Liberals sweep most seats in Winnipeg as part of Canada-wide red tide.

The Liberal red wave rolled through Manitoba but was stopped at the perimeter highway that circles the city of Winnipeg. The rest of Manitoba remains Tory blue except for one far north riding retained by the New Democratic Party(NDP).

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Of the 14 Manitoba ridings the Liberals won seven or half, but all in the city of Winnipeg. The NDP was able to keep its one seat in the far north and take one Winnipeg seat from the Conservatives. The other five seats, all rural, were easily retained by the Conservatives.

Long-serving NDP MP Pat Martin was defeated in Winnipeg Center by Liberal, Robert-Falcon Ouellete. Liberals defeating sitting NDP members was a trend across Canada. The Tory candidate Allie Szarkiewicz came third. The Green Party ran Don Woodstock. The voters also could vote for Communist Party of Manitoba leader Darrell Rankin or Christian Heritage's Scott Miller. Ouellete, who is aboriginal, said: "The goal of this campaign was never, never, never just to win. The goal of this campaign was to see your values reflected in Ottawa, to see your values reflected in our Parliament. There will be challenges in Winnipeg Centre. We should be putting more people back to work, and we can. We should be lifting people out of poverty, and we can."

In defeat Martin told supporters that it had been an honour and privilege to serve his riding for 18 years. He also said the Liberals needed a good group of New Democrats in parliament to make sure they kept to their liberal principles. Otherwise he said they govern just like Tories. There is a common saying that the Liberals campaign to the left but govern to the right. Martin has often had problems with statements he makes that will certainly get him an R rating for his discourse. On social media he called Conservatives "rat-faced whores" and was seen swearing at an opponent at a candidates' meeting.

In Saint-Boniface-Saint Vital, Liberal Dan Vandal, a Metis, won the riding for the Liberals . He said that he was fortunate to be part of something very extraordinary as he arrived for his victory party. The win was a gain from the hapless Conservatives who are now shut out from the city of Winnipeg. Liberal, Jim Carr, who won over a Conservative in Winnipeg South Centre played on the Conservative theme that Liberal leader Justin Trudeau was just not ready saying: "The people of Winnipeg South Centre say they're ready, and I'm ready to be your member of Parliament,"

NDP incumbent Niki Ashton was able resist a Liberal challenge by Rebecca Chartrand in the northern riding of Churchill-Keewatinook Aski who was over a thousand votes behind. In 2011 Ashton had swept the riding with over half the vote.

Although the NDP lost Pat Martin's seat, they gained a seat from the Conservatives in Winnipeg Elmwood-Transcona. The vote is so close though the Conservative incumbent, Lawrence Toel, may ask for a recount. The margin was just 51 votes. The NDP victor, Daniel Blaikie, is the son of the popular Bill Blaikie, who long held the seat for the NDP even through times when its present, very reduced count of 44 seats would have been seen as a giant leap forward. Blaikie was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1979 to 2008. Daniel said the NDP would have its work cut out for it to hold the new Liberal government to account.

My own riding of Dauphin-Swan River-Neepawa re-elected Conservative incumbent Robert Sopuck, by thousands of votes even though he was running against a popular former Conservative MP with the improbable name of Inky Mark. No one came close to Sopuck even though Mark probably took a double-digit percentage of the Conservative vote. Mark had always been an independent representative. He joined a demonstration in support of the Wheat Board when his party wanted to end its monopsony, because the majority of his local farmer constituents opposed the Conservative policy. This time around he chose to run as an independent. The Liberal came far behind Sopuck with the NDP third and then Mark. The Green Party also had a candidate. This riding mirrors the situation in most rural Manitoba ridings where Conservatives have historically been dominant. The only exception is the north where aboriginal groups often vote for the NDP or Liberals and the Conservatives do poorly.

The Conservatives will need to extend their popular support beyond their rural base if they want to do better in Manitoba federally. The NDP were fortunate to elect members in even two ridings given that the provincial NDP government is not at all popular and that NDP members were being defeated by Liberals across Canada.

Former Conservative staff member Michael Sona jailed for role in robocalls scandal

Michael Sona, a former member of the Federal Conservative Party staff has been sentenced to nine months in jail for his role in the 2011 Federal Election robocalls scandal.

