[Discussion] Canadian 2021 Election

Figured some Canadians might want a thread for today's election.

Maybe not considering the vibe I'm getting is hardly anyone wanted this.

Primer for anyone South: 5 Things To Watch In Canada’s Big Election

Recently moved within the Toronto core and my vote hardly matters because it's been Liberal since like 1992~.

Definitely voted for a party that is looking for more proportional representation.

September 2021 in parts of North America: "You're getting elections whether you like it or not."

CTV just called a liberal minority.

Trudeau handed the election to the CPC on a silver platter, and O'Toole stepped hard on his crank with his strategy. His refusing to take a potshot at Kenney when he declared a public health emergency last week, his threatening to take $6 BILLION away from Quebec for childcare, plus his flip-flopping on gun control all added up to a lot of normal CPC voters leaving the party for either the PPC or the LPC.

I think the CPC will turf him hard at the mandatory leadership review (IIRC) that is contained in the CPC constitution. If they are smart, they will see the LPC get pulled left by the need to court the NDP and they will move center. However, I suspect CPC members will, as is normal for most political conventions, look only short term and will see the PPC numbers meant a lot of seats lost, so they will go hard right.

The Canadian voting public does not want hard right. If the CPC goes right-wing with their next leader, the LPC will move to the center again.

Ideally, the CPC moves back to Progressive Conservative politics, but I think those days are long gone.

So Trudeau will still have the most seats (156 to 120_, even though they lost the popular vote to the conservatives by 2 points.

How does that work in Canada? In the US it's because of gerrymandering and the urban/rural divide, but how do progressives have the advantage here?

“Hubris led Trudeau to call the election. He and the Liberals won the election but lost the prize they were seeking. This is only a great night for the Liberals because two weeks ago it appeared they would lose government outright something they could not fathom before they gambled on an election,” said Nelson Wiseman, a political science professor at the University of Toronto.
dejanzie wrote:

So Trudeau will still have the most seats (156 to 120_, even though they lost the popular vote to the conservatives by 2 points.

How does that work in Canada? In the US it's because of gerrymandering and the urban/rural divide, but how do progressives have the advantage here?

Urban/rural definitely plays part of it.

Each riding uses First Past the Post. Liberals tend to win ridings with ~45% of the vote in that riding, while there are a lot of ridings out west in the Prairies (Saskatchewan and Alberta, more specifically) where Conservatives win with ~75% of the vote. So a national popular vote doesn't always translate into a higher number of seats.

I suppose that's sort of like gerrymandering, but it's not intentionally drawing riding borders - just community values being more homogenous in Conservative parts of the country.

What Feegle says. Also, because we have multiple center-progressive parties and only one (real) conservative parties, there is more vote-splitting on the left than on the right, which tends to consolidate conservative voters.

If you look at vote share, roughly 60% of the country voted for center-progressive parties and 40% voted for the Cons and PPC.

Thanks guys. So if in more ridings liberal/conservatives were closer to each other, there might be more strategic voting? But now in safely liberal ridings people vote for the more left-wing NDP instead, without risking a conservative victory?

dejanzie wrote:

So Trudeau will still have the most seats (156 to 120_, even though they lost the popular vote to the conservatives by 2 points.

How does that work in Canada? In the US it's because of gerrymandering and the urban/rural divide, but how do progressives have the advantage here?

More left of the Liberals the NDP/Green party want election reform.

Some kind of proportional representation like one of the the European models.

As Dysplastic mentioned a higher % of Canadians voted center to left. With a good chunk being NDP which is clearly left (17.7%).

That said the Liberals punted on reform in 2015. Realistically they realized it would probably mean lowering their chances at majorities going forward. Thing is those extra seats would probably be more consistently left who they could vote with.

I think majorities in Canada will be much harder going forward unless the NDP losses support which probably won't happen unless the Liberals start inching left.

As for actual gerrymandering. That would be the BQ party in Canada who only runs in Quebec. For that reason alone election reform should be seriously examined.

Just like FPTP reforms never materialized after the 2010 election in the UK. I always have to think back to our Political Science professor back in 2002, who said FPTP is not inherently more or less democratic than our proportional system. This was of course before increased polarization, but still: the biggest threat to any democracy is that those in power will never voluntarily change the system if that threatens that power.

And it seems to me like FPTP system requires so much more maintenance, to avoid that eventually one faction decides they no longer want to release their grip on power.

dejanzie wrote:

But now in safely liberal ridings people vote for the more left-wing NDP instead, without risking a conservative victory?

I wish that were the case, but it's not. People really don't understand strategic voting, which the Liberals use to their advantage, with many Liberal spokespeople equating any vote for the NDP, regardless of the riding, as a vote for the Conservatives.