Peterborough Liberal loses, calls Taliban “my brothers”
The Liberal incumbent in Peterborough-Kawartha, Maryam Monsef, who was also the Minister for Women and Gender Equality, lost her seat. Some say it was her own doing. She recently and infamously addressed the Taliban in Afghanistan by saying “I want to take this opportunity to speak to our brothers, the Taliban.” The reference to “brothers” was widely criticized as Canada recognizes the Taliban as a terrorist organization.
Monsef got 5,000 fewer votes than in the 2019 election and the seat was picked up by a rookie Conservative Michelle Ferreri. Ferreri won 39 per cent of the vote (27,301 votes) to Monsef’s 35 per cent (24,564 votes). Two years ago Monsef won by 39 per cent to Conservative Michael Skinner’s 34 per cent.
Interestingly, this Peterborough seat is considered a bellweather riding, as for more than 35 years voters here have picked the candidate from the winning party. Not this time.
People’s Party were the spoilers
There’s an old saying that if “ifs and buts” were candies and nuts, we’d all have a Merry Christmas. Playing that game and based on ballots cast by election day (excluding mail-in ballots) Farmers Forum found that the People’s Party candidates were spoilers in 24 ridings across the country. Assuming that if the PPC disappeared and the vast majority of their voters would go to the Conservative Party, the Conservatives would have picked up another 14 ridings in Ontario, 6 in British Columbia, 2 in Alberta, 1 in Nova Scotia and 1 in Newfoundland. The Conservatives would have ended up with 143 seats to 141 Liberal seats. You still need 170 seats for a majority but this would have been significant. Many armchair critics lashed out at the PPC for throwing the election in favour of the Liberals. Now they have some ammunition.
Minister of Ag wins rural Quebec seat
Federal Ag Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau, a former campground operator in Quebec’s Eastern townships, won her rural riding of Compton–Stanstead with 37 per cent (21,188 votes) of the vote. The Block Quebecois candidate won 31 per cent (17,688 votes) and the Conservative candidate won 17.5 per cent (10,087 votes).
Hastings bids farewell to Mr. and Mrs. Sloan
Hastings-Lennox and Addington was a rare riding with no incumbent. Former Conservative Derek Sloan was kicked out of his party for being too socially conservative and ran as an independent in Banff, Alberta. He did poorly, finishing fifth in a field of nine with 2,015 votes (2.6 per cent). His wife, Jennifer Sloan, ran in his former Hastings riding and did worse. She got 838 votes (1.5 per cent).
Conservative candidate Shelby Kramp-Neuman won the riding with 45 per cent of the vote. Sloan won the riding two years ago with 41 per cent. Kramp-Neuman is the daughter of former area Conservative MP Daryl Kramp.
Most popular MP in Canada got 76.4 per cent of votes
Canada’s most popular MP is Conservative incumbent Robert Kitchen, 64, of the rural riding of Souris-Moose Mountain, Saskatchewan. He got 30,200 votes (an astounding 76.3 per cent). His closest challenger, Diane Neufield of the People’s Party got 9.1 per cent or 3,594 votes. Kitchen was born in England, served as major-general in the Canadian military and is a chiropractor. He was first elected in 2015. He and his wife have three children.
