Canadian Election Results Thread

[mileslunn]

Here is the Liberals over 15% 160 seats (4 in AB, 12 in BC, 7 in MB, 7 in NB, 6 in NL, 3 in the North, 9 in NS, 84 in ON, 4 in PEI, 23 in QC, 1 in SK) Otherwise less than they won in 2000 and 1993



As has been the case since 1984, the West and Quebec are clearly the Liberals weakest parts.  On election night, Mulroney mentioned Trudeau's last term as being part of the Liberal weakness as he alienated Quebec by bringing in the constitution without their approval and alienated the West with the National Energy Program and ever since then the Liberals have struggled the most in those two regions.  You can afford to lose one as the Liberals did under Trudeau or the Tories have under Harper, but not both unless you can sweep Ontario as Chretien did and he did this more due to unique circumstances.  You had a divided right and an unpopular NDP provincial government being still fresh in people's memories.  With the NDP unlikely to form government provincially anytime soon and the right likely to remain united, the possibility of the Liberals sweeping Ontario seems remote.  Otherwise they have to find a way to breakthrough in Quebec or the West if they ever want to win a majority government.

[mileslunn]

I think they'd be better off trying to work out how to remain a viable force first. They have no easily definable social base now, and that is extremely dangerous.

I agree, although how well they come back or not also depends a lot on their opponents.  I can see two scenarios help making it easier for them, but both are a big if.

1.  The NDP takes a sharp turn to the left and supports many left wing policies that have been abandoned by social democratic parties around the world, thus they drop to 15% and the Tories to take a hard turn to the right and adopt many of the policies the Reform party advocated and they drop to 30% thus creating a opening in the centre once again.

2.  The NDP is unable to appeal to both its Quebec caucus and Western caucus so their support blows up in their face much the way the Mulroney PCs did who tried to do the same thing so the Liberals once again are the main alternative and when people finally get tired of the Tories, they turn to the Liberals.

Finally the NDP and the Liberals may have little choice but to merge as if the Tories win 2 or three majorities and they win 70+ seats in each of them in Ontario, but many with less than 50%, they will merge much the way the PCs and Alliancce merged due to the vote splitting on the right, primarily in Ontario as neither did well in Quebec and the right mostly favoured the PCs in Atlantic Canada while Reform/Alliance in the West.  Either way the Liberals are in dire straits, but I think it has finally dawned on them that their past losses were not accidents, but rather deep structural problems and making cosmetic changes won't be enough, they need a radical overhaul.  Finally with no threat of an election for 4 years, it is a bit easier to do this as opposed to in a minority when there is always the difficult choice of whether to prop up the government or vote them down and face an election.

[mileslunn]

Here is the Liberals over 10% 218 seats (12 in AB, 19 in BC, 8 in MB, 10 in NB, 6 in NL, 3 in the North, 11 in NS, 104 in ON (every riding except Oxford and Oshawa), 4 in PEI, 40 in QC, 1 in SK)



Otherwise almost 1 in 3 Liberal candidates failed to get their deposit back as you must get 10% or more to get it back.  In Ontario and Atlantic Canada there were only 3 such ridings, but quite a few in Quebec and Western Canada and also in both cases the Liberals were generally above 10% in most urban ridings, but below in most rural.  Saskatchewan is the most interesting as Ralph Goodale's riding stands out like a sore thumb in all the maps, so it appears he won on personal popularity not party label.  In fact he could probably win as an independent in his riding.  Although I didn't do over 5% for the NDP as they got above 5% in every riding or the Tories whom it was only a few ridings, I will for the Liberals as I suspect there were several where they got under 5%.  I do believe though they got at least 2% in every riding.

[mileslunn]

The Liberal brand is so tarnished in Saskatchewan that Goodale would actually be a good deal safer as an independent.

