🇨🇦 2024 Canadian by-elections

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

And now, Parm Gill, Ontario Minister for Red Tape Reduction and PC MPP for Milton is also resigning as both minister and MPP to return to federal politics (he was MP for Brampton-Springdale from 2011 to 2015).

Maybe Bonnie Crombie might run here?

Lisa Raitt might run for the Conservatives provincially.

From Ottawa Playbook
— The counter-counter spin: But Global’s COLIN D'MELLO and ISAAC CALLAN report sources gave them a name that might replace him: former federal MP LISA RAITT, said to be seeking a return to politics.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

Raitt vs. Crombie would be fun.

David Lametti, former Justice minister of Canada and current Liberal MP for LaSalle-Émard-Verdun will resign on January 31st, to return to legal practice.

He says he still doesn't know why he was fired last summer and says that any delays in appointing judges are not up to him, but to the Prime Minister office, who took way too long to approve his picks.

A byelection would most likely be a Lib coronation; but in light of provincial QS results and everything, the NDP *could* be worth monitoring as a sleeper factor, unless Jonathan Pedneault gives it another Green run and monkeywrenches things...

Verdun is a great fit for QS and the NDP, but definitively not LaSalle.

Well, the most Liberal parts of LaSalle are in the Dorval-Lachine-LaSalle riding. Still though, they'll be fighting with the Bloc over the left of centre vote.

Not to get too far ahead, but I wonder if Bonnie Crombie would step down as Liberal leader if she lost the by-election. This has happened before, and to fairly major political parties.

I'm thinking primarily of Helen MacDonald the NDP leader in Nova Scotia from 2000-2001.
MacDonald was a defeated MLA who narrowly won a tightly contested leadership contest (in a delegated convention) and then came in third in a subsequent by-election.

According to Wiki, after the by-election, six MLAs asked to meet with her to ask for her to step down as leader, so she stepped down.

Obviously Bonnie Crombie was defeated as a Federal M.P and became a city councilor and then mayor of Mississauga while Helen MacDonald did not hold any office after being defeated, but the parallels would otherwise be quite strong (an established political party but with a diminished caucus, a leader who was not a member of the legislature, and a tightly contested leadership race.)

The one poll, from Abacus Data, that came out subsequent to her winning the leadership hasn't shown any increase in Liberal support either, although a Mainstreet Poll of a week earlier did, but that poll was immediately after the Liberal 'convention.'

Of course, it's early for her to really expect anything other than an immediate post convention bounce, but I think she won the leadership at least partly based on her being the mayor of the third biggest city in Ontario.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

Any ideas on who might run for the Liberals in LaSalle-Emard-Verdun?

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

If the Liberals come in 3rd in the Durham by-election I wonder if that would put pressure on Trudeau to step down.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

If the Liberals come in 3rd in the Durham by-election I wonder if that would put pressure on Trudeau to step down.

I don't think he would step aside and even if he did who would replace him?

There are a number of capable replacements. People always say this, but, for instance, the Democrats ultimately had no trouble finding Hakeem Jeffries to take over from Nancy Pelosi.

The obvious names are:
1.Chrystia Freeland
2.Anita Anand
3.Melanie Joly
4.Francois Phillippe Champaigne
5.Marc Miller
6.Sean Fraser
7.Seamus O'Regan
8.Dominic LeBlanc

No candidate is going to be perfect because no human is perfect. Nothing personal but this 'there's nobody to replace...' is one of the tired and lazy political cliches.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

It would be a huge upset if Durham goes anything other than Conservative, but I think margins will be interesting.  If Conservatives get below 50%, maybe sign like in other by-elections that polls are overestimating support or that support is more fatigue with government but once party comes under greater scrutiny people swing away.  50-60% is probably about what would be expected while over 60% suggests Conservatives might even be doing better than polls but could also indicate bigger swing in rural areas (and yes riding is still more rural than suburban but a mix to some degree and exurban is probably the most accurate time for riding).  It does seem though Conservatives in last few elections dominated exurbs but struggled in suburbs.

