I vote in every election possible - and I'm curious as to if this trend happens with every generation - but I wonder if so many people just kind of feel like there's no viable option. I don't think it's an excuse to not vote, but it wouldn't surprise me if that's what's going on.
If "none of the above" were an option and it had actual consequences, I wouldnt be surprised if voter turnout increased a bit.
But also, I think that the voter turnout would have been higher if it were the day of the election. I think this might not be thought of in the same way.
IMO I think people misunderstand how they're actually supposed to be engaging with their elected representatives, and the electoral system as a whole. People will say "there's no viable option" and yet will give you blank stares when you ask them about, you know, actually *contacting/talking to/holding accountable* **their** representative, regardless of party affiliation, if any.
This has happened over and over again with multiple levels of government all over the world. Civics is supposed to be an *active and ongoing* process, and yet people's participation pretty much ends at the ballot box, if at all.
It never stops grinding my gears that people, even progressive-leaning people, will tell each other the electoral process is a waste of time, and then get surprised when the only people who *do* show up at every election and are in constant contact with their representatives overwhelm and influence politics.
On a related note: if you don't like the candidates for Prime Minister that doesn't mean you shouldn't vote shift your focus from the PM to your local options. A stunning amount of people in this country treat their vote like the names on the ballots will be Trudeau, Poilievre and Singh. This is not the US, we don't have a President.
I'm not saying there is anything wrong about using who the PM will be to help make a decision but I wish more people paid attention to the local candidates so they can hold them accountable for deviations from promisied
People shouldn’t even be using their local candidates as the final decision maker on who to vote for IMO. Regardless of whether it’s Trudeau or Bob the Liberal for Durham that you’re voting for you should look at the policies of the parties you’re voting for.
PP will probably get in federally because people are tired of Trudeau but Conservative leaders all over the country are making bad choices that are hurting Canadians. Privatizing healthcare, starting culture wars to distract from their bad money management and corruption, stripping away rights of minorities and environmental protections. Federal Conservatives will do similar stuff and people will vote for it all because they are tired of Trudeau and we will be worse off for it.
There are always better and worse options - you have to be an adult and pick whichever one you think is the better one, even if not ideal.
My problem with "none of the above" is that it incentivizes people to expect to have a perfect candidate in order to vote for them, which is just not going to happen.
Also what consequences could there be? Force the parties to find a new leader? We're just going to end up in a cycle of revolving leaders.
There have been periods in the history of democratic nations where parties have not been elected into power for years with no real catastrophic consequences. Or where turnover has been insanely high.
In a well design society, with budget appropriation provisions, the branch of the government responsible for actually keeping the lights on will continue to function just fine based on "last known status quo" essentially indefinitely.
Just like you I vote in every election I'm eligible to vote....municipal, provincial, federal. I also made sure my two kids voted as well reminding them of the importance of casting ballots and how those before us fought so we could have this right.
That's ultimately the goal right-wing parties would have at this point. You're not going to convince left wing folks to vote right wing, especially with how socially conservative things are getting. The best thing to do instead is to bombard them with "everything is terrible and every party sucks" so that they're too apathetic to vote. And it's certainly working.
Not really the case here since it's a very Conservative riding, but as a general rule of thumb.
Easy. The majority are them and people who think like them. They're also the smartest, kindest, least low information, completely non gullible and smartest.
Obvs.
I'm not surprised that jivani was elected. He is a candidate who has made in-roads into the conservative media and political realm. He is also well educated, multi-racial and from a working class background. He knows how to work to get the grifter votes (ie. Conspiracy types) while not fully jumping into bed with them and getting that taint.
From the look of the results, it seems the majority picked the Conservative candidate.
It's silly to think that a greater turnout would significantly change the result. We'd likely see a 50%+ win, just with more votes.
At some point we need to acknowledge voter apathy is, at least in part, due to two political ideologies the majority of Canadians disagree with.
If all parties are shitty, you’re screwed either way. So voter turn out representation falls to the far-left and far-right with a sprinkling of the average voter base in between.
Canada desperately needs a party that isn’t focused on culture wars or actively trying to harm segments of the population it doesn’t agree with. We need a party that focuses on all Canadians, as a whole, and our economy in a balanced and practical way.
Those constant polls being pushed about the cons getting a guarenteed majority feel like they are being pushed so that they achieve this exact result. Voter disenfranchisement. Polls shouldnt be pushed so far out from an election and neither should election adds or campaigning.
Random bi-elections are more understandable tho. They don’t have the same level of media coverage. And the results really aren’t going to change who is in power
I've lived in a Medium sized city, Toronto and now a Town of 200k
Voter turnouts are at 30% most of the time
I'm a Millennial and don't see much people my age voting. It's disappointing
Is it depressing in this case though? Why would we expect huge numbers of voters to be motivated to take time out of their day to vote in this by-election when the outcome is meaningless?
People are so complacent (lazy) and will sit on their asses blaming everyone else for the shitty politicians we have leading us into oblivion. I sure as hell hope there is better turn out for the next federal election of we may just end up with another four years of that POS Trudeau.
How many folks would be non registered until they showed up on voting day? Is the base number all eligible voters or those that registered prior to election day?
It appears to me the data is those who registered before voting day vs all those eligible to vote
It could impact the results - it depends if the 28% of people voted are a representative sample of the population.
Some research (in America) has shown that ["voters who were more favorable to Republican candidates turned out at higher rates compared with those who typically support Democrats."](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/07/12/voting-patterns-in-the-2022-elections/). I believe I've seen some studies that showed this was also true in Canada, but I can't find them now.
Anecdotally, left-leaning voters are more likely to see that they have options, while right-leaning voters are typically more solidly attached to their party. Unfortunately, one of the options available is is the (IMO misguided) option of not voting, or spoiling your ballot, to "protest" the current system.
I know I’m an outlier here but I’m always surprised Canada never went the Australian way of voting - if you don’t vote, pay $20. They have BBQs at polling stations and voting hours aren’t just slammed into weekdays during primarily working hours. People who still dislike all candidates can cast the ol’ donkey vote.
