Medicine Hat

The riding of Medicine Hat is in Alberta's southeast corner, bordered on the south by the U.S. and on the east by Saskatchewan. The Red Deer River forms most of the northern boundary.

About 10 per cent of residents are immigrants, and three per cent are aboriginal. Eighty-four per cent listed English as their mother tongue, less than one per cent French and almost nine per cent German.

Agriculture accounts for a major part of the local economy, along with a significant natural gas sector. The average family income is $81,449 and unemployment is 3.6 per cent.

This riding was established in 1907 and changed very little in the 1996 and 2004 redistributions.

Population: 113,085 (2006 census; an increase of 7.6% since 2001)

Political History

For the past five terms, Medicine Hat has been Monte Solberg's riding. He won the seat by almost 14,000 votes in 1993, running under the Reform banner. He won in 1997 by 16,682 votes. His 2000 victory was by a margin of 26,742. In 2004, Solberg defeated Liberal Bill Cocks by 25,910 votes.

In his most recent win in 2006, he received almost 80 per cent of the vote as he beat Liberal candidate Bev Botter. He served as minister of immigration before being appointed minister of human resources and social development in January 2007.

From 1972 to 1993, Progressive Conservatives Bert Hargrave and Bob Porter held this seat. For the 50 years prior to that, it was dominated by the Liberal and Social Credit parties.

• 1925, 1926, 1930 - LIB
• 1935 - SC
• 1940 - LIB
• 1945-57 inclusive - SC
• 1958 - PC
• 1962, 1963, 1965 - SC
• 1968 - LIB
• 1972-88 inclusive - PC
• 1993, 1997 - REF
• 2000 - CA
• 2004, 2006 - CON