The Agenda with Steve Paikin (Audio) - Ontario Decides: The 2025 Provincial Election

Episode Date: February 28, 2025

The live broadcast of Ontario's 44th general election includes context in the first hour where host, Steve Paikin, and co-host John Michael McGrath will discuss what makes this election special. Jeyan Jeganathan spoke with people across Ontario to hear what issues matter the most to them, and Nam Kiwanuka is joined by people who work in our communities to learn what they are seeing on the front lines. Erin Kelly, CEO of Advanced Symbolics, will join Steve Paikin to share insights about what Polly has been tracking this election. And, closer to when the polls close, Steve Paikin and John Michael McGrath will be joined by Deb Hutton, host for Newstalk 1010; Kim Wright, principal and founder of Wright Strategies; Dan Moulton, partner at Crestview Strategy; and Jackie DaSilva, campaign strategist and consultant, to hear what they are looking forward to seeing on election night. This coverage will span gavel to gavel and will go in depth on how voters across the province will cast their ballots. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Renew your 2.0 TVO with more thought-provoking documentaries, insightful current affairs coverage, and fun programs and learning experiences for kids. Regular contributions from people like you help us make a difference in the lives of Ontarians of all ages. Visit tvo.me slash 2025 donate to renew your support or make a first-time donation and continue to discover your 2-point TBO. Hi, everybody. We're delighted to have you with us for this special broadcast on Ontario's 44th General Election Night. We're going to set things up for you during our regular 8 to 9 p.m. time slot for the

agenda and then at 9 p.m. Eastern Time after the polls close, keep it here because we really will have the most comprehensive coverage and analysis available tonight. From my OnPoly co-host, John Michael McGrath. From Erin Kelly, pollster extraordinaire, and lots of other special guests. We remind you, you can stay tuned to us even if you're on the move. On our live stream at tvo.org or on the Agendas X account. If you feel like it, chime in on social media while you're there. Meantime, let's put some Election 44 into some context. Each election is different, although there are patterns that emerge throughout history. So let's go through the four major party leaders and see what's what.

Up first, Doug Ford, leader of the Progressive Conservatives and Ontario's 26th Premier. His new government first got elected in 2018, pledging to bring radical, disruptive, populist change to Ontario. And that approach promptly put his polling numbers in the dumper. But the COVID pandemic gave Ford a chance to change the channel, and he did. And since then, he's been in first place in the polls nonstop. Ford took a risk in calling an early snap election in the middle of winter, the first wintertime election we've had in Ontario

in 44 years. But if the polls are accurate, his bet that his government was best suited to tackle the Trump tariff threat will have paid off. Second, Marit Stiles, Ontario's NDP leader. She was official opposition leader in the legislature before dissolution. She was first elected as MPP for Davenport in 2018 and swept her riding in the 2022 election as well. After Andrea Horvath stepped down, she was acclaimed as the new NDP leader.

No one wanted to run against her. This was Stiles' first province-wide election as leader, and despite running flat out three, four, even five campaign events a day, it was a hard one to break through. Third, Bonnie Cromby and the Ontario Liberals. The Liberals are coming off their worst ever back-to-back election results, where they failed to achieve official party status in two consecutive elections. Crombie certainly ran to win but if she can get her party back over 12 seats which is official party status or even into second place which is the official opposition the campaign will have been a partial success for her. The one big concern may be whether the leader can win a seat for herself. The 905 ridings in Halton, Peel, and York regions tend to vote as a block for one party.

And that means Crombie will be trying to create a patch of red in what may otherwise be a broad swath of blue in that part of the 905. Fourth, Mike Schreiner, leader of the Ontario Greens. Schreiner was the only Green MPP in the House until 15 months ago when the party won a by-election in Kitchener Centre with Ashlyn Clancy. Tonight, the Greens want to hold that riding for what would be just their second general election seat ever.

Finally, here's what the legislature looked like at dissolution, meaning when the lieutenant governor dissolved the House and drew up the writs in 124 writings for this 44th general election. Seats at dissolution, 79 progressive conservatives, big majority government. The NDP is official opposition with 28.

The liberals, not official party status with only nine, two Greens, six independents. There was actually only one person elected as an independent, but five others got turfed from their caucuses, and that's why there are now six. Let's now take a look at the percentage of support from that 2022 election. And this tells you a lot about how efficient the party's votes were.

The PC's got not even 41% of the vote, but that was good for a big majority government. Look at the Liberal and NDP numbers. They're almost exactly the same. The Liberals, 23.9%, the NDP, 23.7%, but that was plenty to get the NDP into opposition and not good at all for the liberals. The Greens down there at 6 percent. Now, before I join JMM at the big table, I wanted to mention that the last general election in 2022

recorded the lowest voter turnout in our history. 44 percent. Before that, the lowest turnout ever recorded was 48% in 2011. We're going to ask Erin Kelly whether she thinks people are maybe a little more buzzed about this election. We'll find out. First, I have someone waiting for me to join him at the big table. So let's do that now. JMM, how do we always start our get-togethers for on-pully? A little bit of sugar. A little bit of sugar, my friend. There we go. And may I say as well, we also usually, as a tradition,

talk about what we're wearing. But we're dressed like adults tonight. Yes, we are. We are dressed as grown-ups. I have no nerdy t-shirts this time. Have I ever seen you in a suit and tie before? When we covered the Liberal Leadership Convention, I wore a suit then.