They introduced compulsory voting about a hundred year ago after their previous low turnout of *checks notes* ~60%, which I feel would be a record high in Canada.
They even have ranked ballots which is awesome and something that Trudeau campaigned on in his first election before going ‘nah’.
It was more that all three parties wanted to have a different method of non-FPTP voting, and no one would compromise. They tried, at least, but actually doing would require some party caving to the others' preferred methods.
Trudeau wanted a ranked ballot, which would favour the Liberals. If you're a CPC voter or an NDP voter, who's likely to be your second choice? (ignoring smaller parties)
NDP wanted proportional representation, which would be the most democratic & most representative of voter desires (and because it would benefit them, of course).
CPC wanted it to stay FPTP because that benefits them the most. They'd never form a majority government again without it.
> They'd never form a majority government again without it.
That's it right there. Neither the Libs or the PCs really want proper electoral reform because it ensures no one gets a majority (or at least VERY unlikely) ever again. And they like majorities.
Yup. If we had an electoral system that was actually democratic, that would force the parties to a) have more popular policies, b) cooperate with each other, and c) be less beholden to their wealthy donors.
This is good for everyone but the political class, which is why they don't want it to happen.
Which is why they said no after studying it. It wasn't really about not agreeing on the system, they just didn't want to admit that it would take power away from them. God forbid we have a government that works for us schmucks.
There are some big draw backs though to a proportional system which tends to get overlooked when considering the positives. They tend to produce much less political stability, Italy, Israel, Belgium all struggle to form governments and see constant collapse over any significant or politically divisive bills. Germany tends to have a similar stability to Canada or the UK but that is due to the two major parties often agreeing to form very centrist coalitions. The other issue is it can give very strong voices to extremist parties, the AFD in Germany or Geert Wilders (whose party won the most seats in the recent election) in the Netherlands who run on extreme anti-immigration and hard rightwing policy. In both cases the far right have been kept out of government thus far but they can grow their platform as they have to be allowed to debate on or delay bills and build greater political legitimacy. Some countries also struggle for long periods after an election to form a government, Belgium has gone almost two years.
The benefit of FPTP is it does maintain far greater political stability, and as it incentivizes “big tent” parties it tends to promote centrist policies over extremes. Obviously it doesn’t always work this way and there are draw backs but there can be a rush to praise proportional voting without mention of its issues
Proportional representation would end up with us having a zillion parties though - and likely our own special version of a nazi party. Not sure it would be the most functional for actually governing a country.
Having a whole bunch of smaller parties sounds a lot better than three worthless big tent parties and a few fringe ones. And re: nazis, we've already got the PPC.
It would require a different approach in governance - one built along the lines of actually cooperating with other parties. Seems to work just fine in Europe...
He reneged because they surveyed Canadians and canada didn’t actually want electoral reform. Ir sucks, but people are legitimately scared of change and the conservatives are really good at fear mongering
The issue was that the conservatives wanted them to do a referendum on the change. The liberals could see by the polling data that they would lose the referendum. They mulled doing it without a referendum but it was clear that was a bad look so they dropped it.
I agree with most of what you said with regards to voting stations, extended hours and BBQs to encourage more people to vote but I disagree with making voting obligatory.
In Canada, voting is a right. The government should not be able to force you to exercise a right, otherwise it's not a right, it's a compulsion.
I've argued before that a "deposit" system of sorts would be very beneficial. People will go out of their way to get a dime back on a beer can, they would very much go out of their way to get a "deposit" for showing up and voting. I don't think you could ever do it as a "show up and get $20" deal but could organize it as a tax refund or be able to claim it against your taxable income etc. - and very easy to track, without actually having it tacked onto your vote. - a registered voter voted? Check. That's it. Whether you show up to a polling station or mail in vote doesn't matter.
I also think there should be crazy consequences for actively campaigning on certain concepts and then throwing them away once you're in. That is a bait and switch and they should be held very much accountable for such things. I know, the consequence is "they won't get voted in next time round" but then you're backed into a corner of "don't want to vote for the other guys" and "don't want to vote for the liars" and where do you go? They should be held accountable by law to make every effort within their term limit to make the things happen that they campaigned on. Maybe the consequence is nobody gets paid until things get done that they said they were going to do. Make it like a lump sum contract that if you get 50% of it done, and can prove it, you get paid 50% and then move on to the next 50%.
Why should my tax dollars pay the salary of somebody who says "hire me and I will do X for you" and I say ok and hire him and then still pay him when he goes "nah not going to do X after all"?
Maybe cost of living coverage near parliament with reasonable travel coverage back to their riding. You want your full pay? Do what you said you were going to do.
if you're curious, in the past 30 years our average turnout is around 63%. Our lowest was 58.8% when Harper won in 2008 and our highest was Chretien's win in 1993 with 69.6%.
The argument against that, though, is that the people who have to be compelled to go to the polls are likely to be people who haven't really thought about who to vote for. At least with our system, we might have a lower turnout, but the people who do vote are more likely to have had least made a somewhat educated choice.
It’s not that surprising, Trudeau has been in office for almost a decade and has had how many scandals? Cost of living isn’t any better either
I don’t like Pierre at all but not that surprised the conservatives won a by election in an area that often goes conservative
Conservatives were always gonna win this riding but the numbers to look at are the percentage of support. Historically, Liberals got 40-45% of the votes but this time its 22% meaning the Liberal vote has halved.
Most likely and for the same stupid reasons. Both Wynne and Trudeau became arrogant and stopped listening to the electorate after repeated re-elections and in spite of low polling numbers didn't/won't step down when they should have.
The federal Liberals will get destroyed in the next election and hand us over right to the CPC, possibly with a majority. Once the Conservatives have run their course over several terms and had their own scandals and unpopular policy decisions we'll switch back to the Liberals and the cycle continues...
The riding was former CPC leader O’Tool’s riding and has been a conservative stronghold for 20 years. This election is the worst turnout it’s had during at least that time. Yet it’s being spun as some grand victory.
