If 614 people in Mississauga East-Cooksville had voted Liberal instead of Progressive Conservative last Thursday night, the verdict on Bonnie Crombie’s first election as Ontario Liberal leader would have been much different.
Just 614 people, in a riding of 87,000 eligible voters. That’s 0.7 per cent of the potential vote — an agonizingly small sliver if you’re on the red team.
Here’s what I mean.
Most of what happened to the Liberals on election day was unambiguously good news. The party garnered 380,000 more votes compared to the 2022 election, good for nearly 30 per cent of total votes cast (compared to just 23.9 per cent in 2022).
After two consecutive elections where the Liberals failed to win the 12 seats necessary to achieve official party status, they hit that benchmark with two seats to spare.
Yes, their vote was inefficient. Despite garnering 570,000 more votes than the New Democrats, the NDP remains the official opposition.
But if you look at Ontario history, rookie leaders almost never win their first time out of the gate when trying to kick out an incumbent government. Crombie has only had the leader’s job for just over a year. They wouldn’t say it out loud, but most Liberals in their hearts figured defeating Doug Ford in a snap, winter election was unlikely. Recapturing power at Queen’s Park was probably a two-election project.
So far, everything I’ve said has been encouraging for the Liberals. And it could have been a pretty solid night had only one more thing happened: Crombie needed to win the seat she was contesting in Mississauga East-Cooksville. But she didn’t.
Two conservative politicians in Ontario really don’t like Crombie. One is Doug Ford. The other is Patrick Brown. And they have used whatever powers they had at their disposal to make her life more difficult. And they succeeded.
First, Ford could have chosen any one of 124 different ridings in which to spend his final day campaigning. He chose to spend it in Mississauga, in the riding Crombie was contesting, doing an event with the Polish community. Crombie’s maiden name is Sawarna. Her background is Polish. In effect, Ford was saying, I’m going to plant my flag in your riding, in the heart of your community. And I will try to inflict maximum political damage on you.
Then Brampton mayor Patrick Brown got into the act. Brown and Crombie were well known foes as the mayors of the two biggest cities in Peel Region. Brown is also well known to have one of the greatest political machines in the province. Remember, this is a guy who won the mayoralty in Brampton (defeating an incumbent, no less) when he didn’t even live in the city.
Brown lent his machine to the PC candidate in Mississauga East-Cooksville, who just so happened to be his mother-in-law, Silvia Gualtieri. Mission accomplished. Gualtieri took the riding by 1,227 votes. Who knows how many accolades the Brown election team deserves for the win. After all, the PCs won every seat in Halton, Peel, and York regions. However, if half of those 1,227 voters had opted for Crombie instead of Gualtieri, the former Mississauga mayor would have won the seat and been able to take her place in the Ontario legislature when it reconvenes, presumably later this month.
Instead, for five years and counting, the Liberals will continue to have a permanent leader who is seatless — unable to lead them during question period, unable to debate legislation, unable to respond to a Speech from the Throne or provincial budget, or to sit on committees which consider bills.
When leaders fail to win their seat, a member of their caucus might resign, forcing a by-election which the leader then contests and (hopefully) wins. Crombie confirmed Wednesday that she has no intention of asking anyone in her caucus to step aside. “I will at the right time find a seat,” she said at a news conference at Queen’s Park. “I wish I had a seat, of course. But there will be a right time to find a seat.”
Crombie now has a hard call to make. She needs to decide whether she wants to hang around Ontario politics for (presumably) another four years, in hopes of a rematch with Ford. The premier would have more barnacles on his ship of state at that time, while Crombie would have a lot more experience as Liberal leader. Or there might be a new Tory leader to oppose in four years, in which case, Crombie’s experience might compare well.
If the public is looking to change premiers, Crombie can also legitimately claim she’s a likelier alternative than NDP leader Marit Stiles. While the NDP's seat count gives the impression of a more successful election night, the party's vote share dropped dramatically. At 18.5 per cent of the total vote, the NDP has to take nearly 20 percentage points from the other parties to win. It’s only ever done that once in the more than six decades it’s been contesting Ontario elections.
Conversely, despite its low seat count, the Liberals are only 7 to 8 percentage points away from being able to form a government. And when Liberals defeat Tories as they did in 2003, 2007, 2011, and 2014, that is not a particularly heavy lift. Crombie looked at the vote count and quickly moved to try to brand the Liberals as one of the big winners on election night. “We’re back as a fully-funded opposition party,” she beamed. “We’ve become the people’s opposition with 30 per cent of the vote share.”
Crombie noted both the PCs and NDP lost seats compared to the 2022 election, while the Liberals gained five. “I’m going to send a fruit platter to the premier to thank him,” she said not totally facetiously.
Crombie says she wants to stick around for the 2029 election and so far, her party seems inclined to give her that chance. Both the Liberal caucus and executive council have unanimously endorsed her staying on as leader. At some point in the next year, party members will have their say on whether to endorse Crombie’s leadership, but at this early juncture, I am picking up no obvious signs that an alternative candidate wants to push her out.
“I have no plans to step down,” she insisted. “I will continue to fight.”
If not for 614 voters, Crombie’s fortunes could have been so much clearer. Instead, she must navigate the much murkier waters of her immediate future. Her metaphorical skill as a sailor will now be on display for all to see.