However, unlike rural ridings in the prairies, most Nova Scotia voters hold Red Tory views rather than socially conservative ones, as reflected in Nova Scotia being one of the few areas in the country where the PCs remained competitive between their 1993 collapse and their 2003 merger with the Canadian Alliance into the present-day Conservative Party of Canada.
The Liberals swept Nova Scotia in their 1993 landslide, but lost all eleven seats in 1997—six to the New Democratic Party (NDP) and five to the PCs.
Under former leader Alexa McDonough, the NDP made major gains there in 1997, picking up seats in the Halifax and Cape Breton areas.
In 2015, the Liberals swept Nova Scotia in convincing fashion, winning an outright majority of the votes cast in all but one riding; that year, they won every seat in Atlantic Canada.
With Toronto's Jack Layton replacing Alexa McDonough as leader, the NDP saw its hold on the Halifax Region slip somewhat, losing Dartmouth.