That seems so long ago. I wore this suit then. You wore the same suit. Yeah, it's the only one I own. Are you kidding me? That's the only suit you got? I'm not kidding you. Wow. So when you wear all those crazy t-shirts for our podcast that's because that's all you got. Yeah I have some vanilla clothes as well. That's great. Well I am delighted to be sharing this evening with you here at the Big Table in the William G. Davis studio as we get set to set up the 44th general election

and then, of course, take people right through the returns, results, winner speeches, and all of that in our 9 o'clock hour after that. So OK, every election is different, but this one is a bit distinctive. Why? Well, it's happening in the winter time. We don't do that very much. Last time a general election was held in the winter was 1981. And seeing

it was March 19th, it was technically only one day away from the spring, but still it was a winter election back then and here's our first one in 44 years. Right. This is only the second winter election in my lifetime. It was actually kind of close. The 1981 election started with the dissolution on February 2nd, on Groundhog Day. I was born seven days later, which I like to mention, not to make you feel old or anything. No, I don't feel old or uncomfortable

with your having mentioned that. Let me add, this is not the first time we have had an election on February 27 in this province. In 1883, then-Premier Oliver Mowat won a fourth consecutive term for the liberals, who, if you can imagine, would go on to win nine straight elections eventually. And no, despite what you may have

heard from this guy over here, I did not cover that election in 1883. Thank you very much. A bit more recently, only five years ago on this day, two ridings held a by-election in Orleans in Ottawa Vanier to Ottawa Area ridings. And we mentioned turnout earlier. Voter turnout was only 21.56%.

By-elections always pretty low, but still that was a bit bad. A second point that makes this election different. The last time an election was called earlier than called for in the fixed term election law here in Ontario was by Kathleen Wynne in the 2014 election. But that was a bit of a different case. The Wynne government had presented its budget and the opposition parties had clearly signaled that they were not going to support it. So Wynne called for a dissolution, held the election, and led her party back

to a majority in 2014. Is this where I say, however, comma, the last time a truly unforced early election was called was by another liberal. His name was David Peterson. He had the biggest majority government in Ontario history at the time. But he wanted to avoid having an election during what everybody said was a looming

recession. So he went early and it didn't work out, at least not for the liberals. The NDP's Bob Ray shocked everyone, including himself, by winning a majority government that was 35 years ago. That was still the one and only time the NDP has formed government in Ontario. Now, let's also mention that Doug Ford is aiming for a third consecutive majority government tonight, something that has not happened

since Leslie Frost did it 66 years ago. Mr. Frost did it in 51, 55, and finally 1959. That was his three-peat. And if he wins more seats tonight, Doug Ford will be the first premier to increase his seat count in three successive elections. We mentioned Oliver Mowat earlier. The liberals did manage to increase their seat count in three straight elections, but that

was under two different leaders. And it was the 1870s, so it's been a while. It has been a while, and I did not cover that one eye. Now, if the polls are forecasting things accurately, and if Doug Ford's government wins, let's say, 47% of the total votes cast tonight, that would be an historic result that is reserved for very few premiers since World War II.

We're going to show you a graphic here. Sheldon, bring this one up. This is the premiers with the highest percentage of the total vote. And we say since World War II. And we're going to show you a graphic here. Sheldon, bring this one up. This is the premiers with the highest percentage of the total vote. And we say since World War II, because that's really when the NDP, then called the CCF, came on the scene. And we had our sort of mature three-party system here in the province of Ontario.

John Robarts, in 1963, still has the record for the highest percentage of the total vote in a post-war election. He got 48.9% in 1963. Leslie Frost, close behind one of those three Peets, in 1951, he was at 48.5%. We mentioned David Peterson earlier. Before he lost in 1990, he had the biggest majority government in Ontario history in 1987.

And he did it on the strength of 47.3% of the total vote. And the fourth highest total vote count since post-war history, Dalton McGinty in 2003. His first victory, that was 46.5%. One other unique thing about this election, or at least recently, We have two brand new leaders in parties racing to get elected in the legislature, Marat Stiles and Bonnie Cromby. Last time this happened that we had two brand new leaders was in 2011. Tim Hudak who had become the leader of the Progressive Conservatives in 2009 and Andrea Horvath who became the leader of the NDP in the same year. They both ran against Dalton McGinty in 2011,

and it went kind of well for them. They reduced McGinty from a majority to a narrow minority in the legislature. It's also worth mentioning that in 2011, that McGinty election, the minority election, Mike Schreiner was the leader of the Greens, but did not yet have a seat and did not participate in the leaders' debates.

And there's been some criticism about the government for the timing of this election but I do want to throw one thing in very quickly. Please. Because of the timing of this election my niece turns 18 years old today. Bowie if you're out there congratulations. She got to vote in her first election and I am informed from the family group chat that she did so. She voted in her first election on her 18th birthday. Exactly right. Beautiful thing. Well done, cuz. Okay, we're now going to turn it over to J.N. Jagannathan, who has got,

after the province-wide leaders debate, hit the road to ask Ontarians about their thoughts on the election. Go ahead, JJ. Good evening, gentlemen. All right, so we got in the van and we went on the road to hear what Ontarians had to say. We asked them what issues matter to them most this election and what they'd like to see from their government after tonight. The biggest issue, especially coming out of the election and what I'm looking for is definitely the cost of groceries. The rising cost of groceries has made it very,

very difficult for me. Housing is always an issue. We have a fairly large homeless issue fairly close to where we are. Our family doctor, I'm a little bit concerned that when she retires what we might have for a family doctor then. Every day you look at the US politics, it gets a little crazier and just makes you a little bit more worried.