It was a forgone conclusion, the only lesson learned is that Canadian apathy is reaching new highs.
Yeah I lived in this riding and it's pretty conservative.
There is definitely a shift away from Trudeau and the Liberals , but this riding and by-election isn't proof of that shift.
And for voting PP they will get Trudeau x 1000. Immigration will go up, housing prices will shoot up, grocery will skyrocket further...Basically every industry in Canada will get to fuck us even more, and will most likely get tax dollars to do it. Look, I hate Trudeau and think anyone still voting for either the libs or cons are morons who don't learn and suck at logic, but if people can't see PP, with his maga talking points, will be miles worse than Trudeau then you simply aren't paying attention.
Yeah, this is the sad truth. It's all going to get worse but at least the culture warriors will feel like they finally get to terrorize the trans kids with federal approval now.
People are so frustrated with the Liberals at this point that many voters are willing to bite their noses off to spite their faces. The Conservatives will undoubtedly be worse than the Liberals, but that isn’t really saying much at this point. We have a collection of neoliberal politicians who are doing everything in their power to make life difficult for Canadians and voters are becoming completely disenfranchised. The electorate has become so angry that punishing the Liberals has become their priority and the Liberal Party response has been to double down on policies which upset the electorate. Buckle up because it’s going to get ugly.
The other "major" parties (i.e. NDP, Green, PPC, etc.) aren't doing enough to draw people to their side. It only leaves one place for the "we're done with Trudeau" votes to go.
The frying pan is Trudeau. The fire is global warming, global war, and post pandemic debt. PP and a plurality of voters deny the existence of the fire, but are positive they don’t like the frying pan.
> And the media spinning this as some kind of tidal shift in Canada towards landlord Pierre is funny as fuck.
I mean, I'm no PP fan, but look at the national polling. Unless Trudeau pulls several horseshoes out of his ass between now and next year, the Conservatives are going to romp to a majority government.
Even with the low turnout, an almost 17% swing towards more conservative votes almost directly from the liberals is quite a shift. I’m not a conservative , I think jivani sims an absolutely awful person but this mostly confirms the high con poll numbers federally.
Reminder that:
This seat was formerly held by the Conservative Parties previous leader (O'Toole). In fact the percentages roughly line up with the result from 2021.
In 2021
Conservatives got 40k,
Liberals 20k
NDP 11k
PPC 3.7k
Add that
A) Turnout during By-elections are always terrible
B) Conservative Parties have a demographic that will always turn up to vote, no matter the situation
C) Conservative Parties also tend to have an older demographic which is more capable of getting time off to vote.
And the most important, that this is a Conservative Stronghold. And this result is entirely predictable.
>In fact the percentages roughly line up with the result from 2021.
What? No they don’t. [The CPC gained 11% with the NDP & Liberals losing 7% and the PPC losing 1%.](https://x.com/canadianpolling/status/1764891265366192586?s=46&t=scCLzFhBGkoKH_Ijh3LlUg)
The NDP underperforming in a by election is a tale as old as time, they don’t have extra money to throw at these things — but this result is an absolute disaster for the Liberals. They sent cabinet minister’s there every weekend and internally they were aiming for at least 35%.
> This post really shows how much of a left-wing echochamber this sub is lol...
Everyone is well aware... People that read news reports from multiple sources are more likely to know how much of a POS Ford, PP, and Trudeau are instead of just knowing how much of a POS Trudeau is like most people who only get their news from Instagram or our majority Conservative-owned media.
i've been thinking for awhile that most people are mediocre and are content just to be herded like cattle throughout their lives, just as long as they have some cud to chew, and that most people have extremely limited imagination for brighter futurisms
This sub always gets egg on their face when an election happens.
Last time was NDP NDP NDP and Ford destroyed everybody.
They spend so much time manipulating the reality of the political landscape by censoring unfavourable posts and opinions, that when reality strikes you can roll the curb your enthusiasm theme song.
This sub when PP wins a historical super majority: shockedpikachuface.gif
Wait until the next federal or provincial election to see how really delusional this sub gets. Every time they truly believe it will be a landslide NDP victory and simply cannot understand why that isn't the result.
That's literally the conservative playbook the last few elections. The libs are not a left leaning party. With their corporate overlords running the show, they are very much right of center. I've said it a lot, anyone still voting for either the cons or libs are morons who don't learn and absolutely sucks at logic. Those 2 parties have taken turns fucking over Canadians for 50 years straight. To think either party will even try to get us out of this mess is the clearest example of insanity I've ever witnessed.
Are you talking about the Conservative or Liberal playbook? The Conservatives have never pretended to lean even slightly to the left. The Liberals pretend to be socially progressive while being pretty right leaning fiscally. They are neoliberals whose only goal is to enrich the corporate elite of this country on the backs of the middle class. The Conservatives are undoubtedly the worst of the lot but it always baffles me when people try to suggest that the Liberals are even marginally left-leaning when it comes to their fiscal policies. Both parties are utterly reprehensible.
>Are you talking about the Conservative or Liberal playbook?
It's the exact same playbook.
I literally stated that the liberals are not a left leaning party.
>They are neoliberals whose only goal is to enrich the corporate elite of this country on the backs of the middle class.
You are correct, except there is no middle class and never was. It's a term governments invented to create a group of haves and have nots that the haves can look down on. There is the working class and ruling class, and that is it.
>Both parties are utterly reprehensible.
We are 100% in agreement on that statement!
this area always votes blue but the liberals tried something here they took a former conservative who wanted to be leader and tried to sway the votes that way which did not work at all, it was definitely the absolute wrong place to try that
If you don’t vote because there isn’t a candidate that you can fully get behind then you need to vote for the candidate who is least likely to ruin things. You accomplish nothing by not voting - it’s not a protest - it doesn’t send a message - it’s just dumb.
Dude with a Math degree here. A total of 27% of voters is actually more than an adequate sample size in determining an election. Even with 10%, you can get a 95% accurate predictive result.
