The Social Credit party, who for a long time had been the country's fourth-largest (and occasionally even third-largest) party, suffered a massive drop-off in support from the previous election, in which they had already lost a major share of the vote and all their remaining MPs. Having performed poorly in various by-elections in the years that followed, the party suffered a blow to its image in June 1983, when the party executive voted to re-admit a faction led by holocaust denier James Keegstra. Party leader Martin Hattersley resigned in protest. Additionally, most of their traditional support in Quebec turned to the Progressive Conservatives. As a result, Social Credit was only able to run 52 candidates in 51 ridings (with two Socreds standing in a British Columbia seat), its second-smallest slate since first running candidates east of Manitoba four decades earlier. The party lost 92 percent of its vote from 1980 and dropped from fourth place to ninth in the popular vote. For all intents and purposes, this was the end of Social Credit as a viable national party. It would make a desultory final appearance in 1988 before collapsing altogether in 1993.