  True in many ways.  If I am not mistaken, the provincial Liberals are now more of a libertarian party than centrist to centre-left and have completely dissociated themselves from the federal counterparts.  The provincial Liberals opposed blocking the takeover of Potash and also favour privatizing government run liquor stores.  Mind you many provincial Liberals on the left went over to the NDP and many on the right went over to the Saskatchewan Party so not much left of the party.  It is true Goodale would probably be safer as an independent, but since there was little chance of the Liberals winning the last two elections anyways, people were probably content to re-elect since they know he would be in opposition and an effective representative.

[mileslunn]

True in many ways.  If I am not mistaken, the provincial Liberals are now more of a libertarian party than centrist to centre-left and have completely dissociated themselves from the federal counterparts.

There's still a provincial Liberal party in Saskatchewan? That runs candidates in elections? Amazing.

Of course back in the 60s, the Saskatchewan Liberals were a rural conservative party, much like the Saskatchewan Party is today.

  There are sort of like the Manitoba Liberal Party or even like the BC Liberal party prior to 1991 as the BC Liberals were shut out of the legislature from 1979-1991 and only came back when the Social Credit imploded.  Maybe they are hoping the same happens to the Saskatchewan Party, but I would count on it anytime soon.

[mileslunn]

I agree the NDP is not a Western party, but I wouldn't call it an Eastern party either.  Rather prior to their breakthrough in Quebec, their support was in pockets, in particular the urban cores with a large number of younger renters, provincial capitals with large number of civil servants, heavily unionized towns, and resource communities in the North and Vancouver Island.  Nonetheless historically they were a Western based party.  In 1988, 33 of the 43 seats they won were in the West.  I am not suggesting this will happen, but it could happen and in terms of the national question there are similiarities between Mulroney in the 80s and Layton now, albeit differences too.  Also the PCs under Mulroney had many on the right in Quebec such as Jean-Pierre Blackburn, Nic Leblanc, Pierrette Venne, and Ricardo Lopez and they also had some who were pretty left leaning in English Canada such as Flora Macdonald, David Crombie, and Alan Redway.  Lets remember, prior to the merger with the Alliance, the PCs were never really a right wing party, but rather a centrist one with a slight rightward tilt, but still included many who leaned to the left.  Those on the hard right only supported them due to their being no alternative.  

[mileslunn]

Great, then we can start doing by poll by poll maps as well as maps by municipality and county.  Should be interesting to see if anything unusual shows up.  Look forward to this.  Although I have an idea of how things will look, we shall see if they are actually as I expect or different.  Quebec should be especially interesting as the results are so radically different than the previous election so although expect much of the province to be painted Orange, it will be interesting to see where the Red, Blue, and Torquoise is located.

[mileslunn]

Here is the Liberals over 5%  Only 20 ridings where they got below 5%, 18 being in the West, mainly Saskatchewan and Alberta and 2 in Quebec (Roberval-Lac Saint Jean and Jonquiere-Alma).  They did get above 2% in every riding however.  I will do the Bloc Quebecois later.

[mileslunn]

Selkirk-Red river (as it was then called) elected a Liberal MP as recently as 1993.

  So did Souris-Moose Mountain and Prince Albert as well in 1993.  I think the change there is the Liberals were never strong to begin with and 1993 there was a strong wave with the NDP and PCs being decimated while the Reform Party was still only a BC and Alberta party.  In 1997 the Liberals fared quite poorly in those three ridings suggesting much of the vote was a one time one.  Still does show how far they have fallen nonetheless.

[mileslunn]

2.  The NDP is unable to appeal to both its Quebec caucus and Western caucus so their support blows up in their face much the way the Mulroney PCs did who tried to do the same thing so the Liberals once again are the main alternative and when people finally get tired of the Tories, they turn to the Liberals.

There are a couple of differences here. The first is that the NDP is no longer a Western party in any meaningful sense; its base of support has shifted entirely, although it remains the only real alternative in most of the West. The second is that the NDP is constituted on an ideological basis, which the Mulroney PCs never had. There are no right-wing NDP MPs who have no real business being in the party; the NDP has always been a social-democratic party, whether its support come from the West or the East. Violent internal spats are far less likely as a result.