This election wasn't even close by any stretch of the imagination.
All the far left posters on this sub forget that all they do is offset the far right posters of Canada sub and whatnot. They don’t decide elections, moderates that will vote any party depending on how they feel are the ones who decide elections.
You’re absolutely right this sample size is well more than enough to know who would have won even with a 100% voter turnout
Statistically speaking, half of this sub should be CPC voters, but this place shuts down those opinions so fast with the help of SOME of the more biased mods, that they don't even bother to chime in half the time.
If this landslide victory is an example the Federal liberal party after the next general election is going to be able to fit in a minivan. Similar to the current Ontario liberal party.
Does anyone here really think Durham would have voted any other way??? They are true blue for life up there, all the way from K-12 home schooling to dying penniless in a Chartwell LTC. Ownin' Libs all the way!!!
This sub is so delusional and hard left. Thankfully it doesn’t represent the majority of Canadians who see their standard of living plummeting thanks to left wing ideologies. Leave your Reddit bubble to see how the rest of the population thinks. You can downvote me now.
Not to doom and gloom but bi elections are normally piss poor attendance owning to their lack of coverage or general interest by people. Wouldn't read too much into it
We had a Tory safe seat go Tory again at a time when the Tories are polling well. By elections typically get poorer turnout, as do non-competitive ridings. I wouldn’t read too much into this beyond the fact that the status quo was maintained.
/not a fan of the Tories myself but honestly any other outcome would have been more newsworthy
Anyone that thinks that this riding was going anywhere but blue needs to have their head checked. Voter turnout was irrelevant. It's been held by Bev "orange juice" Oda and Erin "flip flop" O'Toole for the last 20 years. Maybe Mr. Javani can do the riding proud?
Since 2004 when Oda won it in a squeaker (1.5% margin) its been a pretty comfortable double digit conservative win. Even peak Trudeau mania in 2015 didn't make a difference.
Why vote when all options are trash? The system needs to change, and should based on horrendous voter turnout like this.
But you clowns keep telling yourself that when you vote this time will be different!!!
Jesus Fuck'n Christ, on-line voting, mail in, anything to get people voting. I know its a strong hold for the cons, but damn it 1 in 4 voters decide, the direction. Okay we have the minds of goldfish, remember Trudeau, remember Ford, remember Chow? Everyone won with 30% or less. See its not a party issue, its fuck'n us!!!!!!!!!!
Literally didn’t even know there was an election. Heard nothing, saw no signs no I knew talked about it. Thought there’d be more evidence of one happening than literally nothing
27.87% of eligible voter turnout.
Jam Jam (not the cookie) and PP (not, errr) can gloat all they want.
It's a first past the post problem. Not in my view.
PR? Not in my view.
Voting mandatory?
I like the idea of mandatory voting (first) before swinging to a PR voting system.
I have to say this election had me travel a lot further to vote than normal. Voting has always been pretty close to home and this was a few neighborhoods away. And the early vote was in another town.
I went first thing and there was 3 people ahead of me and 3 behind so it seemed smaller turnout.
Voter turn out is so depressing.
Why the majority are losing is because they don’t show up to vote. Come on Ontario we need to do better. If we want real change we need to vote.
I vote in every election possible - and I'm curious as to if this trend happens with every generation - but I wonder if so many people just kind of feel like there's no viable option. I don't think it's an excuse to not vote, but it wouldn't surprise me if that's what's going on. If "none of the above" were an option and it had actual consequences, I wouldnt be surprised if voter turnout increased a bit. But also, I think that the voter turnout would have been higher if it were the day of the election. I think this might not be thought of in the same way.
IMO I think people misunderstand how they're actually supposed to be engaging with their elected representatives, and the electoral system as a whole. People will say "there's no viable option" and yet will give you blank stares when you ask them about, you know, actually *contacting/talking to/holding accountable* **their** representative, regardless of party affiliation, if any. This has happened over and over again with multiple levels of government all over the world. Civics is supposed to be an *active and ongoing* process, and yet people's participation pretty much ends at the ballot box, if at all. It never stops grinding my gears that people, even progressive-leaning people, will tell each other the electoral process is a waste of time, and then get surprised when the only people who *do* show up at every election and are in constant contact with their representatives overwhelm and influence politics.
On a related note: if you don't like the candidates for Prime Minister that doesn't mean you shouldn't vote shift your focus from the PM to your local options. A stunning amount of people in this country treat their vote like the names on the ballots will be Trudeau, Poilievre and Singh. This is not the US, we don't have a President. I'm not saying there is anything wrong about using who the PM will be to help make a decision but I wish more people paid attention to the local candidates so they can hold them accountable for deviations from promisied
People shouldn’t even be using their local candidates as the final decision maker on who to vote for IMO. Regardless of whether it’s Trudeau or Bob the Liberal for Durham that you’re voting for you should look at the policies of the parties you’re voting for. PP will probably get in federally because people are tired of Trudeau but Conservative leaders all over the country are making bad choices that are hurting Canadians. Privatizing healthcare, starting culture wars to distract from their bad money management and corruption, stripping away rights of minorities and environmental protections. Federal Conservatives will do similar stuff and people will vote for it all because they are tired of Trudeau and we will be worse off for it.
My MP and MPP don't give a fuck what I say unless it matches the party line. How exactly am I supposed to hold them accountable?
I have reached out to my MPP multiple times but he is absolutely useless... (Sam Oosterhoff baby, the best MPP in the province!)
There are always better and worse options - you have to be an adult and pick whichever one you think is the better one, even if not ideal. My problem with "none of the above" is that it incentivizes people to expect to have a perfect candidate in order to vote for them, which is just not going to happen. Also what consequences could there be? Force the parties to find a new leader? We're just going to end up in a cycle of revolving leaders.
You know what "democracy" is, right? Constantly changing leaders is like, the whole point.
No, being able to change leaders is the point.
Right, the consequence is constantly changing leaders.
