Ontario 2018 election

[DC Al Fine]

Where is the mention of getting rid of the Catholic schools?

Getting rid of Catholic schools require amending the Constitution, which the Federal won't do unless there is a general consensus (like there was in Québec and Newfoundland).

All other provinces that got out of it were able to do it.  If Ontario wanted out of the business of being discriminatory, and fully funding these schools, they could do it.

Andrea Horwath's message to young Gay francophones (who can't work openly in a Catholic system): I think you should only have access to 20% of teaching jobs.  That's the message I'm getting anyway.  

The solution is to ban gay hiring discrimination there.

Which essentially makes them non-catholic.  Most of the Catholic schools (particularly in areas of the GTA like Peel) are filled with non-catholics.  So why even have them?

The other thing that I take issue with is when people point to Johny Tory's PC party, and say "look it was a disaster then with what he proposed".  Yeah, it was a disaster because the PCs wanted to EXPAND funding of religious schools, which most Ontarians are against. The opposite, wouldn't you think, would get the opposite reaction (i.e., favourable).

The fact that this exists in 2018, in Ontario, is upsetting.
Again, the issue is more pronounced on the French side, where some 80% of the jobs in most areas with Catholic schools.  It's outrageously discriminatory towards Muslim, Sikh, Atheist, etc, Francophones more than anyone, as the French public boards are so small.
Again, Andrea Horwath is saying loud in clear: I think Muslim francophone teachers don't deserve as many job opportunities as Catholic Francophones for jobs (actually only 1 out of every 5).   Or you're a francophone Sikh family, your child will have to travel across town an hour on a bus to get to a French public school, even though there is a French-Catholic school across the street.  But the catholic family next door, your kids won't have to take an hour-long bus ride.   If people don't see that as discriminatory, than we have a larger problem in this province than we may have though.

Toaster, I'm on mobile, so you'll have to forgive me for not breaking out the paragraphs of your post/my response into seperate quotes.

1) Large numbers of non-Catholics putting their kids in Catholic schools indicates to me that the Catholic schools are providing something that parents want that they don't feel they are getting out of secular schools, whether it's quality of education, morals or something else. For example one of my good friends attended Catholic schools near Hamilton despite being raised Evangelical. He told me that it's semi common for Evangelicals to send their kids to Catholic schools due to the relative lack of secularism. To remove funding is removing options for parents who are dissatisfied with a uniform, secular public system. It's an indicator that there is a segment of parents who are dissatisfied with the public system and a good reason IMO to expand funding to additional groups, both secular and religious.

2) I don't think it follows that opposition to the Tory proposal necessarily indicates the opposite would be positively received. Ontario is about 30% Catholic at least nominally and by your own admission, many non-Catholic students attend Catholic schools. That indicates a large constituency that would have some degree of attachment to Catholic schools (even for non-religous reasons). The NDP would presumably need to win some of those votes to form government.

Oryxslayer had it right; it's not a relevant issue, and the political calculus isn't there for the NDP to make it one. You'd do well to avoid the mistake of my socon peers of confusing principal with popularity.

3) I don't think anyone denies it's discrimination, but politics isnt working out laws from first principles. Progressive governments in Ontario and Alberta are restricting the right to peaceful protest. It sucks and I complain incessantly about it, but I get why progressives are doing it and why the Tories aren't putting up a big fight: Sometimes discrimination is popular.

[DC Al Fine]

Latest Forum poll out this morning is a total bloodbath for the Wynne Liberals:

PC - 46%
NDP - 27%
Liberals - 21% (!) and projected to lose official party status with just 7 seats

http://www.qpbriefing.com/2018/04/20/forum-poll-ontario-liberals-fall-third-place-risk-losing-party-status/

I know it's lolForum, but if that's anywhere near accurate, it will be a bloodbath. The Liberals were down to 11 seats in Ontario federally in 2011 on a 45-25-25 split.

[DL]

The deatils from the Forum poll are there...the Liberals are now in third place even in the city of Toronto!

http://poll.forumresearch.com/post/2838/ontario-horserace-april-2018

[mileslunn]

Looking at the polls and the way the Liberals are acting, do people think Wynne and her party still actually believe they can win or have they shifted more to the strategy of just trying to hold as many seats as possible, but realize they cannot win this election.  I don't think a Ford win is a foregone conclusion but I do think an NDP win is more likely than a Liberal one although PCs still heavily favoured.  The only way I can see Wynne remaining premier is if the Liberals come in second, the PCs only win a minority and they can get the NDP to agree to supply and confidence although the NDP would be screwed big time if this happens.  They let Ford become premier, their supporters won't forgive them, while if they keep Wynne in office they will get punished for allowing a premier most wanted gone to remain.  In that case they would actually be wise to tell the Liberals they will only support them if they change leaders.

