He won the electoral district of Clover Bar by a wide margin to hold it for the governing Social Credit Party of Alberta.
[3] Buck survived the first round of balloting but distantly trailed Harry Strom and two other candidates to end in fourth place with 10.8% of the delegates.
He won a tight three-way race just edging out Progressive Conservative candidate J. Devereux in an election that ended the Socreds' 36-year run in government.
[7] Buck and Speaker attempted to form the official opposition as an Independent caucus as had been done after the 1940 general election, over the Alberta New Democratic Party (NDP) which also had two members.
The speaker denied them opposition status and the same caucus funding that had been provided to the NDP and limited the number of questions that could be asked.