On Monday, three by-elections were held.
- In the riding of Durham, Conservative Erin O’Toole won and will replace the retiring Conservative Bev Oda.
- In the riding of Calgary-Centre, Conservative Joan Crockatt won and will replace the retiring Conservative Lee Richardson
- In the riding of Victoria, New Democrat Murray Ranking won and will replace the retiring Denise Savoie.
Easy to figure out the winners because they’re the ones with the most votes.
But what does it all mean? That’s not so easy to figure out, apparently, but I try here:
…for the NDP and Liberals, Monday’s byelections may prompt a bit of a re-think, not so much about how they each compete against the Conservatives but how they will seek to become the focal point for the anti-Harper movement in Canada.
For the Conservatives and the Green Party, whatever they’re doing politically, carry on.
Wait a minute, Akin, says colleague Lorne Gunter:
If there are lessons to be learned from Monday’s byelection in Calgary Centre, they are mostly for Joan Crockatt, the winning Conservative candidate, and for the Tory organization in Calgary. [As for the Liberals] there is no shortcut back to power for the Grits. Not even the coronation next spring of their Anointed One, Justin Trudeau, can spare them a long exile in the political wilderness.
Postmedia’s Michael Den Tandt looks at the results and comes to this conclusion:
… only Elizabeth May’s Green Party had an unambiguously good day. The Liberals had a mixed result; Conservatives and New Democrats suffered setbacks.
From: “Tories, NDP won seats – but trend favours Grits and Greens”
The National Post‘s John Ivison, on the other hand, says:
The empirical evidence suggests byelection results are not indicative of what might happen at the next general election. But, if you accept that, you also have to accept that the party that won two out of three contests should be on high alert.
While The Globe‘s John Ibbitson:
..the larger lesson might be that the Green Party is starting to walk on two feet. Not only did they place a respectable third in Calgary, Green candidate Donald Galloway came within a whisker of defeating the NDP’s Murray Rankin in Victoria … But despite two wins, this was not a great night for the Conservatives.
These “examinations” on the three by-elections by people who have little or no experience in the political theatre is laughable in the least.
For example, to suggest that the Greens gained momentum in these races is absurd. The only place where they did fairly well was in Victoria and that is for two basic reasons- 1. Elizabeth May represents an adjacent seat and the Greens benefited by this. 2. The Greens are always just behind the NDP in most Vancouver Island seats- so- nothing has changed.
For anyone who truly examines the conduct of the Green Party in Canada; they will tell you that the Greens “Talk” a good talk, but you rarely see them out in the environmental trenches as you do with the New Democrats.
This is why many people refer to the NDP as the “Original Green Party”. Perhaps they should be called the “OGP”, rather than the NDP.