughren's 1st win

While Canadians across the country were surprised by the results of the Alberta election Tuesday, the vote had a special meaning for former Ontario Finance Minister Floyd Laughren.

Laughren, the former Nickel Belt MPP who served in Bob Rae's NDP government after it swept to power in 1990, has a personal connection to Alberta's new premier, Rachel Notley.

Her father, Grant, was leader of the Alberta NDP when he volunteered to help with Laughren's first campaign in 1971, when he defeated Conservative Gaston Demers. Notley contacted the NDP in Ontario and asked if he could volunteer to help a candidate in a “working-class riding in Northern Ontario,” Laughren recalled Wednesday.

"Can you find a place for him? Well, I guess we can,” Laughren said, describing his reaction. “I needed all the help I could get, believe me.

“We were all a bit hyper – it was our first time in a serious campaign. He was a very steady, calming influence on all of us. We welcomed him and he was quite wonderful."

Rather than coming in and trying to take over, Notley acted as a resource of information and support. He helped the Laughren team write leaflets – a big part of campaigns in those days – helping them with the language and telling them to keep them short and to the point.

"He was a wealth of knowledge, but he didn't try and force it on us," Laughren said. "I have very fond memories of him. And certainly last night brought a lot of that back, stuff I hadn't thought about in a long time."

Notley died in a plane crash in 1984, and Laughren took Rae with him to the funeral, although he doesn't remember meeting Rachel.

"But ... I was cheering mightily for Rachel."

There are a lot of parallels to her victory and Rae's in 1990. It was an unexpected NDP breakthrough in a province no one thought would ever vote orange; the heavily favoured premier of the day (Liberal David Peterson) was popular heading into the election, which he called just three years into his term.

“There are a lot of commonalities,” Laughren said. “Another is the lack of experience of the gang that got elected. They're right when they say a rising tide lifts all boats."

Notley's caucus has surged from four members to 53, meaning like Rae, she will have to form a cabinet that includes a lot of novice politicians.

"I think that would be a bit presumptuous,” Laughren said, when asked whether he had any advice for Notely based on his experiences from 1990.

“Except maybe on how to have a one-term government. I could advise her how to do that," he joked.

There are key differences between the two elections, Laughren said, that will give Notely a good chance of avoiding the problems that plagued Rae's five years in power.

"She ran a better campaign than we did when we won,” he said. “We overpromised in our campaign, and I don't think she did."

Selecting a cabinet will be important, as will learning to work with the bureaucracy that has been in place for years.

"It's one of the things that's overlooked sometimes — and I think she knows this — ensuring they know they have to work with the senior bureaucracy, the deputy ministers and the assistant deputy ministers, as opposed to relying only on their loyal supporters that got them there,” he said. “You have to find the right mix."

Another difference was Albertans seemed to want to vote for her, Laughren said, as opposed to 1990 when voters appeared to be angry at the Liberals and were voting against them.

"Not to say that Bob wasn't loveable," he added. "But she ran a very good campaign and conducted herself very well. She didn't take any cheap shots.

"She didn't overreact when (outgoing PC Premier Jim) Prentice said that he knew math was difficult. She didn't overreact and accuse him of sexism or anything like that. And I think that was smart. She just played it cool and people still got the message."

He's not sure what her victory will mean for the federal NDP in the October federal election. It's notable that NDP Leader Tom Mulcair didn't make an appearance with Notely during her campaign, he said.

"So whether it will translate into seats in Alberta, for example, federally, I don't know. It might,” Laughren said. "But this legitimizes the (NDP) everywhere. It erases the thought that you can just write them off, that they'll never form a government, no matter what province you're talking about."