Sunday, September 30, 2007

NDP May Finish Behind Greens in 25% of Riding Contests

If current polling trends continue, the Ontario NDP may finish behind the Greens in 25% of riding contests in the October 10 provincial election.

Based on past electoral performance, the quality of local candidates, and organizational effort on the ground, the Green Party is poised to collect more votes than the NDP in several ridings across the province. Although the Greens have outperformed the NDP in a few by-elections in recent years, it is extremely rare for the Greens to collect more votes than the NDP in any riding contest in a general election. However, the Green Party’s support for a unified secular public school system, the public’s focus of environmental issues, and the Greens’ push for MMP have given the party new credibility and, in the process, have shaken loose supporters from the other parties, particularly the NDP. In ridings where the NDP has little traditional strength, the Greens are certainly within striking distance.

As a result, look for potential 4th place NDP finishes in the following ridings:

416 ridings

Don Valley West

Etobicoke Centre

Scarborough Agincourt

Scarborough Rouge River

Willowdale


905 ridings

Brampton West

Dufferin-Caledon

Halton

Markham-Unionville

Mississauga East-Cooksville

Mississauga-Erindale

Mississauga-Streetsville

Newmarket-Aurora

Oak Ridges-Markham

Oakville

Richmond Hill

Thornhill

Vaughan

Wellington-Halton Hills


Eastern Ontario ridings

Carleton-Mississipi Mills

Glengarry-Prescott-Russell

Leeds-Grenville

Ottawa-Orleans

Ottawa South

Stormont-Dundas-Glengarry


Southwestern Ontario ridings

Chatham-Kent-Essex

Perth-Wellington


Northern Ontario ridings

Parry Sound Muskoka



Other ridings where the Green Party has an outside chance of outperforming the NDP:

Ajax-Pickering

Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound

Don Valley East

Guelph

Mississauga-Brampton South

Mississauga South

Nepean-Carleton

Niagara Falls

Ottawa West-Nepean

Pickering-Scarborough East

York-Simcoe

3 comments:

Idealistic Pragmatist said...

Do you think they'll pick up any seats?

If not, and you're right about their strong performance, that's a HUGE argument for electoral reform right there.

uncorrectedproofs said...

There is virtually zero chance that the Greens will win a seat, or even come close for that matter.

northwestern_lad said...

Interesting observation, but all those numbers prove is that the Green's are really more of a party for Tories and environmentally sensetive righties (especially when you read the Greens policies) because almost all of those ridings that you sited are extremely right-wing ridings. That's not to much a reflection on the Greens gaining strength as the fact that those areas are populated by people who don't tend to vote to the left.

Although, I'll admit, I attended an all-Candidates meeting in a very affluent, right-wing neighbourhood in Toronto this week and there was only one moment when the audience nearly brought the house down, and that was when they all applauded the Greens loudly for their position on the Faith Based Schools Issue.