It’s Not If But How You Read Into the Results
The morning after has once again dawned upon Canada, as political junkies everywhere wake up to digest the results of last night’s election results — in this case, the election of four MPs from BC, Quebec and Nova Scotia. Let the spin game begin, as every pundit and party tries to put their own face on the results in order to somehow frame the public mind. For what it’s worth, I would suggest that it’s not a choice between seeing significance and insignificance in last night’s results — there’s always a message voters are sending by who they vote (or don’t vote) for. However, it’s always a danger in byelections to read too much into the result.
So, what did we see last night and what should it mean? First, byelections are more strongly influenced by the local game, be it the strength of the team on the ground, or the local ties the candidates have to the region. That is why, as much as the Christian Heritage Party had hopes in winning the Nova Scotia riding (and amazed a few people by tying the Green candidate for the early part of last night), byelections aren’t simply an affair of mind over matter — you need to have a reasonable shot to begin with.
In this regard, Quebec’s Rivière-du-Loup result was helped by a tier-one Tory candidate and confirms that the spat between Stephen Harper and Jean Charest is indeed behind the two men.
Nova Scotia’s Cumberland was heavily favoured for the Tories, although last night demonstrates that the NDP, as a duel federal/provincial entity) has done some terrific work in building up its organization. Perhaps it’s a stretch here, but if folks need a reinforcement that Stephen Harper isn’t toxic out east any longer, Nova Scotia lends heavy evidence to that.
New Westminister-Coquitlam was the most cut-and-dry riding that was even up for contention last night, with the NDP’s Fin Donnelly easily winning the western riding. Much hay will be made about the HST issue being a factor, although this is as much as a stretch as saying that the Conservative government’s actions over the last year helped it win Cumberland decisively last night — the riding was already in the orange column, and the increased vote differential between the Tories and NDP could be a number of factors: it could be the HST, or a better ground game, or even BC’s famous, patented way of producing unusual election results. The NDP did everything that they needed to do here, but predictions of larger NDP gains on the west coast next time are exaggerated.
Finally, in Hochelaga the news wasn’t that the BQ won so much as the Liberals bled. The fact that the Official Opposition didn’t do better than third in any of the contests last night is, again, laregly due to a strong NDP machine that just happened to get byelection calls in the three provinces it’s prospecting in. This isn’t Michael Ignatieff imploding or the NDP’s coming ascension to Official Opposition (well, not yet anyway), but rather that typical Liberal voters are getting excited by the notion of throwing a few more New Democrats in to the House mix. There is plenty of time for the Liberals to correct for this, especially when you consider the Liberals weren’t going to come close to winning the Montreal riding anyway, but last night does serve as a reminder to the Liberal team that their attempts at inspiring Canadians are being outdone by the other two federalist leaders, and that it might be time to redraw the playbook.
watching liberals “bleed” is all the entertainment needed to continue watching our news, and the self righteous, and uber self regulating blogosphere, afraid to speak the truth for fear of being “sued” – congratulations Tory candidates, on a job superbly done
A little insight into the conservative win in Riviere du Loup. As I recall, that was Mario Dumont’s long time provincial riding. Provincial and federal election results don’t always mix but there is a strong conservative base in that riding.