Ontario By-Election 2007: Results and Analysis

First of all, let's take a look at how my predictions went.

1) Burlington- I called Conservatives with 45-49% of the vote. Final result= Conservatives 49%
- no big surprise there. Solid blue riding

2) Markham- I called Liberals with 42-46% of the vote. Final result= Liberals 49.3%
- again not a big surprise with this riding. It's been Liberal for the past few years

This leaves me 2/2 seats, and 1/2 covering the spread

3) York South-Weston- I called Liberals with 39-43% of the vote. Indeed, the Liberals finished with 41.4% of the vote. What I wasn't expecting was for the NDP to take the riding with 43.3% of the vote.

This riding needs some analysis. It's traditionally been an NDP stronghold, having been held by Davis Lewis, Donald MacDonald, and Bob Rae. It's one of the poorest ridings in the provinces, has a strong immigrant workforce, and has a very low rate of home ownership. I predicted the NDP could make a breakthrough here, but expected them to finish a strong second. I must say I'm pleasantly surprised with this result.

This needs to be compared with 2003, in which the Liberals took the riding with 61.56% of the votes and 59% in 1999. The drastic drop of Liberal support is of importance. In fact, when Rae held the riding in 1995, he did so with less votes than what the NDP won it with this time around.

In my earlier post, I identified the need for the NDP to put forward a strong sense of class based politics, and argued that a riding such as York South-Weston was one that they needed to win. A riding of poor, property less, workers is, in my opinion, the NDP's natural working class constituency. There's little doubt that the bourgeoisie parties' decision to vote themselves a handsome raise just prior to christmas and their unwillingness to move the minimum wage to $10/hr surely helped the New Democrats, who were vocal on both issues and took principled positions on each. In fact, the dippers have now won four by-elections. Their recent focus on class issues is a promising sign, although I would suggest that the party must continue to move toward the left in order to become the true party of the working class. The question is how far will a $10 minimum wage and politicians pay raises take them? Far enough to form power? I don't think so.

Congrats to new MPP Paul Ferriera. While I believe that the NDP must continue its push toward working class politics and abandon any notions on neo-liberalism (this includes their leader), I'll give credit where its due. And in York South-Weston, credit is due.

And I'll also give myself some credit for somewhat accurate predictions.