Ontario Liberal Party leadership

[toaster]

Caucus has endorsed John Fraser as leader. Well, this is the second straight MPP from my riding to have been Liberal leader!

Looking back at this, it's kind of hard to believe.  The caucus is full of diversity (large percentage black, Francophone, LGBT, women), yet they chose the one straight white man in the caucus to be the leader. 

[DL]

Caucus has endorsed John Fraser as leader. Well, this is the second straight MPP from my riding to have been Liberal leader!

Looking back at this, it's kind of hard to believe.  The caucus is full of diversity (large percentage black, Francophone, LGBT, women), yet they chose the one straight white man in the caucus to be the leader. 

This is to be INTERIM leader...the other people in the OLP caucus may want to run for the permanent job and therefore would not have wanted to disqualify themselves by taking the interim leader job

[King of Kensington]

I wonder what the likelihood of Michael Coteau or Mitzie Hunter jumping to federal politics is.  

[mileslunn]

I wonder what the likelihood of Mitzie Coteau or Mitzie Hunter jumping to federal politics is. 

You mean Michael Coteau.  Anyways possible although both their ridings are already held by the Liberals so unless their MPs retire.  In the case of Mitzie Hunter, possible as John McKay has been there for a long time and he is one of the more conservative Liberal MPs so not sure how well he fits within the more progressive oriented Liberals.

[King of Kensington]

Fixed.

[mileslunn]

Will be interesting if the Liberals decide to stay on the left in the hopes of being the main progressive party to challenge the PCs or do they tack back towards the centre and try to appeal to those who find PCs too right wing and NDP too left wing.  My guess is the latter and think that would be the smarter move.  If you are a progressive why would you vote for third place Liberals to defeat the PCs in 2022?  You are likely to go NDP, whereas in the centre it's possible they could win back many in the 905 who are weary of Doug Ford but also weary of voting NDP.

[toaster]

Will be interesting if the Liberals decide to stay on the left in the hopes of being the main progressive party to challenge the PCs or do they tack back towards the centre and try to appeal to those who find PCs too right wing and NDP too left wing.  My guess is the latter and think that would be the smarter move.  If you are a progressive why would you vote for third place Liberals to defeat the PCs in 2022?  You are likely to go NDP, whereas in the centre it's possible they could win back many in the 905 who are weary of Doug Ford but also weary of voting NDP.

It's kind of odd, but the Liberals tend to do better when they campaign on the left.  There's a middle ground that they will really never lose, but there's a large group on the left (as we've seen) who will flip between NDP and Liberal based on who has the better shot at winning.  Andrea will be in her what 4th try? 

[Dipper Josh]

The smart thing for the Liberals to do is probably go Mitzie Hunter or maybe Navdeep Bains.
As an NDP supporter, gimme Sandra Pupatello.

[RogueBeaver]

Holland won't run.

[beesley]

I know I'm bumping the thread, but the current candidates are Steven Del Duca and Michael Coteau. Del Duca seems to be putting internal matters such as a requirement that 50% of candidates are women at the centre of his campaign, whereas Coteau hasn't said that much.

[toaster]

Del Duca apparently is in the lead.  Such a great group of candidates and he's in the lead?  He's not how you motivate a base.  Career politician, KIRBY station in the middle of no where (but close to where I LIVE) kind of guy.  No thank you.  He's the one I would never vote for. 

[brucejoel99]

Del Duca apparently is in the lead.  Such a great group of candidates and he's in the lead?  He's not how you motivate a base.  Career politician, KIRBY station in the middle of no where (but close to where I LIVE) kind of guy.  No thank you.  He's the one I would never vote for. 

This would essentially be handing the election to the NDP; the public has turned it's back on Ford & Del Duca is about as exciting as wet paper-towel on a stick.

[Hatman 🍁]

Del Duca winning is certainly good news for the NDP, but don't underestimate Ontarians' desire to kick Ford to the curb, and if they Liberals stay in first place in the polls (or ahead of the NDP), that's where they'll go.

[brucejoel99]

Del Duca winning is certainly good news for the NDP, but don't underestimate Ontarians' desire to kick Ford to the curb, and if they Liberals stay in first place in the polls (or ahead of the NDP), that's where they'll go.