[MaxQue]

From having a former sister-in-law which was a Francophone living on Ontario, the secular French system in many zones is utter crap. When she moved back to Quebec, the school had to give her special measures, as she had elementary level French despite being in Grade 10. When she moved back, her father put her in the superior (but insanely strict) Catholic system.

[Hatman 🍁]

I do know non-Catholics who send their kids to a Catholic school. I was encouraged to put our daughter in one, but I refused on principle. Plus, I don't even know where the nearest Catholic elementary school is.

[henster]

The Liberals had ample time to dump Wynne and put up someone else, it would have at least given them a fighting chance. Instead they will be wiped out and not have a much left to choose from to rebuild the party.

[mileslunn]

Forum has a poll out today on public response to issues.  50% preferred eliminating taxes for those on minimum wage than raising by $1/hour while 35% preferred an increase of minimum wage by 1%.  On corporate tax cuts of 1% as Doug Ford proposed, 37% support, while 40% opposed so it seems the PC policies weren't big hits, but not exactly harmful either.

For the NDP all of their policies had support but it wasn't overwhelming.  Interestingly enough all of them were popular amongst Liberal supporters but not so much amongst PC supporters meaning they have a decent chance at uniting progressives, but they will probably need Ford to do something stupid if they want to win outright.  Raising taxes on the rich not surprisingly was the most popular, but 34% opposed it which is actually fairly high compared to past times this has been asked, but perhaps after a few tax hikes on the rich there is less enthusiasm than earlier, but still popular nonetheless.  Childcare was the closest to being split down the middle.

[Dipper Josh]

Where is the mention of getting rid of the Catholic schools?

Getting rid of Catholic schools require amending the Constitution, which the Federal won't do unless there is a general consensus (like there was in Québec and Newfoundland).

All other provinces that got out of it were able to do it.  If Ontario wanted out of the business of being discriminatory, and fully funding these schools, they could do it.

Andrea Horwath's message to young Gay francophones (who can't work openly in a Catholic system): I think you should only have access to 20% of teaching jobs.  That's the message I'm getting anyway.  

The solution is to ban gay hiring discrimination there.

Which essentially makes them non-catholic.  Most of the Catholic schools (particularly in areas of the GTA like Peel) are filled with non-catholics.  So why even have them?

The other thing that I take issue with is when people point to Johny Tory's PC party, and say "look it was a disaster then with what he proposed".  Yeah, it was a disaster because the PCs wanted to EXPAND funding of religious schools, which most Ontarians are against. The opposite, wouldn't you think, would get the opposite reaction (i.e., favourable).

The fact that this exists in 2018, in Ontario, is upsetting.
Again, the issue is more pronounced on the French side, where some 80% of the jobs in most areas with Catholic schools.  It's outrageously discriminatory towards Muslim, Sikh, Atheist, etc, Francophones more than anyone, as the French public boards are so small.
Again, Andrea Horwath is saying loud in clear: I think Muslim francophone teachers don't deserve as many job opportunities as Catholic Francophones for jobs (actually only 1 out of every 5).   Or you're a francophone Sikh family, your child will have to travel across town an hour on a bus to get to a French public school, even though there is a French-Catholic school across the street.  But the catholic family next door, your kids won't have to take an hour-long bus ride.   If people don't see that as discriminatory, than we have a larger problem in this province than we may have though.

Toaster, I'm on mobile, so you'll have to forgive me for not breaking out the paragraphs of your post/my response into seperate quotes.

1) Large numbers of non-Catholics putting their kids in Catholic schools indicates to me that the Catholic schools are providing something that parents want that they don't feel they are getting out of secular schools, whether it's quality of education, morals or something else. For example one of my good friends attended Catholic schools near Hamilton despite being raised Evangelical. He told me that it's semi common for Evangelicals to send their kids to Catholic schools due to the relative lack of secularism. To remove funding is removing options for parents who are dissatisfied with a uniform, secular public system. It's an indicator that there is a segment of parents who are dissatisfied with the public system and a good reason IMO to expand funding to additional groups, both secular and religious.