Don't forget though that for an exurban/rural riding the NDP does somewhat better here than otherwise likely due to it being part of the Oshawa/Durham region.  That will probably hurt the Liberal vote.  The NDP came second here in both the 2011 election and in the 2012 by-election.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

It would be a huge upset if Durham goes anything other than Conservative, but I think margins will be interesting.  If Conservatives get below 50%, maybe sign like in other by-elections that polls are overestimating support or that support is more fatigue with government but once party comes under greater scrutiny people swing away.  50-60% is probably about what would be expected while over 60% suggests Conservatives might even be doing better than polls but could also indicate bigger swing in rural areas (and yes riding is still more rural than suburban but a mix to some degree and exurban is probably the most accurate time for riding).  It does seem though Conservatives in last few elections dominated exurbs but struggled in suburbs.

Don't forget though that for an exurban/rural riding the NDP does somewhat better here than otherwise likely due to it being part of the Oshawa/Durham region.  That will probably hurt the Liberal vote.  The NDP came second here in both the 2011 election and in the 2012 by-election.

Though both '11 and '12 carry an exceptionality because of the Orange Crush/Iggy implosion and their respective afterglow.  Plus, federal byelection dynamics *can* be more binary "sort-y" than general election dynamics; that is, on paper, the NDP might indeed be a sleeper factor, but in practice the Libs *could* emerge as a single-loaded "stop the Cons" force instead--sort of like in Oxford (where the previous general-election-led conventional wisdom was that of the NDP outright threatening the Libs' strategic anti-CPC advantage).  Granted, there was the thumb-on-the-scale factor of the previous CPC office-holder pretty much endorsing Oxford's Lib candidate--but Durham's got an inverse situation of an ex-Con running for the Libs and targeting the same "backroom boy" candidate dynamic.

Of course, the NDP *could* tokenly capitalize on posthumous Ed Broadbent afterglow in his political backyard; but that era's so far back now as to be of negligible import.

You could be right, but I doubt there will be a 'stop the Cons' vote/movement.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

4/51 polls

Churchill, Kim (New Democratic Party)   73
Harding, Darryl   4
Hutton, Fred (Liberal Party)   278
Neary, Tina (Progressive Conservative Party)   177

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

10/51 polls
Churchill, Kim (New Democratic Party)   152
Harding, Darryl   12
Hutton, Fred (Liberal Party)   526
Neary, Tina (Progressive Conservative Party)   378

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

15/51
Churchill, Kim (New Democratic Party) 181
Harding, Darryl 17
Hutton, Fred (Liberal Party) 638
Neary, Tina (Progressive Conservative Party) 519

A bit closer.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

20/51 polls

Churchill, Kim (New Democratic Party)   240
Harding, Darryl   26
Hutton, Fred (Liberal Party)   970
Neary, Tina (Progressive Conservative Party)   800

So much for it being closer.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

25/51 polls
Churchill, Kim (New Democratic Party)   332
Harding, Darryl   36
Hutton, Fred (Liberal Party)   1187
Neary, Tina (Progressive Conservative Party)   984

I've seen enough. Liberal gain.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

35/51 polls
Churchill, Kim (New Democratic Party)   575
Harding, Darryl   48
Hutton, Fred (Liberal Party)   1822
Neary, Tina (Progressive Conservative Party)   1434

It's not even that close.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

40/51 polls
Churchill, Kim (New Democratic Party)   660
Harding, Darryl   59
Hutton, Fred (Liberal Party)   2090
Neary, Tina (Progressive Conservative Party)   1622

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

This Newfoundland result is surprising - is the incumbent provincial government really popular or something?

I don't know if the Liberal government is especially popular but from what I've read and have been told by a person in Newfoundland, they've hit upon a success in economic development which should mean at the very least that the province won't have a decline in population as had been expected.

Essentially, the government has decided to focus on what business professor Michael Porter coined 'clustering' about 40 years ago (referred to as 'network effects' in economics) and focus on tourism and especially the arts for economic development. The people behind this say they want to turn Newfoundland and Labrador into the leading arts hub in North America.

