#ScrimshawSix: The Seats That Will Pick The Premier

On The Ontario Battleground

One of my old bits was the ScrimshawSix, when in the 2019 Canadian Election I would preview six seats in one article, grouped around a common theme. I did Green seats one week, longtime incumbent retirements another, and as we get into the campaign I’ll revive the premise more, but for one week, I want to break out the gimmick to talk about the six seats which I’d like to know the winners of to predict the whole board.

These seats are picked not because they’re the only close seats, but in many ways because of their representative nature. These seats are chosen to be representative of the wide and very weird electoral map that this election will be fought on, and they’re the six seats that are most likely to tell us whether the PCs win a second majority, and who will take second place between the Liberals and NDP, so without further delay, let’s get to it.

Ottawa Centre

Incumbent: Joel Harden, NDP

Margin: 13% over OLP

The only NDP seat east of Kingston, the race for this downtown Ottawa seat will tell us a lot about two broader races – the battle for Ottawa, and the battle for downtown, urban ridings where the Liberals were previously strong and lost in 2018. The NDP surge here last time made a lot of sense with the results in downtown Toronto ridings that were nominally expected to be Liberal holds on any form of uniform swing.

If the Liberals can’t win Ottawa Centre, where their previous MPP is not recontesting due to the small factor of being the Federal MP now, then they’re unlikely to make too many gains in Toronto, outside of Toronto-St. Paul’s, where they’re a dead certain lock to gain the seat. If they can manage to beat Harden, an unassuming and underwhelming member of the legislature, then they’re in play.

The Liberals will be looking to gain NDP voters in Ottawa West-Nepean as well to knock off a Tory incumbent as well as making runs deeper in the suburbs, and a lot of the Wynne 2014-Horwath 2018 voters in those seats will be similar to the ones in Centre, so knowing how this seat goes.

My model currently has Harden winning narrowly, but admittedly, I don’t see that holding by election day. But, if it does, then the NDP have probably held on to second place and if the legislature isn’t in majority, it would be the party asked to form an alternate government when the Ford government fell. And that fact makes this seat worth keeping a careful watch on.

Kitchener South-Hespeler

Incumbent: Amy Fee, PC

Margin: 2% over NDP

This is the kind of seat that the PCs should get smashed in, if the Ontario NDP are going to have a good night, or if the PCs have a very bad night. That said, right now, they’re projected to hold the seat, and increase their majority here, because the NDP fall to the Liberals is putting otherwise easy gains in Kitchener at risk.

The NDP could win this seat, and the neighbouring seat of Conestoga, easily if they just hold their votes from last time, as the PC vote will fall enough that the NDP can gain these seats. The problem is, if the Liberals take more NDP votes than PC ones, then the NDP will fall back too much to win, and the Liberals will have helped keep two PC MPPs in office with vote shares in the range of 35%. (Also, for all those New Democrats convinced that ranked ballots would uniformly elect Liberals, both Kitchener seats held by the PCs right now would be NDP easily under AV, so shut up.)

This is one of the areas where the Liberals should stand down their local campaigning and not send Del Duca – you can’t win any seats here, so don’t fucking try, and let the NDP win these two seats off the PCs.

Mississauga East-Cooksville

Incumbent: Kaleed Rasheed, PC

Margin: 11% over OLP

For all the Liberals who will inevitable be pissed at me for saying they need to stay the fuck out of Kitchener, here’s the other version – the NDP need to give up in Mississauga, because if the NDP vote tanks here, the Liberals can sweep the six seats in the city. Right now I have them winning four of them, and within a point in both Malton and Streetsville.

Now, the Liberals really should be able to win East-Cooksville, but margin here matters a lot. A squeaker here means they can kiss Malton and Streetsville goodbye, and they might not even win Centre or Erin Mills. Win by 10%, and they sweep the city. If you’re looking for the region of the province likely to determine whether Ford’s in majority or not, it’s here, and probably Scarborough, if you’re just looking for pockets of seats.

The NDP have no business showing up here, because they can’t win any seats here – if they couldn’t get close in 2018, they’re not winning here now. Any time, energy, or money the NDP spends here will only help re-elect Doug Ford, and if they make moves here, they’re more interested in fucking over the Liberals than beating the PCs.

Niagara Centre

Incumbent: Jeff Burch, NDP

Margin: 7% over PC

The seat formerly known as Welland is a classic Global Fucking Realignment seat, a culturally conservative, union workers seat that’s been hollowed out by globalization and is now trending right fast. The PCs closed a lot of the gap here last time, with the NDP vote going down 4% as they skyrocketed up province wide.

The reason Niagara Centre matters is that if the NDP lose it, they’ve already lost Essex and Oshawa, and if the PCs can gain three seats from the NDP, then the Liberals and NDP have to gain three more seats, mostly in the suburbs, to knock Ford under the majority line, and with the race this tight as of now, every seat really matters.

The NDP will lose this seat eventually, but the question of whether they can hold it for one more cycle matters. If they can, the path to a non-Ford government becomes a lot easier, and the path to an NDP one gets a boost too. This one matters a lot, because it will tell us a lot about whether Doug Ford’s everyman working class bonafides work as well after 4 years in office.

Vaughan-Woodbridge

Incumbent: Michael Tibollo

Margin: 18.5% over OLP

So, was there a memo, or is there some other reason we haven’t talked about the fact that Steven Del Duca is an underdog to win his old seat back that I missed?

This just-north-of-Toronto seat is full of Italian Catholics and thoroughly chucked Del Duca out when he was a Minister under the Wynne government. It’s a funny circumstance for Del Duca, where there’s a path to 40 seats, Ford clearly out of majority, and he doesn’t win this seat, which would lead to a hilarious set of circumstances.

Maybe he wins it anyways, maybe the leader’s premium is such that the seat flips, but there’s a good chance it doesn’t even in an otherwise good night for the OLP. If Del Duca wins it, Ford’s government is dead. If he can’t, well, no matter what else happens, the weeks following the election will certainly be fun.

Scarborough Rouge Park

Incumbent: Vijay Thanigasalam, PC

Margin: 2% over NDP

Anyone who claims to know who will win this seat is entirely, 1000% full of shit, because right now I have all three parties separated by 0.79%.

I’ve campaigned in the old seat which held some of the current seat of Rouge Park, yes, and ethnic outreach means a ton (and the Liberals sending my white ass around it was super helpful, yes). How the Ford government will be running by election day in non-English media will matter a ton, and how good the NDP and OLP offers to those voters will also matter.

If you wanted a seat to represent how little we know about what will happen this year, this is the one. Strap in, because 2022 is going to be a wild fucking campaign.