So we had an early provincial election called by Doug Ford yesterday - and well, nothing much changed. At least from the perspective of the seat count and balance of power. Doug still has a strong majority (gaining one seat to go from 79 to 80 - out of 124) and the NDP is still the official opposition (dropping from 28 seats to 27 seats). There were a handful of Independents, although only one was elected as such (Bobbi Ann Brady from Haldiman-Norfolk). The rest were NDP and PC MPPs who were expelled from their own parties, all of whom either retired or were defeated - so the Liberals picked up 5 seats to take them to 14. The Greens kept their 2.
Despite the Liberals large increase in seat count and popular vote share (29.95% up from 23.91% in 2022), this wasn't great for the Liberals. They had a leadership race and chose ultra conservative Bonnie Crombie (former mayor of Mississauga) over more progressive Nathaniel Erskine-Smith (who is decent despite being a Nate). And Bonnie Crombie failed to win her own seat. Losing to a conservative candidate who had contested only one other election previously where she came in third for a local city council seat.
Both our opposition parties are as weak and feckless as all centre-left parties have become in this age of growing fascism. We're in a space where a large chunk of the electorate has been abandoned - as conservative parties lurch further rightwards and the opportunistic shitbag opposition trip over each other chasing them. Voter turnout was 45.4%, only squeaking in above the 44.06% last time - which are the two lowest turnouts we've ever had. So this is most likely going to result in both Crombie and Stiles keeping their positions as leaders.
So the depressing part of it all isn't that the Conservatives won again, but that the opposition seems to be quite happy with this state of affairs.
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