Electoral history of Brian Mulroney Electoral history of Brian Mulroney This article is the Electoral history of Brian Mulroney, the eighteenth Prime Minister of Canada. A conservative, he served one term as Prime Minister (1984-1993). He led the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada in two general elections, winning back to back majority governments (1984) and (1988). He was the first Conservative prime minister to do so since Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald, in 1887 and 1891. Mulroney defeated Joe Clark for the leadership of the Progressive Conservatives in 1983, and then defeated Prime Minister John Turner in the 1984 election. Mulroney's majority in the
Brian Mulroney him an advantage that eventually proved decisive. Because of health problems shortly after becoming party leader, Mulroney quit smoking in 1983. By the start of 1984, as Mulroney began learning the realities of parliamentary life in the House of Commons, the Tories took a substantial lead in opinion polling. It was almost taken for granted that Trudeau would be heavily defeated by Mulroney in the general election due no later than 1985. Trudeau announced his retirement in February, and the Liberal Party chose John Turner, previously the Minister of Finance under Trudeau in the 1970s, as its new leader. The