Not unless the NDP suddenly gain strong, galvanizing leadership out of nowhere. Horwath isn't a great leader & she should've been turfed out awhile ago. I wondered why she managed to get an over 70% endorsement during her leadership review after the 2014 election wherein she'd lost the balance of power to the liberals. She had some control, gambled (& campaigned poorly), lost, & yet, they still kept her ffs.

[DL]

Not unless the NDP suddenly gain strong, galvanizing leadership out of nowhere. Horwath isn't a great leader & she should've been turfed out awhile ago. I wondered why she managed to get an over 70% endorsement during her leadership review after the 2014 election wherein she'd lost the balance of power to the liberals. She had some control, gambled (& campaigned poorly), lost, & yet, they still kept her ffs.

As it turned out keeping her maybe wasn't such a bad decision. The Ontario NDP doubled its seat count to 40 and became official opposition in 2018 in an election that could have been a total disaster - the Ontario NDP has done better under Horwath than they ever did under such luminaries as Donald C. McDonald or Stephen Lewis or Howard Hampton. She is a lot more popular with the general public than pundits sometimes give her credit for

[DC Al Fine]

Not unless the NDP suddenly gain strong, galvanizing leadership out of nowhere. Horwath isn't a great leader & she should've been turfed out awhile ago. I wondered why she managed to get an over 70% endorsement during her leadership review after the 2014 election wherein she'd lost the balance of power to the liberals. She had some control, gambled (& campaigned poorly), lost, & yet, they still kept her ffs.

As it turned out keeping her maybe wasn't such a bad decision. The Ontario NDP doubled its seat count to 40 and became official opposition in 2018 in an election that could have been a total disaster - the Ontario NDP has done better under Horwath than they ever did under such luminaries as Donald C. McDonald or Stephen Lewis or Howard Hampton. She is a lot more popular with the general public than pundits sometimes give her credit for

Agreed. Best PV ever except Rae's freak win. I don't see much to complain about.

[adma]

Not unless the NDP suddenly gain strong, galvanizing leadership out of nowhere. Horwath isn't a great leader & she should've been turfed out awhile ago. I wondered why she managed to get an over 70% endorsement during her leadership review after the 2014 election wherein she'd lost the balance of power to the liberals. She had some control, gambled (& campaigned poorly), lost, & yet, they still kept her ffs.

As it turned out keeping her maybe wasn't such a bad decision. The Ontario NDP doubled its seat count to 40 and became official opposition in 2018 in an election that could have been a total disaster - the Ontario NDP has done better under Horwath than they ever did under such luminaries as Donald C. McDonald or Stephen Lewis or Howard Hampton. She is a lot more popular with the general public than pundits sometimes give her credit for

Agreed. Best PV ever except Rae's freak win. I don't see much to complain about.

Exactly.  Given the daunting odds the ONDP has traditionally faced (and the barriers it still faces), to consider 2018 a disappointment due to "poor campaigning" sounds more like vested-interestism--even if it was the flawed matter of Doug Ford Andrea was facing.

Face it; still, to this post-Rae day, Ontarians really have to take a leap of faith to elect an NDP government.

[DC Al Fine]

Not unless the NDP suddenly gain strong, galvanizing leadership out of nowhere. Horwath isn't a great leader & she should've been turfed out awhile ago. I wondered why she managed to get an over 70% endorsement during her leadership review after the 2014 election wherein she'd lost the balance of power to the liberals. She had some control, gambled (& campaigned poorly), lost, & yet, they still kept her ffs.

As it turned out keeping her maybe wasn't such a bad decision. The Ontario NDP doubled its seat count to 40 and became official opposition in 2018 in an election that could have been a total disaster - the Ontario NDP has done better under Horwath than they ever did under such luminaries as Donald C. McDonald or Stephen Lewis or Howard Hampton. She is a lot more popular with the general public than pundits sometimes give her credit for

Agreed. Best PV ever except Rae's freak win. I don't see much to complain about.

Exactly.  Given the daunting odds the ONDP has traditionally faced (and the barriers it still faces), to consider 2018 a disappointment due to "poor campaigning" sounds more like vested-interestism--even if it was the flawed matter of Doug Ford Andrea was facing.