I think you're over thinking this a tad. I'm a secular senior in a catholic school in Belleville which has like 5 or 6 catholic highschools within the area and a majority of secular kids that go here are either for friend groups or geographical convenience. 
The secular population is so incredibly strong in these highschools that the religious church girl cliques are a tiny minority in the school atmosphere.
Another point I wanted to tackle, It's certainly not morals. Our school has just as much weed and vaping as the public schools and everybody knows it including the parents, the culture here and the schools is shockingly unreligious and even in religion class it's just them teaching about the history of the bible and a couple "ABSTINENCE IS THE ONLY OPTION" classes are mixed inbetween.
Even the notion of "parents sending their kids to school" i disagree with, its very culturally appropriate for highschoolers to pick where they go.

To circle back to my original, its really just geographical convenience.

If a party came out and proposed the abolition of the catholic school system they likely wouldnt lose any secular votes, its the the catholic portion of their voting base that theyre worried about.

[lilTommy]

Where is the mention of getting rid of the Catholic schools?

Getting rid of Catholic schools require amending the Constitution, which the Federal won't do unless there is a general consensus (like there was in Québec and Newfoundland).

All other provinces that got out of it were able to do it.  If Ontario wanted out of the business of being discriminatory, and fully funding these schools, they could do it.

Andrea Horwath's message to young Gay francophones (who can't work openly in a Catholic system): I think you should only have access to 20% of teaching jobs.  That's the message I'm getting anyway.  

The solution is to ban gay hiring discrimination there.

Which essentially makes them non-catholic.  Most of the Catholic schools (particularly in areas of the GTA like Peel) are filled with non-catholics.  So why even have them?

The other thing that I take issue with is when people point to Johny Tory's PC party, and say "look it was a disaster then with what he proposed".  Yeah, it was a disaster because the PCs wanted to EXPAND funding of religious schools, which most Ontarians are against. The opposite, wouldn't you think, would get the opposite reaction (i.e., favourable).

The fact that this exists in 2018, in Ontario, is upsetting.
Again, the issue is more pronounced on the French side, where some 80% of the jobs in most areas with Catholic schools.  It's outrageously discriminatory towards Muslim, Sikh, Atheist, etc, Francophones more than anyone, as the French public boards are so small.
Again, Andrea Horwath is saying loud in clear: I think Muslim francophone teachers don't deserve as many job opportunities as Catholic Francophones for jobs (actually only 1 out of every 5).   Or you're a francophone Sikh family, your child will have to travel across town an hour on a bus to get to a French public school, even though there is a French-Catholic school across the street.  But the catholic family next door, your kids won't have to take an hour-long bus ride.   If people don't see that as discriminatory, than we have a larger problem in this province than we may have though.

Toaster, I'm on mobile, so you'll have to forgive me for not breaking out the paragraphs of your post/my response into seperate quotes.

1) Large numbers of non-Catholics putting their kids in Catholic schools indicates to me that the Catholic schools are providing something that parents want that they don't feel they are getting out of secular schools, whether it's quality of education, morals or something else. For example one of my good friends attended Catholic schools near Hamilton despite being raised Evangelical. He told me that it's semi common for Evangelicals to send their kids to Catholic schools due to the relative lack of secularism. To remove funding is removing options for parents who are dissatisfied with a uniform, secular public system. It's an indicator that there is a segment of parents who are dissatisfied with the public system and a good reason IMO to expand funding to additional groups, both secular and religious.

I think you're over thinking this a tad. I'm a secular senior in a catholic school in Belleville which has like 5 or 6 catholic highschools within the area and a majority of secular kids that go here are either for friend groups or geographical convenience. 
The secular population is so incredibly strong in these highschools that the religious church girl cliques are a tiny minority in the school atmosphere.
Another point I wanted to tackle, It's certainly not morals. Our school has just as much weed and vaping as the public schools and everybody knows it including the parents, the culture here and the schools is shockingly unreligious and even in religion class it's just them teaching about the history of the bible and a couple "ABSTINENCE IS THE ONLY OPTION" classes are mixed inbetween.
Even the notion of "parents sending their kids to school" i disagree with, its very culturally appropriate for highschoolers to pick where they go.

