Stephen Harper

Stephen Joseph Harper (born April 30, 1959) is a Canadian economist, entrepreneur, and retired politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Canada for nearly a decade, from February 6, 2006, to November 4, 2015. Harper has served as the leader of the International Democrat Union since February 2018.Over his career, Stephen Harper was elected to the House of Commons seven times, and served nine years as prime minister of Canada, winning three elections as party leader. Harper was the first prime minister to come from the modern Conservative Party of Canada, though older centre-right conservative parties have been active since Canada's founding. Harper was one of the founding members of the Reform Party of Canada and under that banner was first elected to the House of Commons of Canada in 1993 in Calgary West. He did not seek re-election in the 1997 federal election. Harper instead joined and later led the National Citizens Coalition, a conservative lobbyist group. In 2002, he succeeded Stockwell Day as leader of the Canadian Alliance, the successor to the Reform Party and returned to parliament as Leader of the Opposition by winning Preston Manning's former seat. In 2003, Harper reached an agreement with the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, Peter MacKay, for the merger of their two parties to form the Conservative Party of Canada. Harper was subsequently elected as the party's first leader in March 2004. As party leader, Leader of the Opposition, and then Prime Minister Harper represented the riding of Calgary Southwest in Alberta from 2002 to 2015. He also represented Calgary Heritage from 2015 until 2016 after the Conservatives lost the 2015 election.The 2006 federal election resulted in a minority government led by the Conservative Party with Harper becoming the 22nd prime minister of Canada. This was to become Canada's longest-serving minority government, but by proportion of seats it was also the smallest minority government since C