Canadian by-elections, 2017 (next event: Calgary-Lougheed, AB prov.: Dec 14)

[Hatman 🍁]

Upcoming municipal by-elections:

- Feb. 13: Toronto Ward 42 (to replace Raymond Cho who was elected to Queen's Park)
- Mar. 27: Georgina, Ontario Ward 1

Provincial (no dates set so far)

- Saskatoon Meewasin (SK)
- Sault Ste. Marie (ON)
- Point Douglas (MB)

Federal (no dates)

- Calgary Heritage (AB) - to replace Stephen Harper
- Calgary Midnapore (AB) - to replace Jason Kenney
- Ottawa-Vanier (ON) - to replace Mauril Bélanger  (RIP)

[Hatman 🍁]

Manitoba NDP, Kevin Chief (Point Douglas) resigned his seat back in December.
I don't think his resignation is official yet.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/kevin-chief-resigns-1.3896978

Oh yes, I knew I was forgetting something. Thanks!

[Hatman 🍁]

RB must be stuck in 2014. Dion's riding changed names too (just Saint-Laurent now).

[Hatman 🍁]

She's retiring. Can QS hold it? Maybe a chance for the NDPQ to run (is that still happening)? Gouin is basically La Petite-Patrie, which pretty much the most leftist area in Quebec.

[Hatman 🍁]

Atchison is a nut case and very unpopular. Hence why he lost, even against a divided opposition in last year's mayoral election.

[Hatman 🍁]

Looking at a map Meewasin doesn't look all that suburban to me...its close to downtown and mostly right by the river

Well, the northern half of the riding is suburban.

[Hatman 🍁]

River Heights and Richmond Heights are suburban, and vote SP/Tory
North Park is a swing neighbourhood
City Park and Kelsey-Woodlawn vote NDP

[Hatman 🍁]

Grain of salt, etc. But good news nonetheless. And also, happy to see Elections Saskatchewan has finally released the poll by poll results of the last election.

[Hatman 🍁]

Hatman, how would you conduct a public opinion poll for a race where there were 29 candidates on the ballot, like the Ward 42 by-election?

Depends on the mode:
-Phone (interviewers wouldn't read the list, unless asked)
-Online (no problem, just list everyone)

Your big problem is if it's IVR, because you need to read the list (press '1' for X). I would try to identify who the main candidates are and have an 'other' option.

[Hatman 🍁]

Needless to say it is virtually impossible to do an online survey in a municipal ward since there is no online sample/panel at that granular a level.

Even doing a phone poll in that ward is very very difficult since that ward is very new and heavily heavily made up of recent immigrants - most of whom only have cell phones and no land line and since it is impossible to get cell sample at the ward level - you can only poll landlines - which may be very unrepresentative of the voters.

FWIW, I expect Neethan Shan to win simply because on a 29 person ballot - he is the one and only candidate who has run in that area several times before and would be a recognizable name

Yeah, I expect him to win too. And maybe with 10-15% of the vote!

[Hatman 🍁]

I knew Shan would probably win, but that is certainly an impressive victory. I figured voters would've got sick of him running for election every six months. So what, we are now headed for a third school board by-election to fill his seat?

[Hatman 🍁]

Results:
Neethan Shan: 4765 (45.7%)
Zuhair Syed: 1452 (13.9%)
Hratch Aynedjian: 1058 (10.2%)
26 others: 3143 (30.2%)

With two candidates using red, no wonder Liberals couldn't get behind a candidate!

This ward covers the Malvern community of the city (would be the likely name of the ward if Toronto had proper ward names). It's only 10% White, and 43% South Asian, many of whom are Tamil like Shan. 17% of the ward has Tamil as its mother tongue.

[Hatman 🍁]

Off topic but still related, what's going on with the sudden drop in support for the Liberals?

Progressives outside of Canada haven't got the memo yet, but lil' Justin has been a huge disappointment. He tells us what we want to hear, but doesn't do what we want to be done. I don't know how many people actually care about electoral reform, but it's probably enough to account for a couple of points in the polls.

[Hatman 🍁]

Oh look, lotuslander found a thread that's not about BC. Guess it's finally time to put him on ignore.

You can tell Nik Nanos I say 'hi'.

[Hatman 🍁]

Here's a map for y'all:



I think the Sask Party may just eek out a victory. We'll see. It's all about turnout as the riding is heavily polarized between north & south.

[Hatman 🍁]

Let's not call this yet, we don't know where the polls are coming from.

[Hatman 🍁]

yeah, it's over. Huzzah!

[Hatman 🍁]

Swings:
NDP +11.2%
SP: -10.6%
Lib: -0.8%
Grn: -1.1%

Two party average swing: 10.9% SP to NDP

[Hatman 🍁]

Looking more and more like a PC-NDP race.

[Hatman 🍁]

Saint-Laurent: James lost the nomination to a local schoolteacher. She also came a distant 3rd. SAD! (which is why you appoint)

Lol

How hard is it for the LPC to sign up instamembers en masse? If they want to rig a nomination, they should do it the old fashioned way.

yeah, this is just incompetence, or perhaps the Liberals have been feeling the heat on electoral reform, so are trying to avoid any democratic scandals by avoiding meddling in nomination races?

[Hatman 🍁]

Btw, Emilie Taman is a superb candidate. The next Ontario provincial election is. A year away and while the federal Liberals are still relatively popular, the Ontario Liberals most definitely are not. The Ontario Liberals are so unpopular they could be reduced to half a dozen seats. I wonder if Taman could be convinced to run for the Ontario NDP in Ottawa Centre (where she actually lives)

And Vanier would be one of those half dozen seats!

Exactly. That seat has been a Grit stronghold since 1935. The Ontario Liberals will probably do horrendously poorly at the provincial election, but I don't see that having much of an indicative effect federally.

Don't forget, there was just a provincial by-election in Ottawa-Vanier, where the Liberals still won by a large margin.

[Hatman 🍁]

Toronto might hold another City Council by-election, Scarborough ward 44 Councillor Ron Moeser has died
https://www.thestar.com/news/city_hall/2017/04/18/toronto-councillor-ron-moeser-dies.html

How popular was he? Every election he's been in since 2003 has been razor close.

[Hatman 🍁]

What about the Manitoba by-election to replace New Democrat Kevin Chief?

Called today. June 13.

http://news.gov.mb.ca/news/index.html?archive=&item=41543

Well, the one improvement the Tory government is over the previous NDP government is they only take 4 months to call by-elections instead of a year

[Hatman 🍁]

FWIW, I fully expect a 3-way race in the Soo, and wouldn't be surprised if it ends up being a PC-NDP race.

The Liberals may be running a former mayor, but she lost in the last mayoral election (to another Liberal to boot), which is usually a sign that she wasn't very popular. In municipal politics, it is fairly rare for an incumbent to lose.

[Hatman 🍁]

Radio-Canada calls it for GND