To circle back to my original, its really just geographical convenience.

If a party came out and proposed the abolition of the catholic school system they likely wouldnt lose any secular votes, its the the catholic portion of their voting base that theyre worried about.

This really was my experience as well, and that was about 18 years ago when I graduated!
for me, it was the fact that all my friends were going to the catholic school and it was just a given I'd go there as well.

Within the NDP this has been talked about, in 2009 leadership race Michael Prue ran very heavily on ending separate school funding in his leadership race. In 2010, the party commissioned a task force, now i don't totally agree on this but, it came to the conclusion that:
"that the cost savings are unproven. Past amalgamations have produced few efficiencies because of per-student funding rules."
Good article from 2012 - https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2012/06/06/cohn_why_catholic_schools_arent_going_anywhere.html when GSAs were the issue.

For me the issue is one of rights; with the GSA issue and now the fundraising/volunteer issue, it comes down to the fact that Charter Rights are fighting each other. Personally there is a hierarchy to charter rights, and Human Rights is paramount. These are the indelible rights like protections based on Sex, Race, Orientation. Religious rights do not trump these since Religion is not indelible but rather a choice.

[Hatman 🍁]

Changing topics for a bit - I've created a "partisan index" for every riding, similar to the Cook partisan index, but not exactly. I've averaged the difference between the results of the last two provincial and federal elections in each riding and the province wide popular votes for each election.

I've made a map which shows each riding coloured by the party with the highest index score for each riding.



One interesting riding is Brantford-Brant, which the NDP has the highest score despite never having won the seat in any of the elections.

[lilTommy]

Changing topics for a bit - I've created a "partisan index" for every riding, similar to the Cook partisan index, but not exactly. I've averaged the difference between the results of the last two provincial and federal elections in each riding and the province wide popular votes for each election.

I've made a map which shows each riding coloured by the party with the highest index score for each riding.



One interesting riding is Brantford-Brant, which the NDP has the highest score despite never having won the seat in any of the elections.

Interesting; especially Brantford-Brant, how does the formula work to have this riding labelled NDP but not won by the party during this period?. Not too many other surprises eh?
I wonder what impact redistribution would have moving forward? Specifically i'm thinking Toronto Centre, University-Rosedale and Spadina-Fort York. I think TC would be much lighter red now moving forward, UR would be also more favorable to the Liberals? I see these three as swing progressive riding all three being more pale coloured red or orange? 

[Hatman 🍁]

Using this partisan index, the "safest" Tory ridings are:

Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke (+21)
Leeds-Grenville (+20)
Stormont-Dundas-South Glengarry (+18)
Carleton (+18)
Wellington-Halton Hills (+18)
Thornhill (+17)
Niagara West (+17)
Haldimand-Norfolk (+15)
York-Simcoe (+15)
Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston (+15)

Strongest ridings for the NDP:
Hamilton Centre (+34)
Mushkegowuk-James Bay (+33)
Kiiwetinoong (+31)
Nickel Belt (+30)
Toronto-Danforth (+28)
Timiskaming-Cochrane (+25)
Windsor-Tecumseh (+25)
Algoma-Manitoulin (+24)
Davenport (+23) - surprising since they don't hold the riding in federally or provincially.
Hamilton Mountain (+23)

Strongest Liberal seats:
Toronto Centre (+17)
Toronto-St. Paul's (+16)
Humber River-Black Creek (+16)
Don Valley East (+16)
Don Valley West (+16)
Ottawa South (+14)
Ottawa-Vanier (+14)
Etobicoke North (+13)
Orleans (+13)
Eglinton-Lawrence (+12)


As this index measures average results, it doesn't take into consideration voter elasticity, so some of the ridings aren't exactly "safe".

[Hatman 🍁]

Changing topics for a bit - I've created a "partisan index" for every riding, similar to the Cook partisan index, but not exactly. I've averaged the difference between the results of the last two provincial and federal elections in each riding and the province wide popular votes for each election.

I've made a map which shows each riding coloured by the party with the highest index score for each riding.



One interesting riding is Brantford-Brant, which the NDP has the highest score despite never having won the seat in any of the elections.

Interesting; especially Brantford-Brant, how does the formula work to have this riding labelled NDP but not won by the party during this period?. Not too many other surprises eh?
I wonder what impact redistribution would have moving forward? Specifically i'm thinking Toronto Centre, University-Rosedale and Spadina-Fort York. I think TC would be much lighter red now moving forward, UR would be also more favorable to the Liberals? I see these three as swing progressive riding all three being more pale coloured red or orange? 

