Voters of Nanaimo-Ladysmith have elected a Conservative MP to sit in the House of Commons in a federal Liberal government.
With 99 per cent of polls in the riding reporting results, Tamara Kronis of the Conservative Party of Canada is in the lead with approximately 35 per cent of the vote.
Michelle Corfield of the Liberal Party of Canada is in second, and Paul Manly of the Green Party and incumbent Lisa Marie Barron have been jockeying for third place all night. Stephen Welton, representing the People's Party of Canada, is in fifth:
Results with 204 out of 205 polls reporting:
Tamara Kronis, Conservatives, 25855 votes, 35.2%
Michelle Corfield, Liberals, 20410 votes, 27.8%
Lisa Marie Barron, NDP, 13469 votes, 18.4%
Paul Manly, Green Party, 13363 votes, 18.2%
Stephen Welton, PPC, 291 votes, 0.4%
Kronis delivered remarks to supporters at a private gathering at the Nanaimo Curling Centre, saying she was “ecstatic” about winning the Nanaimo-Ladysmith riding.
“It has been an incredible experience,” she said. “We’ve built a big, happy positive team where our campaign was built on hope for the future and for making sure to work for the things that Nanaimo really needs. We’re going to be focused on affordability, on housing and on making sure that we make a serious plan to do everything we can to deal with the overall crisis in the city and I’m so grateful for the opportunity to serve this community.”
Corfield watched results come in with supporters and volunteers at her campaign office in Nanaimo. She said she was proud of her campaign.
“I think we raised the right issues at the right time and put them on the floor in the midst of all the chaos and all the confusion that has been plaguing politics as of recent," she said. "And I think it’s important that we were resilient, we were strong and we put a platform out there that would take Nanaimo-Ladysmith into recovery.”
Addressing her supporters at MGM restaurant after the numbers came in, Barron expressed gratitude to her team of volunteers and the campaign, stating they "were doing the important work of making sure that we were not spreading division or hate."
When asked about what direction the federal NDP should go, given the night's results, Barron said the party should maintain the course.
"I think that we need to make sure that the party is doing exactly what they have been doing, and calling out corporate greed, and making sure that we are seeing tax fairness, that we're seeing health care public and accessible," she said. "We're seeing what's happening with Donald Trump and what happens when we have somebody that's in it for billionaires … we have seen consecutive Liberal and Conservative governments doing similar things and making sure that corporations are allowed to avoid taxes."
The topic of strategic voting was broached during the campaign and Barron said she did think it was a factor.
"We definitely did see some splitting, more than I anticipated by the conversations I was having, if I could be honest, and my hope is that we don't continue to see that, because when we split three ways on the progressive side, then we see a Conservative win, and that's exactly what's happened here," she said.
When asked about her time representing Nanaimo-Ladysmith as MP, Barron said she felt pride.
"I could not be prouder of the work that we did and all of the incredible people that I've met along the way, my office staff, and the ways that they have served people in this riding and case work and so many ways, I know that we have made a positive impact on this riding," she said.
Manly addressed supporters at the Beban Park Social Centre, telling them the results weren't what he had been hoping for.
“No matter what, you know where I stand in this community and I am going to continue to work hard for the community," he said. "I am going to continue to advocate for this community. I am going to continue to fight for the things we need in this community and that includes affordable housing and improved health care and protection of biodiversity and fighting climate change and ensuring that young people have a future that they can count on, an education that they can afford, a future that looks bright."
Asked about the notion of vote-splitting in the riding, Manly pointed to the Liberals breaking a promise to bring in proportional representation, and also to the NDP for not pushing for it harder in the confidence and supply agreement with the Liberals.
The Liberal Party of Canada will again form government.
