Canadian by-elections, 2012

[mileslunn]

I doubt Kitchener-Waterloo will go NDP as they generally get below the provincial average here, although I could see the Liberals picking up as if you look at the federal results the Liberals usually were above the provincial average while the Conservatives slightly below, although they did win it last federal election but they won the majority of seats in Ontario.  Elizabeth Witmer largely held the riding due to personal popularity.  That being said because the riding will determine whether McGuinty gets his majority or not, a lot of people will vote differently than they would in a general election.  Otherwise the question will be does McGuinty deserve a majority or not.  On the one hand some will want stability in this period, thus vote Liberal for that reason, but others feel they need to be kept on a tight leash.

[Bacon King]

Maybe I'm missing something here, but wouldn't a Liberal victory in the by-election be completely irrelevant?

The Speaker is a Liberal, and he's bound by the same rules as the Speaker of the House of Commons, correct? (e.g., he has no vote except to break a tie, and even when breaking a tie is obligated to vote against amendments and final passages)

So even if the Grits gain a seat, the new breakdown would be 54-36-17, but in terms of votes it'd only be 53 for the government and 53 for the opposition, with the tie-breaking vote going to a Speaker who votes down everything, so the Liberals would still need to be getting outside support to get things passed.

Is this not correct? I'll admit I'm making some assumptions here; I'm not entirely sure the Speaker's casting vote works like that in Ontario, especially since they do get to keep their label and everything.

I'm requoting this because it seems to have been ignored. Because Ontario's non-voting speaker is a Liberal, the NDP and PC's currently outnumber the Liberals by a single vote. A government victory in the by-election would only give them half of the votes, with the Speaker breaking ties. Is the Ontario Speaker not bound by casting-vote precedents as in other Westminster-style systems?

Presuming the Liberals do win the by-election, can the Speaker resign his office in the middle of the session to allow his party to elect someone from the opposition so they can have a true majority?   

[adma]

I doubt Kitchener-Waterloo will go NDP as they generally get below the provincial average here,

Though they were actually above the provincial average here in 2007, thanks to a serious campaign by school trustee Catherine Fife--unfortunately for her, that was still the "strategic vote = Liberal" era; but if anyone were to score the seat for the NDP now, it'd be her, I suspect...

[mileslunn]

Maybe I'm missing something here, but wouldn't a Liberal victory in the by-election be completely irrelevant?

The Speaker is a Liberal, and he's bound by the same rules as the Speaker of the House of Commons, correct? (e.g., he has no vote except to break a tie, and even when breaking a tie is obligated to vote against amendments and final passages)

So even if the Grits gain a seat, the new breakdown would be 54-36-17, but in terms of votes it'd only be 53 for the government and 53 for the opposition, with the tie-breaking vote going to a Speaker who votes down everything, so the Liberals would still need to be getting outside support to get things passed.

Is this not correct? I'll admit I'm making some assumptions here; I'm not entirely sure the Speaker's casting vote works like that in Ontario, especially since they do get to keep their label and everything.

I'm requoting this because it seems to have been ignored. Because Ontario's non-voting speaker is a Liberal, the NDP and PC's currently outnumber the Liberals by a single vote. A government victory in the by-election would only give them half of the votes, with the Speaker breaking ties. Is the Ontario Speaker not bound by casting-vote precedents as in other Westminster-style systems?

Presuming the Liberals do win the by-election, can the Speaker resign his office in the middle of the session to allow his party to elect someone from the opposition so they can have a true majority?   

The tradition is regardless of party the speaker always votes whichever way will keep debate going.  That is a longtime parliamentary tradition dating back over 400 years.  He would vote with the Liberals in this case, but so would the same thing happen with an NDP or PC speaker as voting against the government would cause it to fall, thus not maintaining debate.  Off course this is just a tradition not a requirement, but generally most speakers do.  In fact in Britain the speaker will usually run as an independent unlike in Canada where the tradition comes from.