Top of my mind is a leader who can actually go up and fight and fight for us. I don't have a family doctor. I've given up on trying to get one. Housing is a key element in our city. I've never seen anything like this where there's been so many tents. It's a little rough out there rent-wise. I'm like, I'm going to school in Waterloo

and it's horrible. We shouldn't really be looking at removing bike lanes and removing services that so many people rely on here. We actually need to be doing the polar opposite of that and investing in our communities. I really would love to see some more kindness come back into politics again. I'm really tired of hearing the leaders, you know, just be not very nice. They should be focusing on the automotive industry. And being from Windsor, that was my family's livelihood.

I can't really afford rent at the same time as affording a car and I can't really have two jobs without it interfering with another. And I can't really have two jobs as well as having a life. It's very difficult, you know, to be a working class person. Thank you, Jayanne. Hearing from folks across Ontario sets up our conversation here with our guests.

Each one works in our communities and came into studio on election day to talk about some of the issues facing Ontarians. With us tonight are Yodit Idomariam, Director of Legal Services, Rexdale Community Legal Clinic. Nicole Norris, Director of Programs and Agency Network, Food banks Mississauga. And Janet Hunt, registered nurse in primary care, chair and president of the Middlesex Elgin Chapter of the Registered Nurses Association of Ontario. Welcome to you all. Thank you. What a good looking bunch.

Thank you so much for coming in today of all days. I'm not going to play any favourites, but I will start with Janet because she's from London, Ontario. Now, Janet, when people think about nurses, they might think of maybe a nurse in a hospital setting, a nurse at your family doctor, but you're a primary care nurse in London, Ontario.

What does your job entail? I assess people for any problems with their health. I manage chronic, I support people as they look after their chronic disease. We do education with people to help them understand their health. And you actually go to people right? Sometimes, most of the time in my particular role they're coming in for appointments with us and with their family doctor and with the nurse practitioner in our clinic. We also have a group of nurses that go out to people that potentially are living homeless, are unsecure kind of help.

They need additional help. And you're a lawyer at the Rexdale Community Legal Clinic. What is your role there? Sure, yes. I'm a lawyer and also the Director of Legal Services. We provide services in four main areas of law, free legal services in the areas of housing, mainly eviction prevention, social assistance and other income maintenance issues, a lot of disability appeal work.

We also do employment law and we only defend workers. And then we also have an immigration law practice defending newcomers and assisting them with reunification with their families. As well as our case work, we also do public legal education, community development support, and we're committed to engaging with law reform. So you're really kind of embedded in those communities, right? Very much so. So our clinic is rooted in the North Etobicoke-Rexdale community and like many clinics, you know, there are many clinics across Ontario and each of us is rooted in a particular community

and trying to respond to the particular needs of those communities. And this is part of the reason why we wanted to have you all come in because Nicole you we watched people around the province talking about food prices and Ontario is a big province it's very diverse and if you live in a particular part of the province an issue might be felt more and if you live in another part of the province maybe another issue is at the forefront. You've worked on the line of the food bank for some years. What changes have you seen, Nicole? Well, truly, it's been the sheer increase in volume and numbers that we're seeing come through the food bank.

I would say that right now we're in a crisis. It's plain really simple to see. And that- Why do you call it a crisis? If you put it in the perspective that we've seen 200% more visits to food banks since before the pandemic. And last year in Ontario alone, we saw 1 million food bank visits. So this isn't just regional.

It is actually across the entire province that we're seeing this become a crisis. It's hard to hear that because Ontario is a very wealthy province and the idea to think about our neighbors being food insecure might be shocking to some people. Yeah absolutely every single one of those numbers of the 1 million people is a face and a neighbor and a friend of yours. One in every 12 people are accessing food banks now and really when you think about it, they're being faced with impossible decisions on a daily basis. Do I buy food for my family or do I pay my rent?

Do I do groceries or do I pay my bills? So this is really about an affordability crisis. This is about the cost of living crisis that we're seeing. That's all intertwined with the root causes of poverty. And I think for all of us, the things that we think about are one's health, food to eat, which also has a ripple effect with our health, and also shelter. And Yadit, when we talk about renters and what they're going through, what have you seen that's been happening?

Sure. So, unaffordability is a huge question. And we can ask questions like, why is somebody falling behind in their rent? And it's a good question. And I could sit here and give you endless examples of why. Somebody chooses to have to buy winter coats for their children instead of paying the rent in January. They have to pay for a loved one's funeral,

and they fall behind in their rent for two, three more months. They have a sudden job loss, a sudden illness, and there's no backup. There aren't savings. And so that's part of what we're seeing. We're seeing people who even work full time who are drowning in the cost of living. We are meeting with people who are sleeping in their cars, in bus shelters, outside even during the major snowstorm we had a few

weeks ago. And you know we can ask these questions. It's a good question why is somebody behind in their rent. But I think a much better question is why is the rent so high? The rent is too high and that is for definable policy reasons that the provincial government has jurisdiction over. One of the main ones is vacancy decontrol and vacancy decontrol allows landlords to charge anything they want for a new tenancy. This is one of the main reasons why rent is not affordable in Ontario. But, you know, over the last 30 years, rents have doubled. And so for a person even working, trying to make ends meet on a minimum wage,

it's impossible. The minimum wage right now in Ontario is just over $17. The estimate for a living wage in the GTA is $26 an hour. And then for people surviving on social assistance, the situation is dire. For a person, a single person living on Ontario Works, people come to Ontario Works for many reasons at the very hardest times of their lives.

A single person on Ontario Works is now receiving $733 a month that includes shelter. And what is the average rent in the province? It's about $2,600 in Toronto. So that's the average rent and $2,400 has been another estimate but the math just doesn't add up for the most vulnerable people in this province. We're also hearing about again health because all of these things seem to be connected. And Janet we're hearing about nursing shortages. What impact is that having on the people that you take care of?

