TORONTO – Everything as before. The outcome of the 2021 elections does not change the balance of power that characterized the last legislature by a comma. We will have, just as in the last two years, a Liberal minority government led by Justin Trudeau, in his third term after the victories of 2015 and 2019. In support of the new executive there will be 158 deputies compared to the 157 elected in the previous electoral round.
The Conservative Party led by Erin O’Toole, despite once again winning a majority of the popular vote, fails to translate the electoral consensus into seats. The Conservatives will bring 119 MPs to Parliament Hill, two fewer than in the 2019 vote. Jagmeet Singh’s NDP does not take off either, going from 24 to 25 parliamentarians, while Yves-François Blanchet’s Bloc Quebecois grows, winning 34 constituencies compared to the 32 won in the previous elections. The Greens mark a significant drop in the popular vote that translates into the loss of one deputy: there will be only two Green Party MPs in this legislature.
As for popular participation, according to the still non-final data of Elections Canada, 15.9 million Canadians voted, equal to 58.4 percent of those eligible. Also according to data from the federal agency that overseveres the vote, almost all parties have lost ground on the front of the popular vote.
The Liberals in all received 5.1 million votes (in 2019 they were 6 million), the Conservatives total 5.4 million preferences (compared to 6.2 two years ago), the NDP stands at 2.8 million votes (before they were 2.9 million), the Bloc 1.2 million (1.3 million) while the Green Party records a real collapse in consensus, which went from 1.2 million votes to just 370 thousand preferences.
Boom in support for Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party, which receives 811,000 votes but fails to win even one seat, remaining once again outside the federal parliament.
“Let’s go back to work – said Trudeau – aware that we have received a clear mandate from Canadians to overcome this pandemic, turn the page and arrive at a better future”.
However, given the final results, a climate of generalized uncertainty remains in Ottawa.
As in the previous legislature, the Liberal government will need the support of the Bloc or the NDP to advance its political and legislative agenda, not having an absolute majority of deputies in the House of Commons.
A climate of uncertainty that is destined to accompany us also in this legislature, as has already happened in the last two years.
In the pic, Justin Trudeau (from Anju Dhillon’s Twitter profile: https://twitter.com/adhillonDLL)