Face it; still, to this post-Rae day, Ontarians really have to take a leap of faith to elect an NDP government.

Some of it's almost certainly factionalism and vested interest complains, but I think the majority of it is good faith error. It seems like a lot of lefties are just reading Doug Ford's current unpopularity back onto the last election, when he wasn't nearly as unpopular as he is now and retroactively adjusting their expectations of Horwarth.

[DL]

According to this poll when people are just asked how they vote provincially and just the generic party names are read, the Ontario NDP is at 21%. When the poll includes the names of the party leaders and says “the Ontario NDP led by Andrea Horwath” that 21% shoots up to 31%. So remind me why people keep saying  Horwath is a liability when she apparently runs 10 points ahead of the party?

“Without leaders’ names attached, the Liberals had the support of 36 per cent of respondents, while the Tories 30 per cent, the NDP 21 per cent, and the Greens 10 per cent.

But when the leaders’ names were included — including Steven Del Duca as the presumed next leader of the Liberals — the findings changed. In that case, the Tories had the support of 32 per cent, the Liberals 25 per cent, the NDP 31 per cent, and the Greens 10 per cent.

https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/2020/02/11/support-for-ontarios-political-parties-splits-three-ways-poll-suggests.html?fbclid=IwAR1SzaaFiQOEEz9-9xlF6I3e7KFYz0STJNLp2iIlrYleEOuGti7R0r3C5G4

[Hatman 🍁]

I don't think that many people even know who Del Duca is at this point, so I wonder how much of the difference is confusion over federal politics? It bodes well that when people actually think provincially, the Liberals drop to third.

[DL]

I don't think that many people even know who Del Duca is at this point, so I wonder how much of the difference is confusion over federal politics? It bodes well that when people actually think provincially, the Liberals drop to third.

True...once people are exposed to Del Duca Liberal support could decline further. I honestly don't know what the Liberals are thinking in crowning him as leader. Objectively speaking, he strikes as an utterly unappealing, uncharismatic leader.

[adma]

I don't think that many people even know who Del Duca is at this point, so I wonder how much of the difference is confusion over federal politics? It bodes well that when people actually think provincially, the Liberals drop to third.

True...once people are exposed to Del Duca Liberal support could decline further. I honestly don't know what the Liberals are thinking in crowning him as leader. Objectively speaking, he strikes as an utterly unappealing, uncharismatic leader.

Though one might argue: so was Dalton McGuinty going into 1999.  (Then again, Dalton *didn't* get himself defeated the previous election.  And the NDP was coming off 1995, not 1990.)

Still, one must admit: in a whole lot of the 905 and similar places, the Liberals, and not the NDP, remain the default non-Tory option--and it's hard to see Doug Ford galvanizing the "anti-NDP" in his camp the way that various non-NDP parties have done in the West, or how the British Tories stubbornly remain the "anti-Labour" default even if the Lib Dems attempted a few bold decapitations in places like Surrey last time around...

[King of Kensington]

Maybe we'll see some sort of return to Ontario ca. 1990 with the NDP dominating the urban and "progressive" vote and the Liberals becoming the center-right party of the suburbs?   Maybe that's Del Duca's best hope.

[Poirot]

The vote was at a convention with elected delegates so the outcome was known. Result of 2141 votes:

Steven Del Duca 1258
Michael Coteau 364
Kate Graham 299
Mitzie Hunter 122
Alvin Tedjo 74
Brenda Hollingsworth 24

[brucejoel99]

The vote was at a convention with elected delegates so the outcome was known. Result of 2141 votes:

Steven Del Duca 1258
Michael Coteau 364
Kate Graham 299
Mitzie Hunter 122
Alvin Tedjo 74
Brenda Hollingsworth 24

My feeling is that he's a caretaker leader. After 15 years in power, there was no leader (or leaders) in waiting for the eventual election loss & transition to the next generation. Having Del Duca as the leader gives somebody time to build their brand as the next leader of the party while not being damaged as the leader of a party without official party status.

As I said before, Del Duca is a poor choice if you want to win the next election. The Liberals will win back some of the seats they lost, but they won't be in a position to win if they have somebody linked to the Wynne government at their helm. So let him take the lumps, step aside after the next election, & let somebody build their brand & take over after 2022.