One of the things that I have noticed quite a lot in our practice is the fact that we are seeing more and more people that are dependent on Social Security becoming homeless. The other day I cared for a lady that I had to assess because she had chest pain or sorry shortness of breath and I was trying to see how it impacted her daily living and she told me that she couldn't chop wood anymore. And I had to explore that and we went into the fact that she is homeless. And she uses the wood to heat up. You have to have a fire, you have to stay warm. We've had excruciatingly cold weather this winter in the minus 20 digits.

She told me, so I said are you safe where you're where you're living and she said yes. Us oldies we stick together. Well how do you you've been a nurse for 30 years? 30 odd years yeah. And in your time doing the work that you've done to hear that because I think we all have the social contract that we have within our communities within our society is that we all work hard and then when we get to, when we become elders, we're taken care of or we have a safe place to stay. Seeing that, you think what? I just wonder where our social conscience is.

There are some people in our society that need support, that have disabilities or are older and we have supports in place for them. But we haven't continued to increase those payments to keep up with the inflation that is out there and they're becoming more and more deprived. And in your sector too there's a wage issue. What are you seeing in your sector? So wages in nursing, our hospital partners get, they get the highest wages. The long-term care sector, home care and primary care are getting five to ten dollars an hour less than the hospital equivalent.

So you know our nursing students are coming out of school with debt, they want to earn as much as possible so they are graduate being grabbed by the hospitals for that employment and we're seeing not as many people coming to the public to the primary setting. So it's hard to recruit. It's hard to retain people in those environments. But we do those people that are working in primary care are committed to it and really enjoy it. And we do what we can.

And Nicole, Foodbanks Mississauga recently had to lay off staff because of the amount of people needing food banks and they want to save the resources in order to serve their communities. Can you give us a better idea of who's using food banks right now? Yeah, it's actually amazing to hear that I echo this the sentiments that one of our primary areas is that folks that have income, that have employment, One of our primary areas is that folks that have income, that have employment, are also accessing food banks because the wages aren't keeping up with inflation. Another key area that we're seeing folks

would be a main reason that people are accessing is because they don't have access to affordable housing. And what they're telling us is that at the end of the month, if they're on ODSP, for example, they make $16,000 of the month, if they're made on ODSP for example, they make $16,000 in the year. It's basic math that adds up that $16,000 isn't enough for market rent and they have nothing left over or they're in deficit by the end of the month.

So I was speaking to a woman that was saying that she's in the place where she's feeling really ashamed and despairing that she can't even afford the two dollar pizza lunch at her son's school because at the end of the month rent is just eating it all up. So it's it's similar across the board. We're seeing more families also coming through. People that you would identify as being your neighbor. So across the board the cost of living is impacting everyone deeply. And now we know that Toronto, Mississauga, Kingston have declared food insecurity an emergency. Does that help change the needle to actually bring this issue to the forefront?

We really hope so. I hope that it's time for the governments or the next government to step up and take action and say this is an emergency that we know the solutions for. We know that between affordable housing, minimum wage being increased to being a livable wage, that we can actually start to push the needle and it's time for us to demand action in these areas. It is election day and I wanted to just get an idea from the three of you what election issues resonated with you. Yudit, can you start us off? Sure, so on the question of affordable housing, there has to be agreement about what the crisis is and that has to be a starting point because the housing crisis for, is not a crisis for everyone.

There is a lot of money being made in the housing sector. There's a huge ballooning in terms of the financialization of housing in this country. 25% of purpose-built rental units in Canada now are owned by landlords that are large real estate investment trusts, private equity firms, and their main purpose, their sole purpose really is to make money for investors. That is diametrically opposed to the idea of housing being a human right. And so as long as that isn't looked at directly, you know, what the crisis is and how to solve it will continue to be pushed

down the road. And there is no time for somebody surviving on social assistance, for somebody surviving on Ontario Disability Support Programme, but as we're hearing today, it's not just people living in deep poverty, it's also working Ontarians and all kinds of working Ontarians who are on the precipice of financial disaster. And that includes all kinds of workers. We're talking a lot around this election cycle, around protecting Canadian jobs and workers. There's a lot of discussion about that. Let's talk about what that means for workers in Ontario.

It means a livable wage. It means at least 10 paid sick days that are protected, that are legislated and employer paid. It means that temporary workers, people who are often newcomers, racialized workers, who are relying on temp agencies to kind of piece together an income, that they should be as protected as other kinds of workers and gig workers, you know, all people who are delivering food, people who are putting together incomes through app work through. We make our lives very easy on a day-to-day basis. Exactly. They're not protected in the same ways as other workers. Let's talk about what it actually means to protect workers and

you know, we're talking about so many of the hardships if I could just say though it's also a deep privilege to work in the community I do and to hear the stories I do and there's so much resilience and so much power and tenants and workers and social assistance recipients are collaborating learning about their rights and fighting back sometimes in desperate ways involving things like rent strikes which we're seeing across the province. And I do get the sense from the three of you that you care very much about the people that you work with, about the communities that you serve. Janet for you what election issue resonates with you? I think I have to say

the primary care issue. Two and a half million Ontarians do not have a primary care provider. A lot of people are relying on emergency departments but throughout the province we're seeing emergency departments being closed related to staffing issues. So if you live in a rural area and you don't have a family doctor or primary care provider, I should say, because we have nurse practitioners that also provide these services. If you live in a rural area and you don't have a provider and then your emerge is closed and then you're sick, where are you going? And we're seeing a lot of Ontario people that have moved over the last five years, moved from a

city to a more rural area and hanging on to the primary care provider that they have got but having been two, three hours away and not having that ease of access. So I think we need to look at primary care and not just focus on the physicians in them because we have partnerships. We have nurse practitioners, RNs, and MDs that all work in this area. And if we could focus on multi interdisciplinary kind of teams, nurse practitioner led clinics as well, then we could reduce that burden. And Nicole, I'll let you have the last minute and a half. So Ontario Food Banks have come together and we focus on four key priorities.

