Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock
Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock is a current provincial electoral district in Alberta, Canada. The district is one of 87 districts mandated to return a single member (MLA) to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta using the first past the post method of voting. It was contested for the first time in the 2019 Alberta election.
 Alberta electoral district | |||
|---|---|---|---|
 Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock within Alberta (2017 boundaries) | |||
| Provincial electoral district | |||
| Legislature | Legislative Assembly of Alberta | ||
| MLA |
United Conservative | ||
| District created | 2017 | ||
| First contested | 2019 | ||
| Demographics | |||
| Population (2016)[1] | 46,920 | ||
| Area (km²) | 23,699 | ||
| Pop. density (per km²) | 2 | ||
Geography
The district is located in northern Alberta, containing the communities of Swan Hills, Barrhead, Westlock, Athabasca, and Smoky Lake. It stretches east into part of St. Paul County. Major transportation routes include Alberta Highways 2, 18, 28, and 33 (Grizzly Trail).
History
| Members of the Legislative Assembly for Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assembly | Years | Member | Party | |
| See Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock 2004-2019 and Athabasca-Sturgeon-Redwater 2012-2019 |
||||
| 30th | 2019–Present | Glenn van Dijken | United Conservative | |
The district was created in 2017 when the Electoral Boundaries Commission recommended consolidating four electoral districts into three in northeastern Alberta, placing most of Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock and Athabasca-Sturgeon-Redwater, along with a small part of Lac La Biche-St. Paul-Two Hills, into the new district. The Commission recommended naming the district Athabasca-Barrhead, but the Assembly decided to retain Westlock in the name.[2]
The district first elected United Conservative MLA Glenn van Dijken who had previously been elected to Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock as a Wildrose candidate in 2015.[3] Glenn van Dijken defeated his next closest challenger NDP candidate, day home operator and former Smoky Lake councillor Therese Taschuck by over 12,000 votes.[4]
Electoral results
| Redistributed results, 2015 Alberta election | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Votes | % | ||
| Wildrose | 8,676 | 40.67% | ||
| New Democratic | 6,546 | 30.68% | ||
| Progressive Conservative | 6,081 | 28.50% | ||
| Others | 32 | 0.15% | ||
2019 general election
| 2019 Alberta general election | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | ||||
| United Conservative | Glenn van Dijken | 16,822 | 68.51% | -0.66% | ||||
| New Democratic | Therese Taschuk | 4,786 | 19.49% | -11.19% | ||||
| Alberta Party | Wayne Rufiange | 2,232 | 9.09% | – | ||||
| Alberta Independence | Buster Malcolm | 442 | 1.80% | – | ||||
| Independent | Brad Giroux | 273 | 1.11% | – | ||||
| Total | 24,555 | – | – | |||||
| Rejected, Spoiled and Declined | 142 | – | – | |||||
| Eligible electors / Turnout | 34,049 | 72.53% | – | |||||
| United Conservative notional hold | Swing | N/A | ||||||
Source(s)
Source: "49 - Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock, 2019 Alberta general election". officialresults.elections.ab.ca. Elections Alberta. Retrieved May 21, 2020. Change is based on re-distributed results from the 2015 Alberta general election. | ||||||||
References
- Statistics Canada: 2016
- Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission (October 2017). "Proposed Electoral Division Areas, Boundaries, and Names for Alberta. Final Report to the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta" (PDF). Legislative Assembly of Alberta. ISBN 978-1-988620-04-6. Retrieved May 29, 2020.
- "Glenn van Dijken wins Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock". Town and County Today. Great West Newspapers. April 23, 2019. Retrieved 30 June 2020.
- Short, Dylan (April 15, 2019). "Riding profile: Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock". Edmonton Journal. Post Media. Retrieved 30 June 2020.