Elections results are in and for the fourth election in a row, Ontario has elected a Liberal government. This time it’s a majority so we’re election free for the next four years. Woohoo! Unless you’re the kind of person who enjoys spending millions of tax dollars on the public spectacle that is elections, in which case, Boo! (Although there is a municipal election in October and the long-awaited federal election to look forward to in 2015 so you don’t have to be too disappointed).
For anyone who was watching the polls closely (and really what else were you doing, writing midterms?) a majority government wasn’t exactly the expected outcome of the election. And if you were following the multitude of liberal scandals (gas plant, Ornge, eHealth, gas plant!) you probably question the intelligence of Ontario voters.
So how did a government so mired in scandals that their leader was forced to step down get rewarded with a majority government? I think the answer lies in one Tim Hudak.
Hudak of the one million jobs. One million jobs. Ontario voters just voted against one million jobs. What’s wrong with us? Oh wait…there aren’t even a million unemployed people in Ontario. So who would actually doing these million jobs? Maybe we did make the right decision.
The consensus seems to be that the result of the Ontario elections represents not so much a belief in the Liberals but a rejection of Tim Hudak and the PC’s. So congratulations Hudak! You’re officially less preferable than the government mired in scandal. A government who has held office for over a decade and continued to subjugate Ontario to one austerity measure after another.
Of course the election of a majority government allows us to reopen the debate of whether a majority government is good or bad. Because of course there’s a good side to giving one person the power to basically make any decision they want about our province right? I mean just look at the last time the Liberals had a majority government in Ontario… why shouldn’t we trust them with another.
Even for someone who enjoys elections because they give me an excuse to talk about politics non-stop without annoying people too much, this election was dirtier than most, with far too much mud-slinging and one where you truly were forced to pick the lesser of the evils. It should be no surprise than that the number of declined ballots in Ontario increased significantly this election. The total number of declined ballots rose to 31,339. This is the highest it’s been since 1975. While the results of that can be partly attributed to an increased awareness of the ability to formally decline a ballot (such as through the Iron Warrior’s last PCP), it also had quite a bit to do with the general lack of appeal for the choices at the poll.
The riding of Kitchener-Waterloo, one of only a few swing ridings in Ontario went against the majority and re-elected NDP MPP Catherine Fife.
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