Federal minority governments in Canada
At the federal level, no minority government (excepting the odd case of the 14th) has lasted a standard four-year term.
From January to July 1926, King's government sustained such confidence with the support of most of the Progressives (although in many cases only by one or two votes).
King therefore immediately resigned and the Conservative leader Arthur Meighen agreed to form a government which itself, although larger, was also a minority one.
Meighen's conservatives won a plurality of the seats in the previous 1925 election, however, a government was instead formed via an agreement between the Liberals and Progressives.
After King's Liberals had lost the progressives' support he requested parliament to be dissolved by the governor-general, Lord Byng, resulting in the King–Byng Affair.
On July 1, 1926, a week after Byng appointed him prime minister, Meighen lost a confidence vote in the House of Commons resulting in the 1926 election.
Diefenbaker needed the support of the Social Credit Party of Canada and three independents to get any legislation passed.
Diefenbaker, in a rage, launched a two-hour speech condemning the Liberals, and revealing a document from the previous government predicting the economic decline.
The Diefenbaker government ended badly with party infighting, a poor economy and controversies over relations with the United States during the Kennedy administration.
This time, the momentum was with the Liberals and the imploding Tories were all but incapable of governing due largely to a split in Diefenbaker's Cabinet over the deployment of Bomarc missiles in Canada.
The government was defeated in the House on a confidence issue on February 5, 1963, forcing the 1963 federal election which the Tories lost.
While this should have led to an immediate dissolution of parliament, none of the parties were ready, and Pearson was in the process of being replaced as leader of the Liberals.
However, even though the Liberals entered the election strong in the polls, the Trudeaumania buzz had all but ended, and the party was further damaged by a weak economy.
He also wished to win seats in Quebec in his own right and saw the conservative, populist Social Credit Party as an obstacle rather than a potential partner.
As a result of Clark's refusal to extend recognition to Social Credit, its MPs abstained in the Non-Confidence vote that brought down the Clark government on December 13, 1979, a defeat caused by the Social Credit abstention and the absence of a handful of Tory MPs due to illness or travel.
Although the 2004 federal election was initially expected to be easy for Martin to win a fourth consecutive Liberal majority government, during the campaign many began instead to predict a far closer result.
On May 10, 2005, a motion was passed by the opposition parties in the House of Commons to instruct a committee to call for the dissolution of the government.
With the support of two independents and Conservative MP Belinda Stronach—who crossed the floor to the Liberals and was appointed Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development, becoming a member of the Liberal cabinet—the result of the vote was a tie, which was broken in favour of the government by the Speaker of the House of Commons, resulting in a vote of 153–152.
In the early morning of November 29, 2005, Martin went to Governor General Michaëlle Jean to ask for the dissolution of parliament and a January 23, 2006, election.
Paul Martin resigned as leader of the Liberal Party on March 18 to quell any rumours that he might run in any future election.
However, after the election but before the new Parliament took office, Liberal David Emerson crossed the floor to join the Conservatives and Stephen Harper's cabinet amidst some controversy.
On September 20, Trudeau's Liberal Party was re-elected, though still 10 seats short of a majority, and formed a second minority government.