[adma]

Interesting to note (re this byelection being about about "restoring" the Liberal majority) that Andrea Horwath entered Queen's Park under similar circumstances, i.e. a byelection that came to be about restoring the NDP's Official Party Status.  (And there as here, the riding demographics were favourable to the party making the "restoration" bid, even if the departed member was from another party.)

[Lief]

[Hatman]

Why are we posting graphics from that site?

[Lief]

From the Globe and Mail?

[Hatman]

From the Globe and Mail?

No, 308.com (The guy there does stuff for the G&M)

[Holmes]

He's not doing seat projections until the new boundaries are out, apparently.

[Hatman]

He's not doing seat projections until the new boundaries are out, apparently.

Those look like projections to me.

[Hatman]

FR poll of the Kitchener-Waterloo race: http://www.therecord.com/news/local/article/717057--poll-suggests-liberals-could-win-kitchener-waterloo-riding

[Holmes]

The candidates haven't even been nominated. Cool your jets.

[RogueBeaver]

Hopefully not. There was an article earlier today that McGuinty might try this gambit in a couple of other seats.

http://www.therecord.com/news/canada/article/718609--liberals-courting-tory-and-ndp-mpps

[Hatman]

The candidates haven't even been nominated. Cool your jets.

I know, but it's not a good place to start.

[Senator MaxQue]

Another resignation.

David Whissell, MNA for Argenteuil since 1998, resigned today, officially to do other things. Opposition parties are saying than it is probably to escape the ethics rules beginning on January 1st. He is an owner of a big paving company. He prefered resigning as Labour Minister than to sell it, a few years ago.

Last time it didn't elected a Liberal was 1962. Another riding with a significant Anglophone minority. It is also the riding of the Green leader.

Results since Whissell is elected (according to quebecpolitique website):

June 1998 by-election
Liberals: 57%
PQ: 38%
ADQ: 5%

November 1998
Liberals: 42%
PQ: 42%
ADQ: 13%
Others: Bloc Pot (marijuana) 1.2%, Ind 0.7%, Natural Law 0.3%, PDS (the remainers of the NDP-Quebec) 0.3%
Finally, Whissell is relected by 148 votes.

April 2003
Liberals: 53%
PQ: 25%
ADQ: 18%
Greens: 2.1%
Bloc Pot: 1.2% (yes, again)

March 2007
Liberals: 38%
ADQ: 30%
PQ: 26%
Greens: 4.7%
QS: 2.3%

December 2008
Liberals: 50%
PQ: 33%
ADQ: 11%
Greens: 3.5%
QS: 2.1%

Here is Argenteuil.



Diverse and complicated riding.

Many Anglos rural small villages, even if some are less and less Anglo (Gore Township, Wentworth-Nord), in the lower Rouge Valley and along Ottawa River.

Some villages which isn't really in Argenteuil area, which are more in the Laurentians, with the Highway 15 as the big axis and are more French (Saint-Adolphe-d'Howard, Montcalm), including a very rich Liberal ski and spa resort, despite being Francophone (Morin Heights).

A regional center (Lachute) which is more and more exurban.

Mille-Isles and Saint-Colomban, which are very very near of the city of Saint-Jérome which has a commuter rail (train de banlieue) leading directly in Montreal downtown. So, Saint-Colomban, formely a rural village, is now a booming exurb.
Talking of Saint-Colomban, the ADQ was second in half the precincts of the "parish" (which is a legal status for little villages). Liberals being third, in those, with pretty awful result in some precincts (the worst by 13%).

Grey precincts are Lib-PQ ties.

Quoted from another thread, because it was called for June 11, as the by-election in LaFontaine, to replace Tony Tomassi, a Liberal MNA which was expelled from the party (and of Family Ministry) after media learned a business (BCIA) gave him a credit card. He didn't came into the Assembly since then and he was under inquiry for absenteism.

This post is probably long enough, so, the candidates and the LaFontaine preview will go in a future post.

[Senator MaxQue]

Candidates in Argenteuil.
Liberal: Lise Proulx, former president of the Argenteuil Hospital Foundation, former press attachée of the MNA when he was Labour minister, former communication director of the Argenteuil Health and Social Services Centre (CSSS), currently information agent at the Argenteuil CSSS.

