LETHBRIDGE, ALTA.―There is a familiar saying among those involved in politics in this Alberta farming town that goes something like this: “A bale of hay could get elected to Parliament if it was running as a Conservative.”

In this 2015 election, Liberals and New Democrats say the winds have shifted, and a riding that has voted for the right-leaning candidate in every campaign going back 85 years could be up for grabs.

This time around, the Conservative candidate is Rachael Harder, an eloquent young farmer’s daughter, an evangelical Christian and an aspiring politician who studied the craft at the training institute created by Reform Party founder Preston Manning.

On paper, she is what many would consider the archetypal Tory candidate.

“She’s far from a bale of hay. Given any other year and she would have been a shoo-in. This year I think they’re in real trouble,” said Mike Pyne, who is running for the Liberal Party.

The biggest factor that makes Pyne’s suggestion more than just the cut-and-thrust of a political competitor: how voters all across Alberta demonstrated just a few months ago their willingness to change their political stripes when they feel that change is needed.

Following the shock-election of Premier Rachel Notley’s provincial NDP government after four decades of Tory rule, federal NDP candidates are thought to have a chance in the Edmonton area while Liberals are considered contenders in at least four Alberta ridings.

The desire for change has left Conservatives with some uncertainty for the first time in a long time.

“If what happened in Alberta hadn’t happened I could say this with more authority maybe, but I just can’t see people leaving the Conservative party to vote NDP ― though they did it in droves (provincially),” said former Lethbridge Tory MP Rick Casson.

Harder says she is working hard to convince the city’s voters to stick with the Conservatives.

“We’ve never taken this riding for granted. That doesn’t change. We came here to work hard,” she said. “We’ll continue to work hard and we’re going to hope for the best after Oct. 19.”

Where Stephen Harper’s Conservatives currently hold all but one Alberta riding (Edmonton-Strathcona, where the incumbent NDP candidate is Linda Duncan) current projections by Éric Grenier, who runs the website ThreeHundredEight.com, have them losing or fighting to maintain five of the province’s 34 ridings.

That could be the difference between a majority and a minority government. It could be the difference between winning and losing.

NDP candidate Cheryl Meheden, a University of Lethbridge management professor and former mayoral candidate, has great hopes that the longing for a change in Lethbridge will send her to Ottawa.

“I hear it from people who tell me, ‘I have a Conservative membership but I am not voting Conservative. I’m going to vote for you,’” she said. “At first I thought they were just being polite, but when you hear that from enough people and it starts to resonate with you, you think, ‘OK, there’s some truth to this.’”

Casson said he imparted one piece of wisdom to Harder when she stopped by his house after winning the party’s nomination: that nothing is more important for career longevity than the job you do locally.

She seems to have internalized the message.

“I think the ‘change’ that people are referring to is . . . strong representation, wanting boots on the ground, a local voice that’s going to contend for them in Ottawa,” said Harder. “The change that people want is someone who’s going to come in with energy and enthusiasm and vision for this constituency and make sure that their voice makes it to Ottawa and make sure that they’re represented strong here.”

But it is questionable whether Harder can repeat the electoral domination of Casson, who won five elections between 1997 and 2008 with between 55 per cent and 67 per cent of the votes.

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The riding’s new geography based on its growing population means that more of the voters this time around will live in central or suburban Lethbridge rather than in the outlying agricultural areas, or will work at the city’s biggest employers: the university, the college or the hospital, which is a regional hub for southern Alberta.

Most of the city’s biggest employers are also unionized, which is another factor that gives the NDP hope, after both of the city’s provincial ridings voted in the candidates for the left-leaning party in May.

“I think what it comes down to is that people do not like the Conservatives,” said Meheden. “If you want to not have the Conservatives in power you are going to vote NDP because we are the only party that is going to be able to replace the Conservatives here.”

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