The first is to improve social assistance rates. The second would be to invest in affordable housing. The third is to build a stronger workforce. And the fourth is to actually invite people in with lived experience and poverty to join these conversations and co-create some of the solutions together. So just on topic for what we were talking about today, I think it all aligns. We can't, we're so grateful for first for all the work that you do for the communities

in Ontario and also for you making time to speak with us. Thank you so much for being here tonight. We appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for being here tonight. We appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for joining us on election night. We are going to turn it back to Steve, who is joined by Erin Kelly, CEO of Advanced Symbolics, to discuss what Polly was seeing leading up to tonight.

Over to you, Steve and Erin. Namshine, thank you to you and to your guests. Yes, indeed, Erin Kelly from Advanced Symbolics is here. And we've got to, I guess we've got to establish off the top here, the polls are still open. So there's a lot of stuff that you know right now but can't tell us, is that right? That's right, I'm Cassandra. So what are you not allowed to say right now by law? By law, I am not allowed to give you any projections on any of the seats.

For at least another half an hour? That's right. After nine o'clock, once the polls are closed, I'm going to to give you any projections on any of the seats. For at least another half an hour. That's right. After 9 o'clock, once the polls are closed, I'm going to have you back in this very spot, and then we're going to do a deeper dive on stuff. Perfect. OK. I cannot remember a writ period, and I

think this is the 12th provincial election that I've covered, where it felt like public opinion didn't move that much. That's my impression. You know the numbers. What's the case? You're right. Yeah. We saw very, very little movement in who people were

supporting and how they felt about the issues, despite relentless campaigning from the opposition parties. Is that strange? Because you point out relentless opposition. We have television commercials. We have online social media spots that are going all the time. We have candidates doing podcasts. The province was blanketed, and nothing seemed to move the needle.

How come? Exactly. And we had kind of a crisis going on too at the same time. You think? Yeah. But nothing moved that needle. Very little. I mean, I won't say it didn't move at all.

But really it was pretty static through the whole thing. And I think this is an election where people are not wanting change. That's kind of what we read. For sure. Do we know why? People are afraid of there's so much instability right now that the number one thing we're seeing over and over again is Experience, you know who has the experience to be able now people were actually open they were actually open to change part of the problem here is that the

Opposition parties did not bring forward a vision that people could get excited about or rally around. The people are saying this is more of the same. I don't believe things will change if I change my vote. This may be too granular to know, but is it that we don't like your vision any better than Doug Ford's or we understand what the problems are, but we're not sure you're any better to solve them than he is. It's the latter. It's basically people agree that healthcare is a problem. They want better access to medical care. People are disagreeing about what the solution is. Do you just put more doctors at it? Do you make better use of other

professionals? We talked about some of this during the campaign but nobody ever pivoted. It was just the same message even though people are saying I'm not so sure about that. That's very strange, Erin, I've got to say, because in any normal election where you've got a government that appears to be as vulnerable on issues of health and education as this one is, and you've got opposition parties who are banging

the drums on that issue, and yet the needle didn't move at all. Well, here's what was happening online. So, you know, Bonnie Crombie would say, you know, you're trying to privatize health care. But then people would say, oh, you're taking donors, you're taking money from private health care. So we're seeing all of these conversations go online. So people have a lot more information now than I think they did in the past, and they're sharing that information. It's probably being seeded as well. So we've had lots of conversations about that.

And I think the parties, like if you're going to come in and say, you're weak on this, you better make sure you're strong on that or you have some sort of really good answer or vision for the future that guarantees you're not going to have that. So a lot of people are saying that, for example, liberals were sounding like Doug Ford Light, that they weren't providing a vision that was substantially different.

Well, they were running on tax cuts. Yep, tax cuts, fiscal conservative. You know, people are also using Bonnie Cronby's history as mayor of Mississauga against her, saying she was against affordable housing and all these. And now she's saying that she's going to provide affordable housing. So she had people are saying her record wasn't different. So they weren't feeling that she's criticizing Doug Ford, but is her house that clean?

That's the things that we were hearing. It's one thing for the polls not to move, right? People maybe hear stuff, and they just are content with status quo, and so the polls don't move. But was there anything out there at all that you saw move a needle a little bit in terms of an issue? Yeah, so two things. So health care did move the needle a little bit.

So it ignited, it reminded people of how unhappy they are and that this is a provincial responsibility. So this is on Doug Ford's shoulders. Like I said, not enough of a different vision or plan to make people change their vote on that. Here's where there was a missed opportunity. Doug Ford said this was an election about tariffs. Nobody actually, and that he was the best person, nobody actually questioned if he was the best person.

And online we were seeing quite a few people say, I don't think he's the best person. But the opposition parties, you know, that was his strength more or less going in. Why not attack him on his, what he says are his strengths? Because it maybe wasn't a strength and I think that was missed. Did the early election call stick around as an issue at all? It didn't. People were very angry, but it didn't stick around. Engagement. There are lots of predictions out there tonight about this being perhaps the lowest voter turnout ever.

It was 44% last time. A lot of smart people that I listen to say it's going to be even worse this time. What was engagement like that you picked up? Well, here's what's interesting. I mean, people were engaged because there's a lot going on with the tariffs and all that. So we were seeing conversation.

