Everything You Need to Know About the Federal Byelection Coming Up in BC

December 11, 2024 TruthUSA

The federal Liberals will face another popularity test as British Columbians head to the polls in a Dec. 16 byelection, providing a measure of how the party is faring among voters with its latest policy moves and international challenges.

The seat was vacated after Liberal MP John Aldag resigned to run for the B.C. NDP in the October election, a contest he lost by over 20 percentage points to the B.C. Conservatives.

Since the byelection was announced in November in the riding of Cloverdale-Langley City, the Liberal government has put forward its two-month GST tax holiday, which is now at the last stage of approval in the Senate. The minority Liberals’ parallel plan to provide $250 cheques to working Canadians was not backed by the NDP, who declined support saying it wouldn’t help non-working people like seniors.

Ottawa has also been seized with the U.S. presidential re-election of Donald Trump, who has threatened to impose a 25 tariff on Canada if doesn’t strengthen its border security. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is facing scrutiny on how he can manage the relationship with Trump and avoid what could deliver a serious blow to the Canadian economy if broad new tariffs are introduced with its largest trading partner.

A recent poll by Nanos Research for Bloomberg suggested Trudeau had closed the gap with Tory Leader Pierre Poilievre on who Canadians believe is best placed to negotiate with Trump. In January 2024, 39 percent of respondents said Poilievre was better placed, compared to 28 percent for Trudeau. In December 2024, Poilievre was down to 36 percent whereas Trudeau climbed to 34 percent.

Whether this data and the tax holiday translates into gains at the ballot box for the Liberals remains to be seen. Liberals are still trailing in national polls by a large margin, with the Tories being ahead by 22 points in voting intentions according to the latest Léger poll.

The situation in British Colombia, which recently re-elected a majority NDP government, is not more favourable.
Polling average by CBC gives the Conservatives 43.7 percent in voting intentions against 17.9 percent for the Liberals. The NDP comes in second with 27.8 percent.

If polls provide no certainty, one thing that’s clear is the labour conflict at Canada Post is having an impact on the byelection’s organization.

Elections Canada issued a warning that electors will not be receiving a voter information card due to the postal service disruption. Those cards usually inform electors about where to cast their ballots. Voters can find out their polling station by entering their postal code on the Elections Canada
website.

Who Is Running

The riding of Cloverdale-Langley City is not considered a safe Liberal seat, as opposed to the ridings of Toronto-St.Paul’s and Lasalle-Émard-Verdun, which the Liberals lost in byelections earlier this year. The riding has switched hands between Liberals and Tories in the last elections.

The candidate for the Tories is Tamara Jansen, an agricultural business owner who represented the riding in the House of Commons from 2019 to 2021. She lost to Aldag by 1,654 votes in 2021, or a margin of 3.1 percent.

The four provincial ridings that roughly cover the area of the federal Cloverdale-Langley City riding were all
won by B.C. Conservatives in the October provincial election.

Other candidates in the byelection include Madison Fleischer for the Liberal Party and Vanessa Sharma for the NDP.

Bios on the respective party websites describe
Fleischer as a small business owner and community leader, and
Sharma as a union leader and anti-racism activist.

Advance voting concluded on Dec. 9 and election day voting will take place on Dec. 16 from 8:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. local time.

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