Additionally, the NDP is not in government, and such ideological fractures only come to the fore when a party is in government (and thus has to make decisions).

And by the time the NDP wins government, if they do, the Liberals will already be hopelessly defunct and without the finances to regain power or influence.

  Not totally true.  Remember the Canadian Alliance squabbles under Stockwell Day or what about the infighting in the NDP in BC which forced Carole James out despite the fact they were leading in the polls at that time so it can happen in opposition parties too.  Now true Jack Layton seems much more apt at keeping his caucus united than either Carole James or Stockwell Day, but he has also has a much larger and more regionally diverse caucus than he did before.

[mileslunn]

On Polling:

A pollster’s painful reckoning: ‘How could I have screwed up so badly?'

Frank Graves, the guy who runs Ekos, studied how he went wrong.  Among his findings, somewhat counter-intuitively, the cell phone sample INCREASED error.  That's because cell phone-only users - generally younger folks - didn't show up to vote.

Canadian pollsters never did seem to have much of a likely voter screen - but a separate Ekos weighting using more of a screen gave better result.

Full report here:
http://www.ekospolitics.com/wp-content/uploads/accurate_polling_flawed_forecast.pdf

I haven't read it yet.

  That might explain why Nanos which only polls landlines was closer as if you took the Sunday results only, Nanos was actually pretty close to spot on.  A better solution is not to do away with polling cell phones, but rather use the method most US pollsters use.  In the US only those who say they are likely to vote or will definitely vote are included and if this method was used I suspect the numbers would have been closer to what they really were.  Also I would take that into account when weighting the numbers as most pollsters don't report based on the number who say they will vote a certain party, rather than weight each demographic based on what percentage of the population they represent so if seniors are overrepresented in the poll and younger voters under, each younger voters' response would count for more than 1 and each senior less than 1.  The problem here is certain demographics are more likely to show up than others.

[mileslunn]

The Purgs were underestimated in 2008, so there's also a definite 'shy Tory' or something element in there.

The Liberals were underestimated by 2-3% in 2004 and 2006, so perhaps it's a shy government factor.

  True enough.  It also seems much of the underestimation was in Ontario is in all of the past four elections, the results in other parts of Canada weren't that far off or at least it could be attributed to a large margin of error in places like Atlantic Canada.  The problem is a 2-3% swing in Ontario is 15-20 seats thus results in a very different looking parliament.  One blogger mentioned this might be a Rae syndrome otherwise they remember how Bob Rae was accidentally elected in 1990 and thus want to avoid a simliar mistake so they stick with the devil they know rather than the one they don't.

[mileslunn]

Here is the BQ over 35% (only 5 such ridings including Gilles Duceppe's former riding)



BQ over 30% 22 ridings



Interestingly enough the Bloc Quebecois probably could have held their official party status with the same vote percentage had the Liberals and Conservatives done better and this came at the expense of the NDP.  In Ahuntsic it was a tight three way race with the NDP nearly winning and Liberals not far behind.  It will be interesting to see the poll by poll breakdown here as I suspect the Liberals won most of the Allophone polls and the Bloc Quebecois probably more in the heavily Francophone areas while the NDP more in the mixed areas.  In Richmond-Arthabaska this was more the luck of where the riding was.  The NDP dominated the Estrie region while the Tories the Appalaches-Chaudieres and this riding is right on the border between the two regions.  I wouldn't be surprised if the BQ actually won relatively few polls here and rather it was orange in the western half of the riding and blue in the eastern half and the Bloc Quebecois won by coming in second throughout the riding.  These two are definitely one's I look forward to seeing.  I also think in Haute-Gaspesie-La Mitis-Matane-Metapadia, many of Nancy Charest's personal votes would have gone NDP had she not run thus partly why the NDP did so poorly here and the Bloc held this one.

[mileslunn]

Here is BQ over 25% 37 ridings



Ironically at the beginning of the campaign this was generally considered the worse case scenario for the BQ.  This just shows how unpredictable Quebec politics can be.