Sona set a record of sorts by becoming the first and only person, so far, to be sentenced to jail for violations of the Canada Elections Act. The robocalls were designed to misdirect potential opposition voters so that they would not vote on the morning of the 2011 federal vote. Most robocalls are perfectly legal and can be used in political campaigns as well as public information campaigns. The Crown prosecutor had asked for a sentence of at least 18 months. Justice Gary Hearn also gave Sona twelve months on probation. Norm Boxall, Sona's lawyer, had suggested a suspended or conditional sentence but Justice Hearn termed that "entirely inappropriate".
On the morning of May 2, 2011, thousands of automated phone calls went out to some voters in and around Guelph giving incorrect information as to where they should vote. Most of the calls were to Liberal supporters. Sona was found guilty of willfully preventing or trying to prevent electors from voting. The maximum penalty is five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. The scheme involved fake names Pierre Poutine and Pierre Jones, prepaid credit cards that could not be traced, and disposable cellphones from which the robocalls were ordered. Pierre's Poutine is a well-known restaurant in Guelph. The identity of Pierre Poutine or Pierre Jones have never been determined. Sona's lawyer argued that Sona did not have enough technical knowledge to be behind the complicated plot. Boxall suggested that Andrew Prescott, Sona's colleague, who acted as a Crown witness and had experience ordering robocalls was a likely suspect. Prescott had testified against Sona and received immunity in return. Even Crown attorney Croft Michaelson cautioned that Prescott's testimony should be approached with caution. The judge also said that he found Prescott's testimony to be largely "self-serving" and also inconsistent.
The judge relied on testimony from other Conservative staff members who claimed that Sona openly bragged about his actions. Boxall, however, questioned the reliability of other Crown witnesses as well. Chris Crawford, a member of the Conservative ministerial staff who worked with Sona on the campaign claims to have overheard Sona talk of misdirecting voters to wrong polling locations and also sending out calls meant to annoy Liberal voters. Boxall was able to force Crawford to admit that after his testimony to Elections Canada he was given a promotion and $15,000 raise.
 Judge Hearn in handing down the sentence noted that although Sona had no previous record his offence was a serious affront to the electoral process. Crown prosecutor Ruth McGuirl said that the sentence sends a message that this "type of conduct which interferes with fundamental rights of voters" will warrant time in jail. Crown Attorney Michaelson also claimed that jail time was appropriate:" (Jail time is needed) to deter this type of conduct in the future, so it doesn’t ever happen again, and more importantly, so those involved in the electoral process are aware we have rules and the rules have to be followed." Both the Crown and the defence agreed that it was unlikely that Sona acted alone. Sona's actions did not prevent a Liberal win in the riding even though the Conservatives won a majority in the election overall.
 The Liberal who won the riding Frank Valeriote said: “I feel badly for Michael Sona that he’s been the pawn, who in part deployed and executed the delivery of the call, but others did, as well, and Michael’s taken the fall." Some suspect that the campaign manager Ken Morgan, who refused to cooperate in the investigation yet was never charged was also involved in the operation. Sona himself at first claimed he was innocent and was being used as a scapegoat, but later at his sentencing hearing in October he was silent. Sona is not the only one to suffer from the incident.
 New Democratic Party MP Pat Martin was involved in a five million dollar defamation suit for comments he made about RackNine the service the Conservatives used for the robocalls. He settled for an undisclosed sum but is still paying it off. Martin said: “Nobody in their right mind believes Michael Sona acted alone but it looks like he and I are the only two that are suffering any lingering effects from the attempt to hijack…the 2011 election.”

NDP MP Pat Martin swears at Conservative closure of debate

 Pat Martin a Manitoba New Democratic Party MP used distinctly unparliamentary language in a tweet. He may swear by the New Democratic party but he swears at the ruling majority Conservative party. To quote Martin with appropriate omissions: "This is a f--king disgrace ... closure again. And on the Budget! There’s not a democracy in the world that would tolerate this jackboot sh--."
  Martin did not apologize for his outburst but claimed that his language expressed his frustration at the government's tactics. Closure is rarely used in Canada and usually when the opposition is using tactics to deliberately hold up legislation. Martin noted that he is a construction worker by trade and he said that this is the way that they communicate with each other.
    I worked as an inspector on pipeline construction years ago and I can attest that in my experience Martin is telling the truth about construction workers'  language at least in the past. Naturally several Conservative MP's called the language completely inappropriate and expressed their strong moral disapproval. One MP even wants the house speaker to rule on the language since Martin made his tweet while actually in parliament. Of course the Conservatives and much of the media seem to concentrate upon Martin's use of language rather than the inappropriateness of the Conservative use of closure. For more see this article.