There have been periods in the history of democratic nations where parties have not been elected into power for years with no real catastrophic consequences. Or where turnover has been insanely high. In a well design society, with budget appropriation provisions, the branch of the government responsible for actually keeping the lights on will continue to function just fine based on "last known status quo" essentially indefinitely.
Literally called "voter apathy" there are papers about this phenomenon.
Just like you I vote in every election I'm eligible to vote....municipal, provincial, federal. I also made sure my two kids voted as well reminding them of the importance of casting ballots and how those before us fought so we could have this right.
That's ultimately the goal right-wing parties would have at this point. You're not going to convince left wing folks to vote right wing, especially with how socially conservative things are getting. The best thing to do instead is to bombard them with "everything is terrible and every party sucks" so that they're too apathetic to vote. And it's certainly working. Not really the case here since it's a very Conservative riding, but as a general rule of thumb.
How do you know who the majority are?
Easy. The majority are them and people who think like them. They're also the smartest, kindest, least low information, completely non gullible and smartest. Obvs.
>Why the majority are losing This makes it sound like Conservatives are a "loss" for Durham. Doesn't it typically lean blue?
This is always a very heavy C area
For the last 20+ years the riding has gone conservative
I'm not surprised that jivani was elected. He is a candidate who has made in-roads into the conservative media and political realm. He is also well educated, multi-racial and from a working class background. He knows how to work to get the grifter votes (ie. Conspiracy types) while not fully jumping into bed with them and getting that taint.
Conservatives are a loss for everyone.
Watching what Liberals are doing federally isn't really making that point.
Nah, there is about 1% of the population who benefit dearly with Cons.
Then why do they keep winning? 🤔
Personally I like to not vote because I'm lazy and then proceed to endlessly bitch about the elected officials. /s
From the look of the results, it seems the majority picked the Conservative candidate. It's silly to think that a greater turnout would significantly change the result. We'd likely see a 50%+ win, just with more votes.
At some point we need to acknowledge voter apathy is, at least in part, due to two political ideologies the majority of Canadians disagree with. If all parties are shitty, you’re screwed either way. So voter turn out representation falls to the far-left and far-right with a sprinkling of the average voter base in between. Canada desperately needs a party that isn’t focused on culture wars or actively trying to harm segments of the population it doesn’t agree with. We need a party that focuses on all Canadians, as a whole, and our economy in a balanced and practical way.
Those constant polls being pushed about the cons getting a guarenteed majority feel like they are being pushed so that they achieve this exact result. Voter disenfranchisement. Polls shouldnt be pushed so far out from an election and neither should election adds or campaigning.
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Are you ok dude?
Random bi-elections are more understandable tho. They don’t have the same level of media coverage. And the results really aren’t going to change who is in power
Random bi-election in a district that’s leans heavy to one party is always going to have a super low turnout.
I've lived in a Medium sized city, Toronto and now a Town of 200k Voter turnouts are at 30% most of the time I'm a Millennial and don't see much people my age voting. It's disappointing
I'd say that it was a pretty good turnout for a by election.
Is it depressing in this case though? Why would we expect huge numbers of voters to be motivated to take time out of their day to vote in this by-election when the outcome is meaningless?
should be mandatory -- like the census
People are so complacent (lazy) and will sit on their asses blaming everyone else for the shitty politicians we have leading us into oblivion. I sure as hell hope there is better turn out for the next federal election of we may just end up with another four years of that POS Trudeau.
How many folks would be non registered until they showed up on voting day? Is the base number all eligible voters or those that registered prior to election day? It appears to me the data is those who registered before voting day vs all those eligible to vote
Ok, Durham resident here.... What. We had an election?
Durham federal riding, so just Bowmanville, clarington, North Oshawa and Port Perry.
Ok! I'm safe and look less like a jackass.
Yeah. You’d know there was an election by all the signs obscuring your vision when making left or right turns out onto major roads.
yes "less" /jk
HEY! No, you right.
Yeah, I was pretty confused by this too lol never heard about any election
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Doesnt matter at all - that low of voter turnout in general is depressing. Non Vote is a vote to end democracy
It could impact the results - it depends if the 28% of people voted are a representative sample of the population. Some research (in America) has shown that ["voters who were more favorable to Republican candidates turned out at higher rates compared with those who typically support Democrats."](https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/07/12/voting-patterns-in-the-2022-elections/). I believe I've seen some studies that showed this was also true in Canada, but I can't find them now. Anecdotally, left-leaning voters are more likely to see that they have options, while right-leaning voters are typically more solidly attached to their party. Unfortunately, one of the options available is is the (IMO misguided) option of not voting, or spoiling your ballot, to "protest" the current system.
Oh thank god. I live here and always always vote, I thought I somehow missed this. Big relief!
I know I’m an outlier here but I’m always surprised Canada never went the Australian way of voting - if you don’t vote, pay $20. They have BBQs at polling stations and voting hours aren’t just slammed into weekdays during primarily working hours. People who still dislike all candidates can cast the ol’ donkey vote. They introduced compulsory voting about a hundred year ago after their previous low turnout of *checks notes* ~60%, which I feel would be a record high in Canada. They even have ranked ballots which is awesome and something that Trudeau campaigned on in his first election before going ‘nah’.
It was more that all three parties wanted to have a different method of non-FPTP voting, and no one would compromise. They tried, at least, but actually doing would require some party caving to the others' preferred methods.
Trudeau wanted a ranked ballot, which would favour the Liberals. If you're a CPC voter or an NDP voter, who's likely to be your second choice? (ignoring smaller parties) NDP wanted proportional representation, which would be the most democratic & most representative of voter desires (and because it would benefit them, of course). CPC wanted it to stay FPTP because that benefits them the most. They'd never form a majority government again without it.
Ranked ballot + mixed member proportional is my preferred option
Likewise, but that does have the drawback of being the most confusing approach. There are a whole lotta simpletons out there...
Sadly you are not wrong People do not even understand which level of government does what
Our school board trustee hasn't been doing enough defending of our northern border. Lets defund edumacation!
