General elections were held on June 8, 1995, to elect members of the 36th Legislative Assembly of the province of Ontario, Canada. The writs for the election were drawn up on April 28, 1995.
The governing New Democratic Party, led by Premier Bob Rae, was defeated by voters, who were angry with the actions of the Rae government, such as its unpopular hiring quotas and the Social Contract legislation in 1993. These policies caused the NDP to lose much of its base in organized labour, further reducing support for the party. At the 1993 federal election, the NDP tumbled to less than seven percent support, and lost all 11 of its federal seats in Ontario. By the time the writs were drawn up for the 1995 provincial election, it was obvious that the NDP would not be reelected.
Acts were passed in 1991 and 1993, providing for the following name changes to ridings:
The Liberal Party under Lyn McLeod had been leading in the polls for most of the period from 1992 to 1995, and were generally favoured to benefit from the swing in support away from the NDP. However, the party hurt its credibility through a series of high-profile policy reversals in the period leading up to the election. The most notable of these occurred when McLeod withdrew Liberal support from the Equality Rights Statute Amendment Act (Bill 167) introduced by the NDP government in 1994, which would have provided same-sex couples with rights and obligations mostly equal to those of opposite-sex common law couples and introduced a form of civil unions. Her decision was seen as cynical and opportunistic in light of the Liberals' earlier rural by-election loss in the socially conservative riding of VictoriaâÂÂHaliburton. This gave the McLeod Liberals a reputation for "flip-flopping" and inconsistency while offending its socially progressive supporters.
The Progressive Conservative Party, led by Mike Harris, found success with its Common Sense Revolution campaign to cut personal income taxes, social assistance (welfare) rates, and government spending dramatically. Roughly half of his party's seats came from the more affluent regions of the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), especially the suburban belt surrounding Metro Toronto, often called the '905' for its telephone area code.
In addition, by presenting himself as a populist, representing "ordinary Ontarians" over "special interests", Harris was able to build Tory support among working-class voters. Although there were regional variations, many working-class voters shifted directly from the NDP to the Tories during the election, enabling the latter to win formerly NDP ridings such as Cambridge and Oshawa.
The televised party leaders' debate is often regarded as the turning point of the campaign. During the event, McLeod further alienated many voters with an overly aggressive performance. Harris used his time to speak directly to the camera to convey his party's Common Sense Revolution platform, virtually ignoring all questions asked of him by Rae and McLeod and avoiding getting caught up in their debate. Since Liberal support was regarded by many political insiders as soft and unsteady, many voters who were previously leaning to the Liberals shifted to the Progressive Conservatives after the debate.
The Progressive Conservatives won a majority while the Liberals finished with less support than they had in the 1990 election. The NDP, despite improving their standing in some Northern Ontario ridings, were heavily defeated, falling to 17 seats and third party status. The New Democrats would remain the third party until 2018 when they returned to Official Opposition status. McLeod and Rae resigned their party leadership posts not long after the campaign. It was also the worst result for an incumbent Ontario governing party up to that time and would remain so until 2018 when the NDP finally surpassed the then-governing Liberals.
One independent candidate was elected: Peter North in the riding of Elgin. North had been elected in 1990 as a New Democrat, but left the NDP and declared his intention to run as a Progressive Conservative. The PC Party did not accept him as a candidate, however.
At least five unregistered parties fielded candidates in this election, appearing on the ballot as independents:
|- ! colspan=2 rowspan=2 | Political party ! rowspan=2 | Party leader ! colspan=4 | MPPs ! colspan=4 | Votes |- ! Candidates !1990 !1995 !ñ !# ! ñ !% ! ñ (pp)
|style="text-align:left;"|Mike Harris | 130 || 20 || 82 || 62 || 1,870,110 || 925,546 || 44.97% || 21.46
|style="text-align:left;"|Lyn McLeod | 130 || 36 || 30 || 6 || 1,291,326 || 10,808 || 31.05% || 1.35
|style="text-align:left;"|Bob Rae | 130 || 74 || 17 || 57 || 854,163 || 655,343 || 20.54% || 17.03
| || 60 || â || 1 || 1 || 33,077 || 19,770 || 0.80% || 0.46
|style="text-align:left;"|Donald Pennell | 55 || â || â || â || 61,657 || 49,174 || 1.48% || 1.28
|style="text-align:left;"|Ron Parker | 68 || â || â || â || 18,326 || 18,326 || 0.44% ||New
|style="text-align:left;"|Frank de Jong | 37 || â || â || â || 14,108 || 15,989 || 0.34% || 0.41
|style="text-align:left;"|John Shadbolt | 18 || â || â || â || 6,085 ||18,528 || 0.15% || 0.47
|style="text-align:left;"|Jack Plant | 12 || â || â || â || 4,532 || 1,483 || 0.11% || 0.04
|style="text-align:left;"| | 6 || â || â || â || 3,971 || 71,902 || 0.10% || 1.79
|style="text-align:left;"|Darrell Rankin | 5 || â || â || â || 1,015 || 124 || 0.02% || â |- ! colspan="3" style="text-align:left;" | Total |651||130 ! " colspan="2"|130 ! " colspan="2"|4,158,370 ! " colspan="2"| 100.00% |- | colspan="7" style="text-align:left;" | Rejected ballots | 42,152 | 10,423 | colspan="2"| |- | colspan="7" style="text-align:left;" | Voter turnout | 4,200,522 | 129,868 | 63.00 | 1.45 |- | colspan="7" style="text-align:left;" | Registered electors | 6,667,798 | 351,849 | colspan="2"|
Party designations are as follows:
Due to resignations, five by-elections were held between the 1995 and 1999 elections.
|- | style="background:whitesmoke;"|York South<br />May 23, 1996 || |Gerard Kennedy<br />7,774 | |Rob Davis<br />5,093 | |David Miller<br />6,656 | |David Milne (Ind)<br />151<br />George Dance (Lbt)<br />77<br />Kevin Clarke (Ind)<br />70 || |Bob Rae<br />resigned February 29, 1996 |- | style="background:whitesmoke;"|Oriole<br />September 4, 1997 || |David Caplan<br />9,954 | |Barbara Greene<br />5,163 | |Jim Kafieh<br />1,700 | |Bernadette Michael (Ind)<br />132<br />Shelly Lipsey (G)<br />96 || |Elinor Caplan<br />resigned May 5, 1997 |- | style="background:whitesmoke;"|Ottawa West<br />September 4, 1997 | | | Alex Cullen<br />11,438 | | Chris Thompson<br />7,217 | | Katrina Prystupa<br />2,573 | |John Turmel (Ind)<br />201<br />Gene Villeneuve (G)<br />96 || |Bob Chiarelli<br />resigned May 5, 1997 |- | style="background:whitesmoke;"|WindsorâÂÂRiverside<br />September 4, 1997 | |Gary McNamara<br />8,494 | |Fran Funero<br />3,028 || |Wayne Lessard<br />9,308 | |Steve Harvey (G)<br />329 || |Dave Cooke<br />resigned May 5, 1997 |- | style="background:whitesmoke;"|Nickel Belt<br />October 1, 1998 | |Frank Madigan<br />4,173 | |Gerry Courtemanche<br />3,836 || |Blain Morin<br />5,537 | | || |Floyd Laughren<br />resigned February 28, 1998