BQ over 20% 48 ridings



Otherwise they got over 20% in fewer ridings than they won in 1993, 2004, 2006, and 2008.  I guess a lot of the Bloc Quebecois vote were those parked there due to lack of alternatives and once one arrived they switched.

[mileslunn]

Here is the BQ over 15%, 59 such ridings.



Ironically 59 seats back in 2006 prior to the Tory breakthrough and even in 2004 and 2006 was not considered that far fetched for the BQ. 

BQ over 10%, 66 seats



BQ over 5% 73 ridings (only Lac-St. Louis and Mount Royal were below 5%



If I am not mistaken, I don't believe the BQ has ever gotten over 10% in Mount Royal, otherwise they probably run a paper candidate here anyways.  Likewise it was the NDP's worst riding in Quebec too and even Mulroney in the 80s did rather poorly here despite doing well in Quebec.

[mileslunn]

The NDP isn't that divided, 98% of delegates voted no on a leadership review

  I agree they are pretty united now, but things can change.  More I was thinking about the voters that if they pander too heavily to Quebec, this could cost them in English Canada, especially in BC and maybe even in Ontario especially outside the GTA.  By the same time Quebec are fickle voters who can switch en masse on a moment's notice so anything from winning even more seats in Quebec to losing almost all them is possible.  You don't need to get into government for this to happen, just look what happened to the ADQ.  Since most NDP voters in Quebec were first time NDP voters, it would naive to assume they will stay with the NDP, but also naive for the other parties to assume they won't.  In English Canada, the NDP won 44 seats which is only one more than Ed Broadbent got in 1988 and never mind as a percentage it is less since there were 220 seats in English Canada in 1988, now there are 233 seats.  Also in 1984, the NDP beat the Liberals in English Canada by a similiar number of seats yet the Liberals came back in 1988 to a stronger opposition and a majority government in 1993 so they can do the same.  It will take more than one election, but my point, is the Liberals are not dead and out yet by any stretch of the imagination.  In fact in both 1958 and 1984, many talked about the death of the Liberal Party yet both times they were wrong and I think they could be wrong again.  After all the NDP only got 9 seats in 1993 and they didn't merge like the PCs did so if they can come back from that to where they are now, I don't see why the Liberals cannot as they are in much better shape than the NDP was in 1993.

[mileslunn]

Can you make a similar map for the Greens, just for reference?

  I could do so, but it could take time.  I know they only got above 10% in a handful of ridings.  If you could list off the ridings I could do one certainly.  I know they got 46% in Elizabeth May's riding, but I don't believe they got above 20% in any other riding and very few above 10%.

[mileslunn]

I will try to work on the Green Party map this evening.  Also if anybody has the data for Independents that would be great.  I know Andre Arthur in Portneuf-Jacques-Cartier and James Ford in Edmonton-Sherwood Park got in the high 20s, Hec Cloutier in Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke in the high teens and Helena Guergis in Simcoe-Grey in the low teens.  Any others over 5%?

[mileslunn]

As promised, here is the Green Party.

Green Party over 45% (only Elizabeth May's riding off course)



Greens over 15% 3 ridings



I am little perplexed why Yukon went so heavily Green.  Anybody know about the candidate there.  I know for Vancouver Centre, the candidate was Adrienne Carr who was the former provincial Green Party leader so that one makes sense.

[mileslunn]

Here is the Green Party over 10% (only 8 such ridings)



Green Party over 5% (57 seats)