It was up slightly. That doesn't mean we're going to see it at the ballots. People are feeling like if they don't feel there's a reason to change the government, they're not as likely to come out. And so people were talking about the issues. And I think had we had the opposition parties excited people a little bit more with a different vision, it would be different. But I think people are, or had the opposition parties, excited people a little bit more

with a different vision, it would be different. But I think people are going to stay home. Number one, a lot of people are on vacation, you know, that kind of thing. But there's also just a, well, I'm not excited enough about anybody to really come out. And I think that's a shame. 124 writings in the province of Ontario. You're going to have us take a look at three of them. Let's start with one that I suspect is of paramount interest to the good liberals of

this province. Yeah, exactly. So I like this one, Mississauga East. Bonnie Crombie doesn't have a seat right now at Queen's Park, so she's vying for the seat. This was traditionally a PC. It's a liens PC, but we don't have an incumbent PC person here, so we've got Sylvia Galterri, who is the mother-in-law of Patrick Brown, she comes from a well known conservative family. So it'll be interesting tonight to see does

Bronte Cromby get her seat as the Liberal leader. And I know from both camps tons of resources were poured into Mississauga East Cooksville today, liberals going to bat for Bronte Cromby. Patrick Brown and his organization, as you point out, going to bat for his mother-in-law. And the city of Brampton. Right on. We're actually seeing quite a few people online get involved who are from Brampton

talking to people in the saga. So it's interesting in this one. Let's go southwest. Next writing you wanted to take a look at, Windsor West. How come? Windsor, because Doug Ford said this was an election about tariffs. This is ground zero for the tariffs. So interesting for us. So the NDP is here, the Gretzky name. So how will that react? How will people react to that? I mean, she is holding the seat, but they won by a slim margin last time. So if this is about tariffs, will people decide, as Doug Ford thought, that he is the best

person to, or that his party is the best person to deal with tariffs and will it flip for Windsor? NDP caught a break in this writing. You see here there is no Liberal candidate. The Liberals had to drop out. Yes, that's right. That's the other thing. So that does not split the progressive vote

in this writing in a way that it will be in other writings in the province. Exactly. A break for the NDP. One more. Let's go back to the 905. How about Oshawa? What do you like there?

So in Oshawa, again, this is another one where it's a NDP writing, but it could switch. What I like here, well, here the liberal has been dropped off the ballot. You should put a big X over here, because he was forced to drop out. Exactly. So what's interesting here is that now that he's out,

do the votes go to the PCs or to the NDP? Where do those liberal votes go? Or is he even off the ballot? Will people mistakenly pick that name? That's a good point. He's on the ballot, I guess, right? Yeah. He's not running.

I don't know what happens in that case. I guess it's spoiled. The votes are spoiled. He's not there. Right. But for those who know, where will the votes get split? This is a big rematch, incidentally, from a couple of elections ago. Jerry Willett used to be the MPP from this area from 1995 until Jennifer French, a few elections ago, beat him.

So it's a grudge match. There we go. Don't go too far, because I'm going to come back here after 9 o'clock. And when you can give us numbers, we're going to see what happens then, OK? OK, perfect. Excellent.

OK, I'm coming back over here. And I'm going to talk to my pal, JMM, OK? OK, perfect. Excellent. OK, I'm coming back over here. And I'm going to talk to my pal, JMM, a little bit, my On Poly podcast co-host. Hi. Now, just as Aaron took us through a few writings there, you and I are going to go through a few writings that we're keeping a close eye on tonight.

And we want to start with, let's see, Sheldon, you want to bring up number 25, Eglinton-Lawrence? The reason that I want to take a look at this writing, never mind that it's just across the road from the studio here, you see a conservative candidate, a liberal candidate, a green candidate. Where's the new Democrat? There is no new Democrat candidate in this race.

To me, this is what makes it interesting. Because again, the progressive vote will not be split three ways. In fact, the Greens will likely get very little of the vote in this writing at all, which sets up one of the few writings in the province where you get a conservative versus liberal confrontation. The conservatives only won this writing,

Robin Martin winning it two and a half years ago? When was the last election? Two and a half years ago by 500 votes. So it was very close back then. This may be one of the writings where, because of the progressive vote not being split so many ways, the liberals have a decent shot of taking it away from the PCs if the Tory vote is not as strong as it needs to be.

What do you like? I will be looking at Perrystown and Muskoka, which is writing 84 on our list. This is riding where the Greens have poured in just a ton of time and money and effort to win a seat for Matt Richter. This is his, I believe, sixth attempt to win this seat. Is that right? Six attempts? He came very, very close in the 2022 election. Within about, I think, 2000 votes, Graydon Smith ended up prevailing in that election.

Former mayor in the area became a cabinet minister, is running again. And the Greens, I think, have consolidated the non-PC vote in that riding. But with the sheer numbers that the Tories are putting up, if the polls are correct, if it's going to be 45%, 46%, 47% for the Tories are putting up, if the polls are correct, you know, if it's going to be 45, 46, 47 percent for the Tories, it's just, it looks like that's going to be a really hard win for the Greens. Can you imagine poor Matt Richter last time getting 40 percent of the vote for the Greens and losing?

I mean, that's got to hurt. Yes, absolutely. We want to take a look at a bunch of independent writings across the province. And when I say independence, I mean because there is an independent candidate running, who's the former sitting member, but running again as an independent and what that does to the dynamic. Take us up north and west.

Right, so you mentioned Eglinton-Lawrence, where the progressive vote will not be split. We're going to talk first about Algoma Manitoulin, near the very top of the alphabet, where Michael Mantha is running again. He was a New Democrat who was expelled from the caucus. A workplace investigation found that he had behaved inappropriately to a staffer.