This is based on transposed results, but the boundary changes may make ridings like Toronto Centre more competitive, as it could potentially have close elections.

What's happening in Brantford-Brant is the NDP regularly polls better than their province-wide popular vote, while  the other two parties haven't. Provincially, it's a Liberal seat, but they haven't done well in the riding federally, and vise-versa with the Tories.

[DC Al Fine]

That makes sense. Another way to think of it is that since the NDP is a third party a PVI of zero corresponds with a much lower vote than it would for the Tories or Liberals. If the 2011 federal election was a normal result instead off the Liberal wipeout it actually was, we'd probably see even more results like Brantford-Brant. E.g. Scarborough North.

[mileslunn]

My understanding is PVI is where they are at relative to their provincewide average.  So if Eric Grenier's projections were correct (43% PC, OLP 26%, NDP 23%) that would mean OLP +17 and NDP+20 they would win while everything else would go PC.  Or would it be half the difference otherwise Liberals win OLP +9 and NDP +10?

[Hatman 🍁]

It's relative to the average of the last four elections (2 federal and 2 provincial), which was:

Liberal 37%; Cons 37% and NDP 22%

Because there are three main parties, you can't say "this PVI" will get a party a seat, but you can say the NDP needs a PVI of +27 (under the magical Grenier scenario) to get 50%. This would get them the top 5 seats.

[DC Al Fine]

An example of what Hatman is talking about: Thornhill is way more conservative federally than provincially thanks to the Israel issue. If we pretend 2018 is a Liberal landslide, Thornhill would be more likely to get picked off than PVI would indicate.

[toaster]

Where is the mention of getting rid of the Catholic schools?

Getting rid of Catholic schools require amending the Constitution, which the Federal won't do unless there is a general consensus (like there was in Québec and Newfoundland).

All other provinces that got out of it were able to do it.  If Ontario wanted out of the business of being discriminatory, and fully funding these schools, they could do it.

Andrea Horwath's message to young Gay francophones (who can't work openly in a Catholic system): I think you should only have access to 20% of teaching jobs.  That's the message I'm getting anyway.  

The solution is to ban gay hiring discrimination there.

Which essentially makes them non-catholic.  Most of the Catholic schools (particularly in areas of the GTA like Peel) are filled with non-catholics.  So why even have them?

The other thing that I take issue with is when people point to Johny Tory's PC party, and say "look it was a disaster then with what he proposed".  Yeah, it was a disaster because the PCs wanted to EXPAND funding of religious schools, which most Ontarians are against. The opposite, wouldn't you think, would get the opposite reaction (i.e., favourable).

The fact that this exists in 2018, in Ontario, is upsetting.
Again, the issue is more pronounced on the French side, where some 80% of the jobs in most areas with Catholic schools.  It's outrageously discriminatory towards Muslim, Sikh, Atheist, etc, Francophones more than anyone, as the French public boards are so small.
Again, Andrea Horwath is saying loud in clear: I think Muslim francophone teachers don't deserve as many job opportunities as Catholic Francophones for jobs (actually only 1 out of every 5).   Or you're a francophone Sikh family, your child will have to travel across town an hour on a bus to get to a French public school, even though there is a French-Catholic school across the street.  But the catholic family next door, your kids won't have to take an hour-long bus ride.   If people don't see that as discriminatory, than we have a larger problem in this province than we may have though.

Toaster, I'm on mobile, so you'll have to forgive me for not breaking out the paragraphs of your post/my response into seperate quotes.

1) Large numbers of non-Catholics putting their kids in Catholic schools indicates to me that the Catholic schools are providing something that parents want that they don't feel they are getting out of secular schools, whether it's quality of education, morals or something else. For example one of my good friends attended Catholic schools near Hamilton despite being raised Evangelical. He told me that it's semi common for Evangelicals to send their kids to Catholic schools due to the relative lack of secularism. To remove funding is removing options for parents who are dissatisfied with a uniform, secular public system. It's an indicator that there is a segment of parents who are dissatisfied with the public system and a good reason IMO to expand funding to additional groups, both secular and religious.