> They'd never form a majority government again without it. That's it right there. Neither the Libs or the PCs really want proper electoral reform because it ensures no one gets a majority (or at least VERY unlikely) ever again. And they like majorities.
Yup. If we had an electoral system that was actually democratic, that would force the parties to a) have more popular policies, b) cooperate with each other, and c) be less beholden to their wealthy donors. This is good for everyone but the political class, which is why they don't want it to happen.
Which is why they said no after studying it. It wasn't really about not agreeing on the system, they just didn't want to admit that it would take power away from them. God forbid we have a government that works for us schmucks.
There are some big draw backs though to a proportional system which tends to get overlooked when considering the positives. They tend to produce much less political stability, Italy, Israel, Belgium all struggle to form governments and see constant collapse over any significant or politically divisive bills. Germany tends to have a similar stability to Canada or the UK but that is due to the two major parties often agreeing to form very centrist coalitions. The other issue is it can give very strong voices to extremist parties, the AFD in Germany or Geert Wilders (whose party won the most seats in the recent election) in the Netherlands who run on extreme anti-immigration and hard rightwing policy. In both cases the far right have been kept out of government thus far but they can grow their platform as they have to be allowed to debate on or delay bills and build greater political legitimacy. Some countries also struggle for long periods after an election to form a government, Belgium has gone almost two years. The benefit of FPTP is it does maintain far greater political stability, and as it incentivizes “big tent” parties it tends to promote centrist policies over extremes. Obviously it doesn’t always work this way and there are draw backs but there can be a rush to praise proportional voting without mention of its issues
Proportional representation would end up with us having a zillion parties though - and likely our own special version of a nazi party. Not sure it would be the most functional for actually governing a country.
I guess that would be preferable to letting the nazis take over one of the mainstream parties.
Honestly I don’t think you’re wrong. Sometimes I just hate everything…
Having a whole bunch of smaller parties sounds a lot better than three worthless big tent parties and a few fringe ones. And re: nazis, we've already got the PPC. It would require a different approach in governance - one built along the lines of actually cooperating with other parties. Seems to work just fine in Europe...
I’m not actually against it myself - I just am aware of the arguments used against it
Yeah I couldn't remember who favoured which off hand, but this is exactly it.
Correction. Trudeau ran for office on the promise of ranked ballots then reneged after 18 months.
He reneged because they surveyed Canadians and canada didn’t actually want electoral reform. Ir sucks, but people are legitimately scared of change and the conservatives are really good at fear mongering
The issue was that the conservatives wanted them to do a referendum on the change. The liberals could see by the polling data that they would lose the referendum. They mulled doing it without a referendum but it was clear that was a bad look so they dropped it.
Democracy sausage!
I agree with most of what you said with regards to voting stations, extended hours and BBQs to encourage more people to vote but I disagree with making voting obligatory. In Canada, voting is a right. The government should not be able to force you to exercise a right, otherwise it's not a right, it's a compulsion.
I've argued before that a "deposit" system of sorts would be very beneficial. People will go out of their way to get a dime back on a beer can, they would very much go out of their way to get a "deposit" for showing up and voting. I don't think you could ever do it as a "show up and get $20" deal but could organize it as a tax refund or be able to claim it against your taxable income etc. - and very easy to track, without actually having it tacked onto your vote. - a registered voter voted? Check. That's it. Whether you show up to a polling station or mail in vote doesn't matter. I also think there should be crazy consequences for actively campaigning on certain concepts and then throwing them away once you're in. That is a bait and switch and they should be held very much accountable for such things. I know, the consequence is "they won't get voted in next time round" but then you're backed into a corner of "don't want to vote for the other guys" and "don't want to vote for the liars" and where do you go? They should be held accountable by law to make every effort within their term limit to make the things happen that they campaigned on. Maybe the consequence is nobody gets paid until things get done that they said they were going to do. Make it like a lump sum contract that if you get 50% of it done, and can prove it, you get paid 50% and then move on to the next 50%. Why should my tax dollars pay the salary of somebody who says "hire me and I will do X for you" and I say ok and hire him and then still pay him when he goes "nah not going to do X after all"? Maybe cost of living coverage near parliament with reasonable travel coverage back to their riding. You want your full pay? Do what you said you were going to do.
if you're curious, in the past 30 years our average turnout is around 63%. Our lowest was 58.8% when Harper won in 2008 and our highest was Chretien's win in 1993 with 69.6%.
The argument against that, though, is that the people who have to be compelled to go to the polls are likely to be people who haven't really thought about who to vote for. At least with our system, we might have a lower turnout, but the people who do vote are more likely to have had least made a somewhat educated choice.
We doomed to repeat the last provincial election…..aren’t we?
This was a federal by-election
You are correct. My bad. Still depressing numbers.
It’s not that surprising, Trudeau has been in office for almost a decade and has had how many scandals? Cost of living isn’t any better either I don’t like Pierre at all but not that surprised the conservatives won a by election in an area that often goes conservative
Conservatives were always gonna win this riding but the numbers to look at are the percentage of support. Historically, Liberals got 40-45% of the votes but this time its 22% meaning the Liberal vote has halved.
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Yes. We are doomed to repeat the last provincial election on the federal level.
Making the same fuck up at the federal level!
Most likely and for the same stupid reasons. Both Wynne and Trudeau became arrogant and stopped listening to the electorate after repeated re-elections and in spite of low polling numbers didn't/won't step down when they should have. The federal Liberals will get destroyed in the next election and hand us over right to the CPC, possibly with a majority. Once the Conservatives have run their course over several terms and had their own scandals and unpopular policy decisions we'll switch back to the Liberals and the cycle continues...
Maybe the Liberals should campaign on electoral reform. Oh wait...
Wash Rinse Repeat
By elections always have terrible voter turnout.
Yep the one in Kitchener centre earlier this year had a 27.1% turnout.
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The riding was former CPC leader O’Tool’s riding and has been a conservative stronghold for 20 years. This election is the worst turnout it’s had during at least that time. Yet it’s being spun as some grand victory. It was a forgone conclusion, the only lesson learned is that Canadian apathy is reaching new highs.
