Ontario NDP win a landslide in the Hamilton East by-election!

[Filuwaúrdjan]

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[Filuwaúrdjan]

This is the first time since 1990 that the Ontario NDP has gained a seat (unless you count the two-incumbent battles in 1999 caused by the redistribution)... and 63.6% is the highest % of the vote won by the Ontario NDP since 1990...
Hamilton East is once again the safest NDP seat in Ontario.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

NDP is left? right?

Ontario Political parties:

PC=right wing
Liberal=centrist/centre left
NDP=social democratic

[Filuwaúrdjan]

That sounds like good news, but I don't follow Canadian politics very closely.  How much chance is there the NDP can deny the Liberals a majority & force a coalition?  And will the Liberals coalition w/ the NDP ahead of the Bloc?

Well this was a provincial by-election not a federal by-election... but is certain to have an impact federally as the Dippers were already targeting two of the three federal Hamilton seats (Hamilton East-Stoney Creek, and Hamilton Centre) and after this they will have a better chance of winning those... and they might go after Hamilton Mountain as well.
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1) The Liberals are teetering b'tween majority and minority... kinda like 1997...
2) Martin will do all he can to avoid coalition with the BQ... it would be humiliating for him... and the BQ would just use it as an excuse to cause trouble.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Left and Right are relative terms... Canada isn't a very ideological country and politics varies a lot from province to province...
For instance, in Nova Scotia even the Tories are economically centre-left.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yes, by economically right I meant by European standards. The Canadian Tories model themselves on British Tories do they not?
In any case there is no-way the UK Conservative party is anywhere like as conservative as the Republicans.
They're probably half way between the GOP and Dems.

If our Tories ever proposed privatising health care they would be massacred at the polls!

Most of the CPC does... although there are still a lot of old Reform diehards.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

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... although there are still a lot of old Reform diehards.

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What bacame of the SoCreds?

Federally: Reform (now part of CPC), Provincially, BC: BCLibs, Alberta: ABPC's

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I'm from Ontario, that victory was very good, a lot of good feelings for the NDP to go around. Hopefully this is the first signs of a NDP Ontario by 2009. The Liberals are cracking in Ontario on both levels of government. I just hope it's the NDP that take up the slack and not Conservatives, our social systems can't take anymore abuse.

Siege

The NDP better be ready for government then. Not like 1990 (if ONLY Peterson had called the election a year later...)