Ontario PC Party leader Doug Ford and his wife, Karla, are reacting after being re-elected Ontario Prime Minister in Toronto on June 2. Frank Gunn / The Canadian Press
Prime Minister Doug Ford has easily won a second majority government after a roller coaster ride dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic, with the resignation of both NPD and Liberal leaders over the failures of their parties in the time to pose serious challenges to the progressive conservative giant.
His party was the leader or elected with 83 seats, an increase of seven seats over the results of 2018, with 41% of the popular vote.
A jubilant Mr. Ford addressed supporters in the suburbs of Etobicoke, west of Toronto, saying he had made his party more inclusive and called for unity.
“If you work in the assembly line and have voted NDP all your life, or do your last vote for the federal Liberals, I want you to know that as long as I’m here, there will be room for you in this party,” he said. Mr. Ford said.
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It was a devastating night for the Liberal Party, which had won or led in just eight seats, one more of the seven it won in its practical elimination in 2018. Liberal leader Steven Del Duca, who said on the last day of the campaign that does not. regardless of the outcome of the election, he would remain the leader, he told supporters Thursday night that he was giving up his rebuilding effort and giving up the leadership he had just won two years ago.
Mr. Del Duca also lost his own attempt to secure a seat in Vaughan — Woodbridge, north of Toronto, where he was easily defeated by Michael Tibollo of the PCs. The Liberals needed 12 seats to regain official party status in the legislature.
“This is not the result we were expecting and for which we worked hard,” Mr. Del Duca, who had promised to convert Mr. Ford in a prime minister for a single term when he took over the leadership of his assaulted party.
Speaking to supporters of her home base in Hamilton, NPD leader Andrea Horwath said she was stepping down. His party saw the number of seats in 2018 reduced from 40 to 31, according to initial results. This week he had said he would make a decision on his future once voters were considered. Many members of his party expected him to face a challenge if he tried to hold on, after losing his fourth election since taking over the NPD in 2009.
“It’s time for the torch to pass,” Ms. Horwath, who served for four years as the leader of the official opposition.
He won his seat at Hamilton Center, but his party was beaten elsewhere, including in Brampton, a battlefield suburb northwest of Toronto. In the Windsor area, the PCs snatched the Essex promenade from the NDP, where People’s Deputy Taras Natyshak refused to run again.
Prior to his announcement, there was already a call for him to go on Thursday night by NPD’s Joel Harden, who won re-election in Ottawa Center. He told local media it was time for a “new leadership”.
At 10pm, four cyclists had not yet reported any results. Voting was extended to the constituencies of 19 constituencies, which was delayed when the ballot count could begin.
Electoral turnout could mark a new low in Ontario’s voting history. According to the first results of Elections Ontario, only 40.7% of voters voted. Prior to this campaign, the lowest turnout was 48% in 2011.
Political strategists have said throughout the campaign that the electorate seemed detached, tired after the two-year pandemic.
Pollster Shachi Kurl, president of the Angus Reid Institute, said her data suggested Ontario voters were not impressed by the party’s top three leaders, but the opposition could not file a strong case against Mr. Ford.
“It’s been the bleh battle,” he said. “It’s been an uninspiring campaign and unrelated from the perspective of the Ontario electorate. They looked at the options they had and put ‘bleh.'”
PCs were led or elected in almost every constituency in the critical seating strip surrounding Toronto, a region that often decides who forms a government in Ontario.
And in the historic Toronto stronghold of the Liberals, the NDP retained many of the traditionally red seats that changed in the 2018 campaign. Toronto — St. Paul’s, even though the Liberals were ready to win NDP-controlled Beaches — East York.
Greens leader Mike Schreiner, who won the first seat of the party in 2018, kept his riding in Guelph.
Computers ran a “main” campaign with a tight and cautious script, announcing few new promises beyond the plans, outlined in their budget, to spend billions on hospital expansion and construction of highways, including Highway 413, which would run west of Toronto through Greenbelt’s protected lands. .
Amid widespread anxiety over high inflation, Mr. Ford also repeatedly mentioned its moves to the government to cancel license plate adhesive fees and temporarily reduce gasoline taxes by 5.7 cents. He avoided questions from the media when the campaign was over, after also skipping a press conference after the leaders’ first debate. Many PC candidates chose not to run in the local debates of all the candidates.
Both the NDP and the PCs issued attack announcements to Mr. Del Duca long before the formal campaign began, trying to remind voters that he was in the government cabinet of unpopular Prime Minister Kathleen Wynne who was ousted in 2018.
Although health care was an important issue for all parties, the repeal of the management of Mr. COVID-19. Ford has been in the background for the past two years.
During his first year in office, Mr. Ford suffered a series of scandals and missteps and was booed by the crowd celebrating the 2019 Toronto Raptors basketball title.
His was seen as a polarizing figure after his time as Toronto City Councilman during the tumultuous tenure of his late brother, Rob Ford, as mayor of the city between 2010 and 2014.
Mr. Ford’s public approval ratings improved during the early stages of the pandemic, when he was on television almost every day, and some Ontarians were excited about his displeasure over rising prices or the “yahoos.” anti-mask.
But the tide turned again in April, when it sparked a public outcry with Ontario’s response to a third wave of COVID-19: a wave that epidemiologists blamed for its hasty reopening. Medical experts called for orders to ban playgrounds and give additional powers to baffling police. The measures were partially reversed and Mr. Ford offered an emotional apology.
PC strategist David Tarrant, a lobbyist and communications consultant who is a former senior aide to Mr. Ford said the turnaround came after Conservative strategist Kory Teneycke returned full-time as campaign manager, bringing an outside vision and more discipline to Mr. Ford. decision making.
But Mr. Tarrant also said that Mr. Ford can be traced further, to the appointment of Monte McNaughton to the job portfolio in 2019 with a mandate to appeal to unions. The government made a number of changes aimed at workers, including reversing its opposition to raising the minimum wage. A list of private sector construction unions lined up to endorse PCs.
As a result, Mr. Tarrant, the PC Party under Mr. Ford is appealing to a wider range of voters, though some free-market conservatives, he said, may not like the direction the party has taken.
“This isn’t just Doug Ford’s change story,” Tarrant said. “It has actually changed party. In fact, it has changed the coalition of people who are open to voting for the PC.”
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