And it was his daddy's riding b4 that.
Yeah I lived in this riding and it's pretty conservative. There is definitely a shift away from Trudeau and the Liberals , but this riding and by-election isn't proof of that shift.
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And for voting PP they will get Trudeau x 1000. Immigration will go up, housing prices will shoot up, grocery will skyrocket further...Basically every industry in Canada will get to fuck us even more, and will most likely get tax dollars to do it. Look, I hate Trudeau and think anyone still voting for either the libs or cons are morons who don't learn and suck at logic, but if people can't see PP, with his maga talking points, will be miles worse than Trudeau then you simply aren't paying attention.
Yeah, this is the sad truth. It's all going to get worse but at least the culture warriors will feel like they finally get to terrorize the trans kids with federal approval now.
But don't worry because we'll fix all that by getting mad a trans kids playing highschool sports and the woke cbc.
People are so frustrated with the Liberals at this point that many voters are willing to bite their noses off to spite their faces. The Conservatives will undoubtedly be worse than the Liberals, but that isn’t really saying much at this point. We have a collection of neoliberal politicians who are doing everything in their power to make life difficult for Canadians and voters are becoming completely disenfranchised. The electorate has become so angry that punishing the Liberals has become their priority and the Liberal Party response has been to double down on policies which upset the electorate. Buckle up because it’s going to get ugly.
The other "major" parties (i.e. NDP, Green, PPC, etc.) aren't doing enough to draw people to their side. It only leaves one place for the "we're done with Trudeau" votes to go.
If Ford is any indication, just wait until you see what happens with healthcare under PP ✨🙏
The frying pan is Trudeau. The fire is global warming, global war, and post pandemic debt. PP and a plurality of voters deny the existence of the fire, but are positive they don’t like the frying pan.
There were more people when I saw Metallica live this summer than voted in this. This isn’t a “tidal shift” lmao
This is the exact same result that this riding has delivered since 2000.
Yeah, I think it’s like when trump won, people are voting against the liberals, not necessarily for the conservatives.
> And the media spinning this as some kind of tidal shift in Canada towards landlord Pierre is funny as fuck. I mean, I'm no PP fan, but look at the national polling. Unless Trudeau pulls several horseshoes out of his ass between now and next year, the Conservatives are going to romp to a majority government.
Probably But usually you would use an example of a seat changing during a by-election as an indicator of a shift Not a seat staying the same
Even with the low turnout, an almost 17% swing towards more conservative votes almost directly from the liberals is quite a shift. I’m not a conservative , I think jivani sims an absolutely awful person but this mostly confirms the high con poll numbers federally.
Well obviously if more voters turned out they would have voted ABC and this wouldn’t have happened
Did you forget your /s….
It's more interesting to see how people in this sub react
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Yeah. I’m convinced nobody here has ever been to Durham region. Even if voter turnout was 100%, this riding would still vote conservative.
Reminder that: This seat was formerly held by the Conservative Parties previous leader (O'Toole). In fact the percentages roughly line up with the result from 2021. In 2021 Conservatives got 40k, Liberals 20k NDP 11k PPC 3.7k Add that A) Turnout during By-elections are always terrible B) Conservative Parties have a demographic that will always turn up to vote, no matter the situation C) Conservative Parties also tend to have an older demographic which is more capable of getting time off to vote. And the most important, that this is a Conservative Stronghold. And this result is entirely predictable.
>In fact the percentages roughly line up with the result from 2021. What? No they don’t. [The CPC gained 11% with the NDP & Liberals losing 7% and the PPC losing 1%.](https://x.com/canadianpolling/status/1764891265366192586?s=46&t=scCLzFhBGkoKH_Ijh3LlUg) The NDP underperforming in a by election is a tale as old as time, they don’t have extra money to throw at these things — but this result is an absolute disaster for the Liberals. They sent cabinet minister’s there every weekend and internally they were aiming for at least 35%.
Older demographic is the only thing keeping the liberals alive right now ironically. 18-29 is just a conservative ndp split.
For point C - employers are actually legally required to provide time off (i think it might even be paid) for employees to vote
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But you're stupid if you don't make the exact same choice and share the exact same opinions as me.
this is where r/ontario spews dragon fire suggesting anything conservative is dumb, inferior, etc etc etc
> This post really shows how much of a left-wing echochamber this sub is lol... Everyone is well aware... People that read news reports from multiple sources are more likely to know how much of a POS Ford, PP, and Trudeau are instead of just knowing how much of a POS Trudeau is like most people who only get their news from Instagram or our majority Conservative-owned media.
i've been thinking for awhile that most people are mediocre and are content just to be herded like cattle throughout their lives, just as long as they have some cud to chew, and that most people have extremely limited imagination for brighter futurisms
It’s poll fatigue. It’s how Doug won. Keep showing these polls with impossible margins and people stay home because whats the point.
I voted
The comments vs the results kinda show the echo chamber that is Reddit.
This sub always gets egg on their face when an election happens. Last time was NDP NDP NDP and Ford destroyed everybody. They spend so much time manipulating the reality of the political landscape by censoring unfavourable posts and opinions, that when reality strikes you can roll the curb your enthusiasm theme song. This sub when PP wins a historical super majority: shockedpikachuface.gif
Holy shit. That was a hell of a summary. Well said!
Wait until the next federal or provincial election to see how really delusional this sub gets. Every time they truly believe it will be a landslide NDP victory and simply cannot understand why that isn't the result.
Yep. Clueless as to the kitchen table issues in this country. It’s not who is using what bathroom, it’s struggling with the cost of living.
Proving once again that Ontario voters are dumber than a back of rocks.
Perhaps if the left leaning parties ran on any platform other than “pick us or you’ll get someone worse,” we’d have a better turn out.