Martin against NDP name change..

Martin has a good point. The "new" in New Democratic Party has lost its referential aspect of denoting that it is new but it retains its emotive significance as part of a brand name as the advertisers would put it. As Martin puts out other instances where the term "new" no longer denotes new are widely accept such as New York or New South Wales and on and on.

The success of the Doer government has little to do with the name but a great deal more to do with the fact that in practice the Doer government has been little more than a progressive conservative government rather than a Conservative government. As a result the term NDP in Manitoba has lost its radical scare value for the most part. Anyway Manitoba has often had NDP governments and the sky did not fall.


Winnipeg Free Press
Taking 'new' out of NDP a dead N: Martin
By: Mia Rabson
OTTAWA -- Would a New Democrat by any other name be the same?Canada's largest lefty party is gathering in Halifax beginning Friday for its annual meeting and one of the items on the agenda is to consider removing the "new" from New Democratic Party.
The party has had that moniker since 1961 when the western-based Cooperative Commonwealth Federation and the Canadian Labour Congress joined forces to form a new national party.
The Conservatives got flak for calling themselves Canada's New Government for almost two years after they were elected in 2006.
So almost a half-century of being the "new" NDP is longer than one would consider novel.
While issues such as reforming the tax system, greening Canada's policies and protecting the needy are among the weightier items being considered at the convention, it's almost certain the great name debate will get the most attention.
That ruffles Manitoba NDP MP Pat Martin's feathers.
"I'm completely against it and resent the attention it's getting," Martin said. "Should Nova Scotia just be called Scotia? Should New York rush to change its name to York?"
He said it would make no sense for the party to distance itself from its most successful chapters, particularly the NDP in Manitoba which has ruled for a decade under Gary Doer and is still riding high in popularity and voter satisfaction.
The federal NDP has for years been searching for a way to duplicate the secret of Doer's success. This convention seems to be marking a big step in doing that with resolutions drawn from Doer's own playbook. That includes one to eliminate the national small business tax.
So dumping the "new" from their name, and distancing themselves from Doer's brand, seems like a counterintuitive plan.

Should the NDP and Liberals Merge?

If the NDP is so much interested in power it might as well merge with the Conservatives and work within the government. Oh sorry I forgot that is in effect the present situation lol! How come the Green party that just caught up with the NDP is not pressing to merge with Liberals or maybe they could merge with the Conservatives now they are greening! Actually a more sensible merger would be of the Greens and NDP to challenge Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum.


'Unite the left' against Tories, NDP MP urges
Last Updated: Wednesday, March 14, 2007 | 11:22 AM ET
CBC News
An "informal coalition" uniting federal New Democrats with centre-left Liberals may be necessary to thwart Conservative government dominance in Canada over the coming years, a veteran NDP MP has said.

In an interview with the Toronto Star published Wednesday, Pat Martin, MP for the riding of Winnipeg Centre, said it may be time to "unite the left somehow" in order to expand the NDP's base, but stopped short of suggesting the Liberals and NDP enter into a formal merger.

Martin said he would "rather stick pins in my eyes" than see such a formal merger of the parties, but he also acknowledged the need "to swallow up the centre."

He told the Star he likened the current challenge for centre-left parties to that of the political climate during the 1990s, when the Canadian Alliance and Progressive Conservative parties were splitting votes on the right.

"I'm talking about some kind of informal coalition," Martin told the newspaper. He said that co-operative strategies were achievable under former Liberal prime minister Paul Martin, but "the phone never rang."

A Decima poll released March 1 showed NDP support had dipped into the low teens. For the first time in Decima's polling, the numbers showed national support for the Green party was head-to-head with the NDP at 13 per cent.

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Meanwhile, the Conservatives surpassed the Liberals with 36 per cent support compared to the Liberals' 27 per cent.

"This should be a call to arms, a sounding of the alarm," Martin said, telling the Star the next election would be a make-or-break moment for the NDP.

"How much longer can we hang on?" he said.

Martin also questioned the logic in spending $15 million in each election when the NDP can only expect to put 29 MPs or fewer into the House of Commons: "You would be crazy not to ask yourself, 'How much longer can we continue to spend that kind of money for these kinds of results?'"

The outspoken MP's comments drew no response from a Liberal party spokesman and federal NDP Leader Jack Layton denied there were dissenters in his party.

A Decima Research poll released last April showed that a quarter of Canadians wanted the NDP and the Liberals to join forces