Labrador Bye-Election: Conservative Gains

Toronto Star’s Chantal Hebert makes some insightful observations regarding the Labrador bye-election. Despite winning, things don’t look that good for the Liberals because the bye-election shows that an engaged or interested electorate is against the Liberals’ interests. In short, Liberal voters are more likely to stay home, and supporters for the other parties are more likely to get out the vote:

One of the reasons by-elections have a reputation for quirky results is their traditionally low turnouts. But in Labrador this week voters bucked the trend: 54 per cent cast a ballot, a 10-point increase from last June.

Matching the increase to the results, most of those extra people came out to support the Conservatives. Out of a bigger pool of actual votes, the Liberals ended up with a smaller catch than last year. Meanwhile, the Conservative vote more than doubled.

She points out that had the Liberals lost last week’s confidence motion (after having lost the previous week - and then ignored it), Martin would’ve preferred a July election date as a way to drag out the campaign and to keep turnout for Opposition parties lower.