But he is running again. He said he was putting his political future in the hands of voters. There is also an NDP candidate. That is Mr. Timurisky, who is a 30-year veteran paramedic and firefighter. But we could see a split NDP vote. Could we then see the liberal candidate come up the middle?

He is an Anishinabeg Grand Council Chief, or former Grand Council Chief, Reg Neganove, who he might win. And frankly, the way the Tories have been doing, frankly, very well in the North in the last few elections, I wouldn't necessarily count the Tories out in this writing either. I want to put one more of these so-called independent story writings on the record here.

And that's in my hometown of Hamilton. Let's go to Hamilton Center. And one of the reasons that we're going to talk about this writing is because of this person. She is the former sitting member there. She is Sarah Jama, who had some fairly controversial things to say about Middle Eastern politics, which got her kicked out of the NDP caucus.

She still has a significant amount of support, we're told, in that writing. And as a result, she is running as an independent in Hamilton Center. There is, however, an NDP candidate there as well. Will the two of them split the social democratic vote, allowing one of the other parties, presumably the liberals, to come up the middle

and win that seat? That's something I'm going to be watching very much over the course of the evening. OK, we are just about to bring our expert array of panelists into our studio here. In fact, one of them is walking right through my shot as we speak. Well done, Kim. That's okay. I'm gonna put a question to you anyway tonight, Kim. Don't you worry, despite doing that. Anyway, just before we

do that, I wanted to throw it back out to Jayan Jagannathan, who's been talking to people during the course of this election campaign about the issues that matter most to them. Jayjay, take it away. One of the most important things for me is just affordability of like basic things like groceries and also like looking down the line being able to buy a house one day. Definitely cost of living for sure. Already groceries are so expensive and everything is getting more and more expensive. I moved out of a big city into rural Ontario. I won the lottery. I did find a family doctor. The biggest concern living downtown Hamilton is the homelessness and the mental health related to homelessness.

Hope is kind of a stretch when it comes to owning a home. I would just like to see some controls on the rents in the city. There was a promise to end hallway medicine and it has gotten worse instead of better. Before I found my living situation, it was almost impossible to find something affordable with both of our jobs and our income.

More care and more effort and more action put into working class people rather than using us as a blanket term and saying we're for the people. Health care, education, employment, those are the things that taxpayers in Ontario are concerned about. We are approximately 14 minutes away from most of the polls closing, and I want to welcome our esteemed panel of strategists who will be with us throughout the evening to analyze how the writings are faring. Please welcome Deb Hutton, conservative supporter and host for News Talk 1010, Kim Wright, NDP

supporter and founder and principal of Wright Strategies. Dan Moulton, liberal supporter and partner at Crestview Strategy. And Jackie De Silva, green supporter, political consultant and campaign manager. Good to have you all with us tonight as we approach the top of the hour. Yes indeed, fantastic to see you all again. I want to start with a very simple question to each of you off the top. Give me your best 30 seconds and then we'll do a deeper dive after that. We're going to go in order of precedence as they say. So the standings in the last house, that means you first Deb.

What was this election about? Donald Trump and a strong mandate for the premier to actually protect Ontario. Kim, what was this election about? Oh, crass politics at its worst. This was nothing short of, you know, Doug saw the polls, Dottie, you take a shot and hope that nobody showed up on election day in the snow. Dan? Well, I won't be partisan and I'll say it was a Seinfeld election. It wasn't about

very much. Well, Seinfeld was about nothing. Are you prepared to go that far? I'm prepared to say it was pretty much about nothing. I think most voters are showing up today with the question, do I want change? And I think we're going to see a result that probably says, meh, I don't really care. Jackie. I think it was about a little bit of cynical politics this time around.

Yeah, calling an election in February in an unprecedented economic situation. I think we're going to see a really low voter turnout today and some of our democracy on a bit of a lifeline. and some of our democracy on a bit of a lifeline. I think we want to follow that up with the writings that they're watching. Well, you know what? I want one more out of Deb.

All right. How much of the need to get out before Pierre Polyev does what he does federally was behind the reason we're having an election right now? There's no doubt. I think, that the Premier and his team, I'll say probably the team more than the Premier, was looking at that and deciding that it was important that if the Premier was to get another mandate,

probably wanted to do it while he was fighting a Liberal government in Ottawa. But I do think the whole world changed when Donald Trump got elected. I don't think anybody can deny that, whether it's January, February, March or April. We are a northern country that actually should be able to have elections 12 months of the year. And so I think it was important.

And I think the result we're going to see tonight would tell you that voters actually think it's important to go after the tariffs and to protect our jobs and our economy. People are worried out there Steve. Jackie the Greens are the climate party. Did the absence of climate change on the agenda affect your ability to move the needle? Well I think we've actually moved beyond just a one issue party. I think you can see in Mike Schreiner and his team, they were the first ones to have a fully costed platform

released. Actually, still are the only party to have a fully costed platform. And that has touched on more than just climate. So I think you'll see that that resonated with at least a couple of ridings tonight. As we did with Erin Kelly, we want each of you to pick a riding that you think is worth watching tonight

for any particular reason. Doesn't have to be because you think it's a sign of something apocalyptic. It could just be anything. And Deb, I'm going to ask you to start. You want to go south and west, I presume, eh? Well, I chose Haldeman Norfolk, not because I think it has anything to do with the conservatives

being re-elected with a bigger majority tonight, which is my prediction, but it's an interesting one because the incumbent MPP was actually a former staffer to the previous MPP and had wanted to seek the conservative nomination and the party went in a different direction and they chose last time out in 2022, a mayor from Haldeman. And the independent running as an independent beat that mayor. out in 2022 a mayor from Haldeman. And the independent, running as an independent, beat that mayor. Which never happens.

