3 key takeaways from the Saskatchewan provincial election

The Saskatchewan Party won its fifth consecutive majority government Monday, CBC has projected, but the legislature will look significantly different this time around.

The Sask. NDP saw a surge in support and is projected to win or leading in 26 ridings, nearly doubling the size of the Opposition in the legislature and taking home several key urban battleground ridings.

That leaves Leader Scott Moe to govern with a reduced Sask. Party caucus — 35 of its candidates are either projected to win or leading — and missing several former ministers when he appoints his next cabinet.

With seven seats still too close to call and mail-in ballots not scheduled to be counted until Wednesday, here are three things to know about how Saskatchewan voted:

NDP dominates Regina, Saskatoon as rural-urban divide looks wider than ever

Sasktchewan's rural-urban divide persisted at the ballot boxes, with the NDP projected to win 11 of Regina's 12 ridings and leading the other, and projected to win or leading in all but two seats in Saskatoon.

Those gains included several battlegrounds like Regina Northeast, Regina Pasqua, Saskatoon Stonebridge and Saskatoon Churchill-Wildwood, where electoral boundary redistribution since 2020 narrowed the Sask Party's margins of victory.

The Sask. Party held on to most of its rural strongholds and appears to have defended several ridings in smaller cities like Prince Albert and Moose Jaw, where the NDP had hoped to make gains. However, the Prince Albert Northcote seat remains too close to call, with the Sask Party leading the NDP by 125 votes as of Monday night.

The rural-urban divide wasn't completely black and white. The NDP is also projected to pick up the primarily-Indigenous Athabasca riding that covers the northwest corner of the province, a long-time stronghold for the NDP won by the Sask. Party in a 2022 byelection. It also held onto its Cumberland seat in the province's northeast corner.

"We have changed the landscape in this province," NDP leader Carla Beck said in her concession speech on Monday night.

Donna Harpauer, a former Sask. Party cabinet minister who did not run for re-election, said the results showed the divide is "fairly wide yet again," as it has been in the past.

"It's going to be on the new government to kind of bridge that gap again and bring the urban and rural back together," she told CBC News. 

"Ultimately in this province of Saskatchewan we're very centre, and in order to keep both urban and rural supporting you and supporting the initiatives that you put forward, you've got to always keep to the centre and the new government needs to be mindful of that."

3 cabinet ministers projected to lose seats, 2 trailing

The NDP's gains in cities were projected to unseat three former cabinet ministers, with two others trailing as the night ended.

Former justice minister Bronwyn Eyre (Saskatoon Stonebridge), former social services minister Gene Makowsky (Regina University) and former minister of parks, culture and sport Laura Ross (Regina Rochdale) were all projected to lose their seats to their NDP opponents.

Former environment minister Christine Tell (Regina Wascana Plains) and former corrections, policing and public safety minister Paul Merriman (Saskatoon Silverspring) both trailed NDP candidates, but a winner has not yet been projected in those ridings.

The losses mean a hit to ministerial and legislative experience in Moe's next cabinet, as well as the likely loss of three of his four female cabinet ministers.

Moe, for his part, said in his victory speech that he would listen to the "message" voters sent to his government.

"We knew when we started this campaign, that it was going to be a challenging campaign. Recent history has not been kind to incumbent majority governing parties in this nation or around the world," he said. "But we also believed that we had a message and we had a record that we could be proud of."

Smaller parties ebb, but vote-splitting still in play

None of the province's smaller parties — the Saskatchewan United Party (SUP), Buffalo Party, Progressive Conservatives, Saskatchewan Progress Party or Greens — were projected to win or even nab a second-place finish in any riding, but the SUP still appears to have played a small role.

Moe's concerns about vote-splitting by the Sask. United may come true and cost Tell her Regina Wascana Plains seat. The NDP is currently projected to win with 47.1 per cent of the vote, while the Sask Party's Tell has 43.2 per cent and the Sask. United has 4.5 per cent.

However, Sask. United's overall vote share is very small compared to the Sask Party's 53 per cent and the NDP's 39.4 per cent popular support. The SUP nabbed four per cent of the popular vote, while the remaining parties grabbed a combined 3.7 per cent.