Betty E. Unger (born August 21, 1943) is a

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

politician and a former member of the

Senate of Canada The Senate of Canada () is the upper house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Monarchy of Canada#Parliament (King-in-Parliament), Crown and the House of Commons of Canada, House of Commons, they compose the Bicameralism, bicameral le ...

, from

Alberta Alberta is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Canada. It is a part of Western Canada and is one of the three Canadian Prairies, prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to its west, Saskatchewan to its east, t ...

, Canada from January 2012 until her retirement in August 2018 upon reaching the mandatory retirement age of 75.

Political career

In 2000 Unger ran for the

House of Commons of Canada The House of Commons of Canada () is the lower house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Monarchy of Canada#Parliament (King-in-Parliament), Crown and the Senate of Canada, they comprise the Bicameralism, bicameral legislature of Ca ...

as a candidate for the

Canadian Alliance The Canadian Alliance (), formally the Canadian Reform Conservative Alliance (), was a centre-right to right-wing federal political party in Canada that existed under that name from 2000 to 2003. The Canadian Alliance was the new name of the ...

Edmonton West Edmonton West () is a federal electoral district (Canada), electoral district in Alberta, Canada, that was represented in the House of Commons of Canada from 1917 to 1988, from 1997 to 2004 and again since 2015. Demographics History and g ...

, losing a close contest to Liberal

Cabinet Minister A minister is a politician who heads a ministry, making and implementing decisions on policies in conjunction with the other ministers. In some jurisdictions the head of government is also a minister and is designated the ' prime minister', ' p ...

Anne McLellan A. Anne McLellan (born August 31, 1950) is a Canadian politician and academic who served as the ninth deputy prime minister of Canada from 2003 to 2006. She was a cabinet minister in the Liberal governments of Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin ...

. The race was so close that the media prematurely declared a Canadian Alliance victory on election night. In 2004 she ran as a candidate in the 2004 Alberta senate nominee election. She finished a close second place behind

Bert Brown Bert Brown (March 22, 1938 – February 3, 2018) was a Canadian senator, farmer, and development consultant. Early life Brown farmed in Kathyrn, Alberta, from 1969 to 1999, after which they sold their family farm. After retiring from the Sen ...

. She is the first Albertan woman to be elected a senator-in-waiting. On January 6, 2012, she was appointed to the Senate on the advice of Prime Minister

Stephen Harper Stephen Joseph Harper (born April 30, 1959) is a Canadian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Canada from 2006 to 2015. He is to date the only prime minister to have come from the modern-day Conservative Party of Canada, ser ...

Governor General Governor-general (plural governors-general), or governor general (plural governors general), is the title of an official, most prominently associated with the British Empire. In the context of the governors-general and former British colonies, ...

David Johnston David Johnston or Dave Johnston may refer to: Politics *David Johnston (governor general) David Lloyd Johnston (born June 28, 1941) is a Canadian academic, author, and statesman who served as the 28th governor general of Canada from 2010 to ...

References

External links

*
Betty Unger homepage
1943 births Canadian Alliance candidates for the Canadian House of Commons Candidates in the 2000 Canadian federal election Living people Conservative Party of Canada senators Canadian senators from Alberta Women members of the Senate of Canada Canadian senators-in-waiting from Alberta 20th-century Canadian women politicians 21st-century members of the Senate of Canada 21st-century Canadian women politicians {{Alberta-politician-stub