Newfoundland and Labrador already has a successful artistic community, but the province still has a great deal of what artists love - big buildings (or big spaces) with cheap rent.

How Canada’s Newfoundland And Labrador Builds An Amazing Creative Community
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonyounger/2022/04/17/how-canadas-newfoundland-and-labrador-builds-an-amazing-creative-community/?sh=1dfdc8a355e4

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

This Newfoundland result is surprising - is the incumbent provincial government really popular or something?

I don't know if the Liberal government is especially popular but from what I've read and have been told by a person in Newfoundland, they've hit upon a success in economic development which should mean at the very least that the province won't have a decline in population as had been expected.

Essentially, the government has decided to focus on what business professor Michael Porter coined 'clustering' about 40 years ago (referred to as 'network effects' in economics) and focus on tourism and especially the arts for economic development. The people behind this say they want to turn Newfoundland and Labrador into the leading arts hub in North America.

Newfoundland and Labrador already has a successful artistic community, but the province still has a great deal of what artists love - big buildings (or big spaces) with cheap rent.

How Canada’s Newfoundland And Labrador Builds An Amazing Creative Community
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonyounger/2022/04/17/how-canadas-newfoundland-and-labrador-builds-an-amazing-creative-community/?sh=1dfdc8a355e4

An influx of artists might even help the NDP down the road!

Maybe, but keep in mind if this were just artists it wouldn't be that much economic development. I'm guessing the numbers but I'd assume that for every artist there is something like 10 technicians.

On the one hand, there is the famous story of when Michael Moore won for best documentary at the Academy Awards with Fahrenheit 9/11 and referred to Iraq as a 'fictitious war' (meaning a war fought for fictitious reasons - and he happened to be correct - but there are a lot of silly conspiracy theories in his documentary as well) that all the actors  loudly cheered while all the technicians at the show either booed or were stone faced.

On the other hand though, I'm moving in a month to Maple Ridge. Maple Ridge has a fairly thriving arts community (kind of like a larger version of Gimli, Manitoba) ever since Sylvester Stallone's Rambo was partially filmed there about 40 years ago. The NDP MLA there is Bob D'Eith who was the President of Music B.C (as well as an entertainment lawyer and a pianist.) The NDP nominee though federally in 2021 (who narrowly lost to the Conservatives) was Phil Klapwyk, the head of the IATSE Local - the technician union.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

This Newfoundland result is surprising - is the incumbent provincial government really popular or something?

I don't know if the Liberal government is especially popular but from what I've read and have been told by a person in Newfoundland, they've hit upon a success in economic development which should mean at the very least that the province won't have a decline in population as had been expected.

Essentially, the government has decided to focus on what business professor Michael Porter coined 'clustering' about 40 years ago (referred to as 'network effects' in economics) and focus on tourism and especially the arts for economic development. The people behind this say they want to turn Newfoundland and Labrador into the leading arts hub in North America.

As a person admittedly old economy I hear this as the economic plan for a province and just think "eff off, come back to me when you've grown up and become serious".

There's nothing wrong with being artsy, but when you're talking about the arts as we're going to drive economic development with that, the arts only work economically if they have patrons, and those patrons make their money from what? It's no different than a pro sports team. A pro sports team in an area can generate economic development to a point, but it only works if there's people and/or corporations buying the tickets, and if business sucks/there's no jobs, they're not going to. The sports team's financial health at the gate is dependent on the economy that surrounds them. Arts like the sports team or any entertainment enterprise are not primary economic generators, they are derivatives.

California:
Overall, the creative economy directly contributed 14.9 percent ($507.4 billion) of the state's $3.4 trillion economy, and 7.6 percent of its jobs.

Show business is big business.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

This Newfoundland result is surprising - is the incumbent provincial government really popular or something?

I don't know if the Liberal government is especially popular but from what I've read and have been told by a person in Newfoundland, they've hit upon a success in economic development which should mean at the very least that the province won't have a decline in population as had been expected.

Essentially, the government has decided to focus on what business professor Michael Porter coined 'clustering' about 40 years ago (referred to as 'network effects' in economics) and focus on tourism and especially the arts for economic development. The people behind this say they want to turn Newfoundland and Labrador into the leading arts hub in North America.

