EDMONTON -- Alberta's lone NDP member of Parliament is calling it quits.

Linda Duncan has announced on social media that she will not run in next year's general election.

"It is time to pass the torch to another," Duncan wrote Tuesday.

The three-term representative for Edmonton Strathcona says she will stay in the job until the writ for next fall's election is dropped.

"Rest assured that over this coming year I will continue working hard inside and outside the House of Commons with my NDP colleagues to hold the government accountable," she wrote.

Duncan was first elected in 2008 and has worked in a variety of critic portfolios, currently in international development and environment.

She narrowly defeated Conservative incumbent Rahim Jaffer in the 2008 election, but was re-elected by healthy margins in 2011 and 2015.

Along with politics, her life has been dedicated to the law and the environment.

She founded the Environmental Law Centre in Edmonton in the early 1980s and has worked as an international environmental law consultant, helping Indonesia, Bangladesh and Jamaica set up rules for environmental enforcement.

Recently, she has been walking a fine line politically while Alberta's NDP Premier Rachel Notley and federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh publicly spar over the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.

Notley has been vociferously advocating for the line to get more oil to the B.C. coast and boost Alberta's bottom line.

Singh is opposed to the project.

Earlier this month, Duncan said she wouldn't wade into the spat, but also said the pipeline is not top of mind for her constituents.

Duncan is one of a number of recent federal NDP caucus members announcing it is time to move on.

On Monday, Irene Mathyssen, NDP MP for London Fanshawe, announced she will not seek a fifth term. Last month, longtime NDP Hamilton Centre MP David Christopherson announced he will not seek re-election.

Other departures include former leader Tom Mulcair and B.C. MP Kennedy Stewart, who is running to be mayor of Vancouver.

Saskatchewan MP Erin Weir was expelled from caucus earlier this year after an investigation found evidence to support harassment complaints.

Posted by Linda Duncan on Tuesday, 28 August 2018