Interestingly enough it seems BC outside the Lower Mainland, Calgary, and Central Ontario are the Green strongspots.  Ontario is weird as the strongest Green ridings are either downtown Toronto where the Conservatives are weakest or Central Ontario which is the most Conservative part of the province.  I wonder if strategic voting played a part here as in Downtown Toronto there was no chance at a Conservative win while in Central Ontario it was a foregone conclusion the Tories would win so no need to vote strategically.  Also Calgary seems awfully strong for the Greens but not so much Edmonton.  Interestingly enough the Liberals also did better in Calgary than Edmonton while the NDP was much stronger in Edmonton so it seems the centre-left vote united behind the NDP in Edmonton but was more evenly split in Calgary.  Perhaps it was the fiscal policies as the Greens are fairly fiscally conservative and Calgary seems to be quite a bit more fiscally conservative than Edmonton.  In Manitoba two were Conservative strongholds while one was an NDP stronghold so not ridings where there was a risk of vote splitting while the two Atlantic Canada ridings were both Conservative strongholds.  I suspect the Greens did poorly in Newfoundland & Labrador partly due to their stance on the seal hunt as I believe they are the only party opposed to it, and opposing it is political suicide in Newfoundland & Labrador.

[mileslunn]

Here are the Independents over 10%.  I just did one map here.  3 of the five (Andre Arthur, James Ford, and Helena Guergis) are pretty much Conservatives running as independents while Hec Cloutier is a former Liberal but fairly right leaning though.

[mileslunn]

53%? That'd nearly be a sweep of all seats. Heh. Also, wow at Bloc in third. Hopefully these numbers can stick until the next election, and the NDP doesn't piss off English Canada in the meantime. It'll be quite a balancing act. Well, the election isn't for four years anyway, so whatever.

Here's an English version: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2011/06/24/ndp-quebec-support-bloc-quebecios_n_883287.html

  I wonder if the Canada Post issues is having any impact.  Quebec tends to be far more pro-labour union than English Canada so the NDP may be benefitting from this.  Historically many of the businesses were owned by Anglophones thus Quebec's strong affinity for labour.  On the other hand, the Canada Post issue may hurt the NDP in Ontario where people tend to feel public sector unions get too many benefits compared to similiar jobs in the private sector.  I suspect the slight Tory rise in Quebec is mostly amongst older rural nationalists who voted Bloc Quebecois.  Up until this election, the Bloc overwhelmingly appealed to left of centre voters, but most of that swung to the NDP, thus the 23% who voted Bloc are probably much more evenly split between those on the right and those on the left.

[mileslunn]

In the case of Nova Scotia, it appears the NDP was hurt most in Rural Nova Scotia, not so much in Halifax.  Otherwise this made Central Nova a safe Tory seat and South Shore-St. Margaret's less vulnerable than it would have been otherwise, however in Halifax it appears the NDP held or gained votes.  In the case of Newfoundland & Labrador, traditionally St. John's has been where they are strongest, but this time around they had their lowest support in those two ridings while did better in the Rural ridings so I suspect a lot of the Tory support in St. John's was more based on tradition than ideology.  My understanding is St. John's is mostly made up of those of Irish descent and Catholic whereas Rural Newfoundland is mostly those of English descent and Protestant and thus St. John's is more nationalistic so they voted against the party that brought Newfoundland into confederation.  If anything the equalization changes would have angered them more than others.  I could be wrong, but that is my speculation.  In the case of Manitoba, Winnipeg North was more a personal vote than partisan vote.  Lets remember that Kevin Lamoureux won in an NDP stronghold provincially too so I suspect many of his votes were personal ones rather than partisan ones.  As for Elmwood-Transcona, the Tories had a strong second place finish in 2008 so not surprisingly I suspect they put a lot of resources into winning this and generally they have a strong success rate of picking up marginal seats.  Also Winnipeg has seen much of its growth along the periphery not urban core and the areas near the perimeter highway are more conservative than those in the urban core thus paritally why Winnipeg has swung to the right.

[mileslunn]

Now that I am back from My European trip, I can also help out on any requests.

[mileslunn]

Now that I am back from My European trip, I can also help out on any requests.

My request: everything. Well, basically municipalities. I'd also like to see Ottawa broken down by ward (and perhaps other cities).

  Don't worry I will work these.  It may take some time, but I will get the maps out again.  I am usually outdoors more in the summer months so it may be a bit slow, but once the colder weather arrives, I can finish whatever is left.