# Preston Manning **Preston Manning** (born June 10, 1942, Edmonton) founded the [[Reform Party of Canada]] in 1987 and built it into the vehicle of Western Canadian populist conservatism under the slogan "The West Wants In." He is the son of Ernest Manning, the long-serving Social Credit premier of Alberta. He channeled [[Western Alienation]], the Prairie conviction that a central-Canadian elite governed against the resource economy, into a national protest movement that displaced the Progressive Conservatives across the West. ## Building Reform Reform was founded at a convention in Winnipeg from October 30 to November 1, 1987. It broke through in **1993**, winning 52 seats as the Progressive Conservatives collapsed to two. In **1997** it won 60 and became the Official Opposition. Manning's platform paired fiscal restraint with direct-democracy mechanisms such as recall, referendums and citizen initiatives. ## Architect, not prime minister Manning concluded that vote-splitting with the Progressive Conservatives kept the Liberals in power permanently. At the May 1998 Reform convention he launched the "United Alternative," which members endorsed with 91%. It produced the Canadian Alliance in 2000, but Manning lost the Alliance leadership that July to Stockwell Day, 64% to 36% on the second ballot. He left the Commons in January 2002. The institutional line he started ran through [[Stephen Harper]]'s 2003 merger into the [[Conservative Party of Canada]] and on to [[Pierre Poilievre]]. ## Movement infrastructure In 2005 he founded the Manning Centre, a training and networking hub for Canadian conservatives. It rebranded in 2020 and is now the Canada Strong and Free Network. In September 2025 he addressed the [[Reform UK]] annual conference in Birmingham, a link between the original "Reform" brand and [[Nigel Farage]]'s party. ## 2026: the Alberta referendum Ahead of the **October 19, 2026** Alberta referendum, which includes a question on starting the constitutional process toward secession, Manning co-chairs the virtual "Alberta and the West Assembly" with former B.C. premier Gordon Campbell. The first sessions ran September 19–20, with a follow-up planned for October. He pitches the assembly as an educational forum airing arguments for and against separation rather than taking a side. He has pointed voters toward the premier's nine other ballot proposals as the constitutional fix for Alberta's grievances. On September 16, 2026, at 84, he said he was "baffled" that people outside Alberta see Premier Danielle Smith as a separatist. His view was that "there has been no one more vocal in speaking out for a strong Alberta and a united Canada." Critics argue Smith is legitimizing separatist grievance to manage the hardliners in her United Conservative Party. ## Why he matters here Manning is the originating figure of the populist-insurgency arc in the [[Canadian History Hub]]. He is also a frequent reference point for comparisons with American grassroots conservatism: a movement that won by capturing and remaking an establishment party. In 2026 he is again positioned between Western grievance and federalism, lending his authority to the process while declining to endorse secession. ## Related - [[Reform Party of Canada]] · [[Conservative Party of Canada]] · [[Western Alienation]] - [[Stephen Harper]] · [[Pierre Poilievre]] - [[Reform UK]] · [[Canada]] · [[Canadian History Hub]]