PQ: Roland Richer, former elementary school director, defeated candidate for PQ investiture for the 1998 by-election.

CAQ: Mario Laframboise, BQ MP for Argenteuil-Papineau-Mirabel from 2000 to 2011 (defeated by NDP), former mayor of Notre-Dame-de-la-Paix, former prefect of Papineau MRC.

Greens: Claude Sabourin, Green leader since 2010, teacher, author, Green candidate in Argenteuil in 2003 (2.1%), 2007 (4.7%) and 2008 (3.5%) and federal Green candidate in Argenteuil-Papineau-Mirabel in 2004 (5.1%) and 2006 (4.6%)

QS: Yan Zanetti, voluntary fireman and guy who fixes and builds houses, living in Wentworth.

Conservative: Jean Lecavalier, former teacher, former president of the ADQ-Argenteuil, ADQ candidate in 2007 in Nelligan (western Montreal,), former municipal councillor in L'Île-Bizard (western Montreal). Wierd party, as they apparently compare themselves to National Union.
It fits with the 3 priorities of the candidate: Reopen Mirabel Airport, better ambulatory care in Argenteuil and asking government money to fix a municipal pool, all right-wing ideas...

[RogueBeaver]

Reopening a useless airport and infrastructure spending are right-wing ideas? Anyhoo this by-election looks like a Pelquiste wash.

[Senator MaxQue]

Reopening a useless airport and infrastructure spending are right-wing ideas?

No. It was irony and a a prolongation of their comparaison with the National Union, which was more patronage than ideology.

[Hatman]

Finally. Will we get to see some maps of LaFontaine as well?

BTW, LaFontaine is basically the Montreal suburb of Riviere-des-Prairies. The riding should be named that.

[Senator MaxQue]

Finally. Will we get to see some maps of LaFontaine as well?

BTW, LaFontaine is basically the Montreal suburb of Riviere-des-Prairies. The riding should be named that.

Yes, even if it will be boring and perhaps not before Victoria Day, unless you write my 20-page final lab report.

Earl, well, you know than the Quebec commission loves to name ridings about people.

[Hatman]

No rush.

I know. I hate riding names named after people. Especially when the riding name would be obvious and not controversial such as this one.

[RogueBeaver]

We don't have any controversial riding names. If someone started using 20th-century political VIPs then maybe, but that hasn't happened yet. Sole exception is Con-derre's riding of Bourassa and even that isn't a BFD here.

[DL]

We don't have any controversial riding names. If someone started using 20th-century political VIPs then maybe, but that hasn't happened yet. Sole exception is Con-derre's riding of Bourassa and even that isn't a BFD here.

The riding of Bourassa is actually NOT named after Robert Bourassa. Its named after Henri Bourassa (no relation) who founded Le Devoir about 100 years ago. The riding has had that name since the early 70s when Robert Bourassa was a first term premier.

There are ridings named after many other former premiers (ie: Taschereau, Duplessis, Jean Lesage, Johnson, Rene Levesque). Its hard to imagine having ridings in Ontario named "George Drew" or "Davis" or "Bob Rae" etc... BTW: In Australia almost all ridings are named after famous people such as ex-PMs and more often then not the name of a riding tells you nothing about where it is located.

That being said, why not rename "Toronto-Danforth" as "Layton" and maybe also rename Mount Royal "Trudeau"...Mount Royal is already a bit of a misnomer since the riding is actually no where near the mountain. Westmount-Ville Marie actually has all of Mount Royal in it!

God forbid that they ever re-name Prince Albert "Diefenbaker"! I think the only case of a riding outside Quebec being named for a politician is Buranby-Douglas which is named after Tommy Douglas who used to represent it in the 60s.

[Senator MaxQue]

I think than Rogue knows than Bourassa is for Henri.

True than he forgot René-Lévesque, Duplessis, Taschereau, Johnson, Gouin and Jean-Lesage.

And Mount Royal isn't about the mount (which is in Outremont, not in Westmount--Ville-Marie!), but about the Town of Mount Royal (often called TMR in English).