As a person admittedly old economy I hear this as the economic plan for a province and just think "eff off, come back to me when you've grown up and become serious".

There's nothing wrong with being artsy, but when you're talking about the arts as we're going to drive economic development with that, the arts only work economically if they have patrons, and those patrons make their money from what? It's no different than a pro sports team. A pro sports team in an area can generate economic development to a point, but it only works if there's people and/or corporations buying the tickets, and if business sucks/there's no jobs, they're not going to. The sports team's financial health at the gate is dependent on the economy that surrounds them. Arts like the sports team or any entertainment enterprise are not primary economic generators, they are derivatives.

California:
Overall, the creative economy directly contributed 14.9 percent ($507.4 billion) of the state's $3.4 trillion economy, and 7.6 percent of its jobs.

Show business is big business.

I think the subtext here is that the expanding offshore oil industry, and other less prominent extraction industries, are what's really bringing in the money to this (comparativly) remote part of Canada - and that provides the capital for everything else.

Yes, those are old school notions. If you bring together actors, artists and musicians combined with the scenery there is a great likelihood that it's going to attract Hollywood foreign investment. Those dollars are just as good as dollars brought in by extraction industries.

Edit to add: I went 'old school' myself: The video game industry is also multi billions.

Sound recording studios still bring in a lot of money even with all the at-home technology.

What else the creative types bring in after that is up to them to think up, but certainly, for instance, there is no reason St John's can't be Madison Avenue.

This notion that the 'real economy' is manufacturing and resource extraction is a myth.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

Final results

Matt MacFarlane (Green) 1,226 (48.9%) +14.1
Carmen Reeves (PC) 964 (38.5%) -21.7
Gordon Sobey (Liberal) 272 (10.9%)
Karen Morton (NDP) 40 (1.6%) -1.3

Green gain from PC.

Turnout: 58.9% (-9.1)

Was this result expected or a surprise?

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

This Newfoundland result is surprising - is the incumbent provincial government really popular or something?

I don't know if the Liberal government is especially popular but from what I've read and have been told by a person in Newfoundland, they've hit upon a success in economic development which should mean at the very least that the province won't have a decline in population as had been expected.

Essentially, the government has decided to focus on what business professor Michael Porter coined 'clustering' about 40 years ago (referred to as 'network effects' in economics) and focus on tourism and especially the arts for economic development. The people behind this say they want to turn Newfoundland and Labrador into the leading arts hub in North America.

As a person admittedly old economy I hear this as the economic plan for a province and just think "eff off, come back to me when you've grown up and become serious".

There's nothing wrong with being artsy, but when you're talking about the arts as we're going to drive economic development with that, the arts only work economically if they have patrons, and those patrons make their money from what? It's no different than a pro sports team. A pro sports team in an area can generate economic development to a point, but it only works if there's people and/or corporations buying the tickets, and if business sucks/there's no jobs, they're not going to. The sports team's financial health at the gate is dependent on the economy that surrounds them. Arts like the sports team or any entertainment enterprise are not primary economic generators, they are derivatives.

California:
Overall, the creative economy directly contributed 14.9 percent ($507.4 billion) of the state's $3.4 trillion economy, and 7.6 percent of its jobs.

Show business is big business.

You're confusing two items and acting as though they are one. Hollywood is not an "arts" business as you're saying Newfoundland should be. It's in that context much more a cold manufacturing business. The widgets they're manufacturing are films that use the inputs of local labor, get distributed globally, and they have budgets and cost accounts and are required to make back their costs plus more to pay back the investors. Black Adam made $400 million and was considered a box-office bomb (read: business failure), no different than a car that moves units but after engineering, marketing, rebates, etc. is deemed a business failure. What widget would the Newfoundland arts hub produce that generates long-term sustainable jobs for the province to the point it can positively influence the Newfoundland economy above asterisk level and can also be a business success not subject to the whims of the greater economy?

