The previous election had resulted in the Liberals emerging as the largest party, but far short of a majority, and only two seats ahead of the Progressive Conservatives.

Trudeau had ridiculed this policy as an intrusion on the rights of businesses and employees to set or negotiate their own prices and wages with the catch-phrase, "Zap!

[citation needed] While polls at the election campaign's outset had projected that the Progressive Conservatives would at least win a minority government, they in fact lost nearly a dozen seats.

Their poor showing was blamed primarily on Lewis strongly hinting prior to the election that he would back Stanfield over Trudeau in the event of another minority parliament - which may have caused left-wing voters to vote for the Liberals in order to keep the Tories out of power - and also by an unpopular mineral tax introduced by the provincial British Columbia government of Dave Barrett, which would lead to Barrett's government suffering a landslide loss in the following year's provincial election.

After the election, Social Credit leader Caouette invited Jones to join the Socred caucus, which would have given that party enough members for official status.

Stanfield, having failed to defeat the Liberals in any of his three elections as leader, faced pressure to stand down and eventually did so in 1976, being succeeded by Joe Clark.