🇨🇦 2024 Canadian by-elections

[lilTommy]

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)

Congrats to the PEI Greens. I think this makes them tied with the Liberals in terms of seats now - who gets to be the Official Opposition?

It will be up to the Speaker. They could go with the Liberals, since they are the incumbent official opposition, or the Greens, since they got a higher popular vote total in the last election. Or they could have both parties rotate or share the role. I believe there are precedents for any of those options from other jurisdictions.

I hope Rock Paper Scissors occurs.

when there is a tie for election results, do they draw lots? i know in the Yukon in 2021 they drew lots to decide the winner of the Vuntut Gwitchin electorate. It makes more sense for the greens who had the higher vote share to be the opposition, now that they have seats that would entitle them to it.

[lilTommy]

That seat in it’s various incarnations has been NDP since 1965 except for two times it went Tory in 1974 and 2011

a "Blaikie" has held this seat from 1979-2008, then from 2015-now.

Fun fact: Bill Blaikie became the provincial MLA for Elmwood in 2008, while the provincial MLA Jim Maloway was elected the MP for Elmwood-transcona; they just switched seats. In 2011 Maloway lost the Federal seat but was elected again in the provincial seat the same year. He's still the MLA.

[lilTommy]

Halifax M.P Andy Fillmore has confirmed what has long been rumored. He is stepping down as an M.P to run for mayor of Halifax.

Interesting the number of Liberal incumbent riding vacancies where the NDP has a chance.
https://halifax.citynews.ca/2024/06/17/halifax-mp-stepping-away-from-federal-politics-ahead-of-expected-mayoral-bid/

Halifax looks to be the best pick-up of LPC non-incumbents so far. Lisa Roberts who ran in 2021, former MLA was very close last time (40%ish vs Fillmore at 42%)

Of The other LPC seats, the NDP may only have decent shots at Beaches-East York, most of them look more favourable to the CPC. On the CPC side though, Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River will have no incumbent so that will be a good target for the NDP.

[lilTommy]

This is further evidence of the "Edmontonization" of Winnipeg. The Alberta NDP won every single seat in Edmonton in 2015, all but 1 in 2019 and won every seat in 2023 - including the wealthiest seats that used to be PC strongholds. Now the Manitoba NDP has all but 2 seats in Winnipeg - and who knows if the PCs can even retain their last 2 seats in that part gets taken over by some populist extreme social conservative from the rural areas?

This will also be likely the case in SASK when they go to the polls this year, and was the case last time the NDP was the gov't about 20years ago.

Even in BC we are seeing Vancouver's slow drift to full NDP, only two seats are not held by the NDP and one of those was so close (within a thousand votes more or less) But with the BCCs and BCU eating the same voter pool, the NDP is likely going to pick up that one next time if not potentially both

[lilTommy]

The NDP is winning the Manitoba provincial byelection in Tuxedo! That was considered the safest Tory seat in Winnipeg!

Western Canadian provincial political coalitions continue to look more and more like certain American states.

The death of any provincial Liberal party does that; The NDP also has much deeper routes in the West while the "Liberal" brand is not viewed positively (not just b/c of the Trudeau federal effect), but historically so.