"Arts" is a guy makes one painting of the Newfoundland landscape and sells it for $5000. It's a one-time thing and the economic activity is done after the sale and then trickle down economics/economic multiplier is everything the guy then spends that $5000 on, so if the guy buys a coffee every morning a small percentage of that $5000 goes into the coffee shop and its workers (i.e. service industries are likewise derivatives and not primary economic generators). What's unknown here is who is the guy that bought the painting for $5000 and from where did he make his money, because if not for him and his trickle down/economic multiplier, no economic activity would have occurred and we would just have a landscape sitting on the wall collecting dust.

Manufacturing that generates economic development in contrast would be a setup of a few people working together that mass produce paintings of Newfoundland landscapes, selling them each for $25 and their production numbers are based on balancing supply and demand to be a long-lasting business that runs steady instead of just a one-off creation.

You're getting hung up on a word.

Read the Forbes article I posted and you'll see I mean the widgets and not just the paintings. Certainly however, film production needs the 'painters' as well (set decoration, storyboarding...)

The artists are needed with the widgets. You can either call them complements or network effects.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

This Newfoundland result is surprising - is the incumbent provincial government really popular or something?

I don't know if the Liberal government is especially popular but from what I've read and have been told by a person in Newfoundland, they've hit upon a success in economic development which should mean at the very least that the province won't have a decline in population as had been expected.

Essentially, the government has decided to focus on what business professor Michael Porter coined 'clustering' about 40 years ago (referred to as 'network effects' in economics) and focus on tourism and especially the arts for economic development. The people behind this say they want to turn Newfoundland and Labrador into the leading arts hub in North America.

As a person admittedly old economy I hear this as the economic plan for a province and just think "eff off, come back to me when you've grown up and become serious".

There's nothing wrong with being artsy, but when you're talking about the arts as we're going to drive economic development with that, the arts only work economically if they have patrons, and those patrons make their money from what? It's no different than a pro sports team. A pro sports team in an area can generate economic development to a point, but it only works if there's people and/or corporations buying the tickets, and if business sucks/there's no jobs, they're not going to. The sports team's financial health at the gate is dependent on the economy that surrounds them. Arts like the sports team or any entertainment enterprise are not primary economic generators, they are derivatives.

California:
Overall, the creative economy directly contributed 14.9 percent ($507.4 billion) of the state's $3.4 trillion economy, and 7.6 percent of its jobs.

Show business is big business.

You're confusing two items and acting as though they are one. Hollywood is not an "arts" business as you're saying Newfoundland should be. It's in that context much more a cold manufacturing business. The widgets they're manufacturing are films that use the inputs of local labor, get distributed globally, and they have budgets and cost accounts and are required to make back their costs plus more to pay back the investors. Black Adam made $400 million and was considered a box-office bomb (read: business failure), no different than a car that moves units but after engineering, marketing, rebates, etc. is deemed a business failure. What widget would the Newfoundland arts hub produce that generates long-term sustainable jobs for the province to the point it can positively influence the Newfoundland economy above asterisk level and can also be a business success not subject to the whims of the greater economy?

"Arts" is a guy makes one painting of the Newfoundland landscape and sells it for $5000. It's a one-time thing and the economic activity is done after the sale and then trickle down economics/economic multiplier is everything the guy then spends that $5000 on, so if the guy buys a coffee every morning a small percentage of that $5000 goes into the coffee shop and its workers (i.e. service industries are likewise derivatives and not primary economic generators). What's unknown here is who is the guy that bought the painting for $5000 and from where did he make his money, because if not for him and his trickle down/economic multiplier, no economic activity would have occurred and we would just have a landscape sitting on the wall collecting dust.

Manufacturing that generates economic development in contrast would be a setup of a few people working together that mass produce paintings of Newfoundland landscapes, selling them each for $25 and their production numbers are based on balancing supply and demand to be a long-lasting business that runs steady instead of just a one-off creation.

You're getting hung up on a word.

Read the Forbes article I posted and you'll see I mean the widgets and not just the paintings. Certainly however, film production needs the 'painters' as well (set decoration, storyboarding...)

The artists are needed with the widgets. You can either call them complements or network effects.

