Manning, Ernest Preston, politician (b at Edmonton 10 June 1942), son of Ernest MANNING. After graduating from the University of Alberta in 1964, Manning ran unsuccessfully as a Social Credit candidate in the 1965 federal election before joining the National Public Affairs Research Foundation, a conservative think tank. During 1966-67 he researched his father's book, Political Realignment and co-wrote the White Paper on Human Resource Development for the Social Credit government in Alberta. The White Paper inspired the creation of several new agencies: a Department of Youth, a Human Resources Council and the Alberta Service Corps.
After the elder Manning retired in 1968 father and son established Manning Consultants Ltd, a management consulting firm. Preston experimented with the Social Conservative Society in the late 1960s and later the Movement for National Political Change, a precursor to the Reform Party. Neither attracted many members but the conservative ideas laid out gave rise to the REFORM PARTY in the more congenial climate of the late 1980s when disillusionment with the federal Conservative Party deepened. The party was formed at a convention in Winnipeg in November 1987, with Manning as its leader.
Manning's advocacy of a party promising fiscal responsibility, provincial equality (ie, no special status for Quebec) and parliamentary reform leading to more direct democracy, quickly brought support in the West, particularly in the climate of the MEECH LAKE failure and the federal implementation of the GST. Though Manning lost decisively to Joe CLARK in the 1988 federal election, by 1990 Reform was a significant political force in the West. Manning vigourously opposed the CHARLOTTETOWN ACCORD, the most prominent English-Canadian politician to do so. In the 1993 federal election, Manning translated Western resentment and anger into a stunning success. Alberta voters overwhelmingly embraced the Reform Party, electing Reform candidates in 22 of 26 seats (subject to recounts). The party also had unprecedented success in British Columbia, winning 24 of 30 seats, and added 4 in Saskatchewan and one each in Manitoba and Ontario. In the process, the Reform Party helped complete the process of destroying the Conservative Party that its rival Bloc Québécois had begun in Québec.
Much of the party's success was attributed to Manning's performance during the campaign, particularly in the national debates. An overwhelming Liberal majority, however, made it less likely that Manning would succeed in forcing his agenda for cutting social programs, freezing health-care transfer payments and dismantling publicly funded programs in education and culture. Nevertheless many Westerners saw Reform as an important counterpoise to the separatist Bloc from Québec.