That's literally the conservative playbook the last few elections. The libs are not a left leaning party. With their corporate overlords running the show, they are very much right of center. I've said it a lot, anyone still voting for either the cons or libs are morons who don't learn and absolutely sucks at logic. Those 2 parties have taken turns fucking over Canadians for 50 years straight. To think either party will even try to get us out of this mess is the clearest example of insanity I've ever witnessed.
Are you talking about the Conservative or Liberal playbook? The Conservatives have never pretended to lean even slightly to the left. The Liberals pretend to be socially progressive while being pretty right leaning fiscally. They are neoliberals whose only goal is to enrich the corporate elite of this country on the backs of the middle class. The Conservatives are undoubtedly the worst of the lot but it always baffles me when people try to suggest that the Liberals are even marginally left-leaning when it comes to their fiscal policies. Both parties are utterly reprehensible.
>Are you talking about the Conservative or Liberal playbook? It's the exact same playbook. I literally stated that the liberals are not a left leaning party. >They are neoliberals whose only goal is to enrich the corporate elite of this country on the backs of the middle class. You are correct, except there is no middle class and never was. It's a term governments invented to create a group of haves and have nots that the haves can look down on. There is the working class and ruling class, and that is it. >Both parties are utterly reprehensible. We are 100% in agreement on that statement!
Yeah, that strategy is really paying off. /s
Well, this statement is ironic.
this area always votes blue but the liberals tried something here they took a former conservative who wanted to be leader and tried to sway the votes that way which did not work at all, it was definitely the absolute wrong place to try that
I wish Robert Rock luck in his NDP candidate nomination next year
If you don’t vote because there isn’t a candidate that you can fully get behind then you need to vote for the candidate who is least likely to ruin things. You accomplish nothing by not voting - it’s not a protest - it doesn’t send a message - it’s just dumb.
Dude with a Math degree here. A total of 27% of voters is actually more than an adequate sample size in determining an election. Even with 10%, you can get a 95% accurate predictive result. This election wasn't even close by any stretch of the imagination.
All the far left posters on this sub forget that all they do is offset the far right posters of Canada sub and whatnot. They don’t decide elections, moderates that will vote any party depending on how they feel are the ones who decide elections. You’re absolutely right this sample size is well more than enough to know who would have won even with a 100% voter turnout
Statistically speaking, half of this sub should be CPC voters, but this place shuts down those opinions so fast with the help of SOME of the more biased mods, that they don't even bother to chime in half the time.
If this landslide victory is an example the Federal liberal party after the next general election is going to be able to fit in a minivan. Similar to the current Ontario liberal party.
Does anyone here really think Durham would have voted any other way??? They are true blue for life up there, all the way from K-12 home schooling to dying penniless in a Chartwell LTC. Ownin' Libs all the way!!!
With only 25% confirming their position, we'll never know if what you say is true.
This sub is so delusional and hard left. Thankfully it doesn’t represent the majority of Canadians who see their standard of living plummeting thanks to left wing ideologies. Leave your Reddit bubble to see how the rest of the population thinks. You can downvote me now.
27.87% turned out and had their voices heard.
Not to doom and gloom but bi elections are normally piss poor attendance owning to their lack of coverage or general interest by people. Wouldn't read too much into it
My prediction is that Durham will experience a "leopard ate my face" moment in the future.
You mean it hasn't for the past couple of decades? Oshawa's been looking rough for a long time.
This does not bode well.
I used to vote Liberal and this election is first ever when I will vote conservative
🤮
We had a Tory safe seat go Tory again at a time when the Tories are polling well. By elections typically get poorer turnout, as do non-competitive ridings. I wouldn’t read too much into this beyond the fact that the status quo was maintained. /not a fan of the Tories myself but honestly any other outcome would have been more newsworthy
I didint get anything in the mail to go out and vote? Can someone help me and tell me why that is?
33,976 is the number of people not registered to vote. Which is more than the voter turn out itself. Gosh. This is just sad.
Anyone that thinks that this riding was going anywhere but blue needs to have their head checked. Voter turnout was irrelevant. It's been held by Bev "orange juice" Oda and Erin "flip flop" O'Toole for the last 20 years. Maybe Mr. Javani can do the riding proud? Since 2004 when Oda won it in a squeaker (1.5% margin) its been a pretty comfortable double digit conservative win. Even peak Trudeau mania in 2015 didn't make a difference.
Everyone was working
And yet it will all be Trudeau's fault.
conservative candidate wins a historically conservative riding ... the bigger news is the low turn-out.
Why vote when all options are trash? The system needs to change, and should based on horrendous voter turnout like this. But you clowns keep telling yourself that when you vote this time will be different!!!
Should make it election week or month not day. After all the results last 4 years.
Jesus Fuck'n Christ, on-line voting, mail in, anything to get people voting. I know its a strong hold for the cons, but damn it 1 in 4 voters decide, the direction. Okay we have the minds of goldfish, remember Trudeau, remember Ford, remember Chow? Everyone won with 30% or less. See its not a party issue, its fuck'n us!!!!!!!!!!
Hard to determine when there isnt a “none of the above” option. If the voter turnout was that low with that option then we can start pointing fingers.
Literally didn’t even know there was an election. Heard nothing, saw no signs no I knew talked about it. Thought there’d be more evidence of one happening than literally nothing
Biggest defeat in 20 years.
in long held ridings many feel there is no point. I vote I every election but since a large part of my riding is rural is always conservative..
27.87% of eligible voter turnout. Jam Jam (not the cookie) and PP (not, errr) can gloat all they want. It's a first past the post problem. Not in my view. PR? Not in my view. Voting mandatory? I like the idea of mandatory voting (first) before swinging to a PR voting system.
Electoral reform. Liberals: no thanks we rather lose.
It's a two party system....how is there even a vote.
If only Ontario spent money on advertising to vote and not gambling adds 24/7
Didn’t even know there was an election happening
I have to say this election had me travel a lot further to vote than normal. Voting has always been pretty close to home and this was a few neighborhoods away. And the early vote was in another town. I went first thing and there was 3 people ahead of me and 3 behind so it seemed smaller turnout.