I'm a mechanical engineer on satellites that go up in space. By the esteemed arts definition, I guess I should instead be called fabricated exotic metal designer.

Yes, I agree there is a science in art and an art in science, the two aren't as distinct as some make them out to be. I don't think I posted it on this board for discussion, but there is an old time radio show from the 1950s from the radio program either 'X Minus One' or 'Dimension X' written and starring a D.J named Al 'Jazzbo' Collins about this called 'Real Gone.' The show was about the art in science and commerce and the science in art and commerce.

I'm aware that many larger anyway engineering firms have an artist in residence.

However
1.I didn't say that the artists would make the widgets, I said there is no point in making the widgets there without the artists being there.

2.There are also, as I'm sure you know, scientific/engineering 'clusters' like Huntsville, Alabama and the North Carolina (and Virginia) research triangles. So, you should be familiar with the idea of how clusters/hubs attract other businesses.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

The federal Liberals have done a remarkably good job of holding the caucus together since the last cabinet shuffle when it was mentioned that at least half of those first elected in 2015 (about half the caucus) weren't going to run again if they didn't get into the cabinet.

The polling numbers seem to have hardened to the point where it can probably be said that it doesn't matter either what the Liberals do now (except to drop further) or what external events occur. Apparently Liberal cabinet ministers joke about how they know the voters are going to fire them.

I can think of several reasons why Liberal M.Ps aren't retiring though:
1.I think they get severance if they're defeated versus retiring.
2.More incumbent Liberals running more chance to hold the Conservatives to a minority, which would be important if, as they likely expect, that Poilievre will become very unpopular very quickly.
3.Group dynamics of the M.Ps simply deciding to hang together.

Despite that though, a couple Liberals do seem to be planning to leave:
1.John Aldag, the M.P for Cloverdale-Langley city might/is likely to run for the provincial NDP in a new provincial riding in Langley.

2.Andy Fillmore, the M.P for Halifax seems set to run for mayor of Halifax (Halifax Regional Municipality) with the current mayor Mike Savage retiring.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

2.Andy Fillmore, the M.P for Halifax seems set to run for mayor of Halifax (Halifax Regional Municipality) with the current mayor Mike Savage retiring.

Maybe the NDP can finally win back Halifax?

Andy Fillmore has more or less confirmed he's running for Halifax Mayor, and the NDP nominated back in September Lisa Roberts for the riding, the former MLA and 2021 nominee.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

2.Andy Fillmore, the M.P for Halifax seems set to run for mayor of Halifax (Halifax Regional Municipality) with the current mayor Mike Savage retiring.

Maybe the NDP can finally win back Halifax?

Andy Fillmore has more or less confirmed he's running for Halifax Mayor, and the NDP nominated back in September Lisa Roberts for the riding, the former MLA and 2021 nominee.

And the map is slightly more advantageous for the NDP, with Fairmount being moved to Halifax West (providing that there is no by-election of course).

No by-election but 2021 nominee and former union leader Mary Shortall has been nominated in St. John's East which is the other best riding for the NDP in the Atlantic.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

2.Andy Fillmore, the M.P for Halifax seems set to run for mayor of Halifax (Halifax Regional Municipality) with the current mayor Mike Savage retiring.

Maybe the NDP can finally win back Halifax?

Andy Fillmore has more or less confirmed he's running for Halifax Mayor, and the NDP nominated back in September Lisa Roberts for the riding, the former MLA and 2021 nominee.

And the map is slightly more advantageous for the NDP, with Fairmount being moved to Halifax West (providing that there is no by-election of course).

No by-election but 2021 nominee and former union leader Mary Shortall has been nominated in St. John's East which is the other best riding for the NDP in the Atlantic.

She is also the president of the party now.

Have you or anybody else here ever seen this: Imperfect union, Canadian Labour and the Left. It was a 1989 National Film Board 4 hour documentary 4 part series. I've been going over my old VHS collection (what's a VHS, grandad?) and I saw I recorded the first two parts.

Unfortunately this is just a summary, not the actual videos
https://collection.onf.ca/collection/imperfect-union-canadian-labour-and-the-left