2) I don't think it follows that opposition to the Tory proposal necessarily indicates the opposite would be positively received. Ontario is about 30% Catholic at least nominally and by your own admission, many non-Catholic students attend Catholic schools. That indicates a large constituency that would have some degree of attachment to Catholic schools (even for non-religous reasons). The NDP would presumably need to win some of those votes to form government.

Oryxslayer had it right; it's not a relevant issue, and the political calculus isn't there for the NDP to make it one. You'd do well to avoid the mistake of my socon peers of confusing principal with popularity.

3) I don't think anyone denies it's discrimination, but politics isnt working out laws from first principles. Progressive governments in Ontario and Alberta are restricting the right to peaceful protest. It sucks and I complain incessantly about it, but I get why progressives are doing it and why the Tories aren't putting up a big fight: Sometimes discrimination is popular.

Just seeing this now, sorry for my late reply.  I think non-catholic parents "choose" the catholic school based purely on geography (as was mentioned above) - and I am speaking in terms of elementary here.  By high school (even middle school), students are likely making the choice.  It's a huge problem in the Francophone community.  It divides the community, and puts unreasonable hardship on non-catholic Franco-ontariens more than anyone else.  As a non-catholic Francophone who worked with a French public board in Northern Ontario, there were about 20 jobs posted at the Catholic board for every 1 permanent posting at the public board. And the fact that the union (AEFO) covers both systems (French public and French Catholic teachers), makes it difficult to get union support in fighting the discriminatory system.  

It just doesn't make sense, particularly in smaller communities that can't support 4 different schools.  You end up with schools with classes split between 4 grades.  You have schools (like in Iroquois Falls) where one building houses three schools (Iroquois Falls Secondary, Ecole Publique l'Alliance, and Ecole catholique l'Alliance.  With three different Principals I might add.  Makes no sense.  I support having different French and English boards (and is why I don't support the Green's position on this), but not catholic.  A leader needs to stand up for what is right, or she should go to Muslim families and say to their face "I don't think you deserve funding for a school system for your religion, but I do for your neighbours who are catholic".  Because every year this continues, that is what they are supporting.

[mileslunn]

An example of what Hatman is talking about: Thornhill is way more conservative federally than provincially thanks to the Israel issue. If we pretend 2018 is a Liberal landslide, Thornhill would be more likely to get picked off than PVI would indicate.

True enough.  On the other hand Nipissing would be far more PC friendly in PVI than federal results would suggest.  Part of that is Vic Fideli's personal popularity, but for whatever reason it seems since the 80s the PCs have generally done better there than they have provincially.  For about a short period, OLP support was much stronger in Southwestern Ontario than federally (ridings like Elgin-Middlesex-London, Lambton-Kent-Middlesex, and Chatham-Kent-Leamington started voting Tory federally before they did provincially) although now Liberals are quite weak there.  Still its a good starting point even if imperfect.

[King of Kensington]

I want to see the end of the Catholic school funding, as do most Ontarians.  Unfortunately no party that sees itself in contention for government is willing to touch it. 

Maybe the best strategy is to "de-Catholicize" the system by getting rid of the discriminatory hiring practices and forbidding separate schools to prioritize Catholic enrollment (though I know they've been increasing non-Catholic enrollment in recent years).  Then eventually the "historically Catholic" schools merge in with public.

[King of Kensington]

I think the NDP platform got exactly the "endorsement" they wanted from the Globe and Mail:  it's a solid left-wing document, but it's not for us!
 
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/article-globe-editorial-the-ontario-ndp-goes-all-in-with-its-election/

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Been meaning to ask this for a while, but what is the profile of Northern Ontario? First Nations? resource extraction?

(to be honest I'm more intrigued by the high Grit numbers than the NDP strongholds)

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Been meaning to ask this for a while, but what is the profile of Northern Ontario? First Nations? resource extraction?

Both. Also a substantial Francophone population in parts and other industrial activity here and there.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

That's mostly Tradition.

[Hatman 🍁]

(to be honest I'm more intrigued by the high Grit numbers than the NDP strongholds)

Depending on where it is in the province, it is either visible minority loyalty (which could swing en masse to the PCs this year), suburban progressives ("fiscally conservative, socially liberal" - this group will also swing to the PCs due to the reckless spending of the government), university towns and downtown "elites".  The latter two groups are probably the least likely to swing in this election, though the 'downtown elites' could go NDP if they pull into second place.