Which never happens. She's going for it again tonight. And the Conservatives have chosen the mayor of Norfolk. So the other half of the county are of the riding. And so I think it will be very interesting to have an incumbent who ran the first time as an incumbent, not a Sarah Jama situation, and see whether she gets elected. Bobbi Anne Brady. She ran and won as an independent and she is trying it again tonight. Against another mayor.

Against another mayor. So it'll be interesting. Well I think it's an interesting point too as well as to how much lingering anger there is about the pandemic. Because I think her election had a lot to do with parts of this province that were pretty angry about this government's public health restrictions during the pandemic very upset about vaccine mandates and you know I grew up in Oxford County right next door a lot of people not part of the province very angry about that I think it's a question didn't come up in this election very much didn't come up as a splinter issue for conservatives

like it did in 22 it'll be interesting to see how much lingering anger there is can I ask a trivia question at the table here? Who was the liberal candidate in Oxford in 2014? Oh, he happens to be at the table, and boy is it exciting. I mean, look. I mean, candidates are really generous term. I was a sacrificial lamb. But you had your name on the ballot, and good for you.

I know, long signs and everything. There you go. Kim, you picked Sault Ste. Marie. Why? I did. I am excited picked Sault Ste. Marie. Why? I did. I am excited about Sault Ste. Marie.

So Sault Ste. Marie is currently an open seat because the former Tory cabinet minister Ross Romano has decided not to run again. Longtime viewers of TVO and folks around this panel know it also used to be a New Democrat seat under with Tony Martin being the long time NDP MPP. Our candidate there is a local city counselor. She has been running a really fascinating campaign that has included things like getting the Jumbotron at the Sue Greyhounds OHL game, right?

Like where people are at, what are politics where people are at? A heck of a good campaign or heck of a good debater really will be an amazing addition to the caucus. I would just like to add a follow-up for Deb. A lot of grumbling in this race that the Taurus were not able to find a candidate with local roots in Sault Ste. Marie. Why do you think the party struggled there? I don't think it was a struggle. I think the contender there for the conservatives knows the writing quite well, despite the fact that didn't grow up there.

And I think, listen, when you, when you see all of the pictures of Doug Ford throughout this campaign, what do you see? You see them with workers and you look at the steel town of Sioux and you say, those are workers that care a lot about their jobs, care a lot about Trump tariffs. And so I think it will be an interesting race. I agree with Kim because I think it's clearly between the New Democrats and the conservatives for very different reasons.

It's why you saw Mauret Stiles early on in the campaign up there several times in the campaign but also with the workers and the steel workers up at Algoma Steel. Viewers will also remember that during the Ray government it was them saving part of Algoma Steel. Viewers will also remember that during the Ray government, it was them saving part of Algoma Steel. And these are things that continue to be remembered. One of the things that's really been interesting the last couple of elections, where people think that, some of that labor shifts,

a lot of that came out of the Liberal Party. Those were those working family coalitions, the Carpenters, Liuna, the Firefighters, who actually used to provide the ground game for the Liberal Party. And not having that essentially since the McGinty years is why you've seen the Liberal Party out in the wilderness. Because it's one thing to run a Twitter campaign, but it's a very different thing on a snowy day in February to get those people into the ballot box. You've also seen all of those unions line up behind the premier too. Oh there's been quite a few that have lined up behind Marge Stiles and the NDP.

So you know. I think it's fair to say there's a bit of a split. A lot of the private sector builder, carpenter, electrical worker type unions have lined up behind the PCs. The public sector unions, of course, still can't stand the PCs and they're with the NDP. And the last time I checked the steelworkers were very much in that private sector union and have been foundational and out there campaigning alongside Mars Delos as has been the entire Ontario Federation of Labour. So I think there are certainly things that everyone needs to look at, but that shift

from that working families coalition leadership and those arms and legs campaigns, that is a different tale. And I was joking with a friend of mine today that it was so hard to find some liberal campaigners in some writings, it was like trying to find Pokeroo. So it's... Missed him again. Missed him again. Dan, let's get your writing here.

Ottawa Centre is what you wanted to take a look at. How come? Well, I think it's a really interesting writing to watch early on in the night because for me it's if liberals are doing decently well there, not even needing to win it. I mean it's probably 31 of 31 seats for us to take. But if we're doing well there, it's a really bad night for the New Democrats. I mean, they've got a really strong candidate there,

so I think they'll probably end up taking it based on the public opinion polling we had going into tonight. But if the Liberals are doing well, if it's a close race there, it's a really interesting one to watch early on, because it means it's going to be a bad night for the New Democrats in downtown Toronto.

It's going to be a bad night for the Democrats in downtown Toronto it's gonna be a bad night for them in pretty much every part of Ontario and so yeah I think it's a really interesting race in that regard. This is also a candidate, the Liberal candidate in Ottawa Centre that had tweets that said things like consent is not sexy. Those are pretty horrific things that I would have thought that the Liberal Party would have tried to walk away from a candidate that didn't believe in things like consent. Kim, the polls close very soon. I'm not sure how partisan we need to be tonight. I think that viewers of this program are pretty educated and are more interested in commentary that's at a higher level than that.

But it is a legitimate question and we've seen this in several writings that there were some pretty horrific things that had been posted and things that had been said recently as well. And those are concerning. And those are concerns we were hearing on the doorsteps in Ottawa Center and in other places. Honestly, Kim, as someone who grew up with a generation that were given these social media tools when they were pretty young, I don't think that we should be holding kids

when they were in high school to account for the things that they were posting when they were kind of dumb and young. And I think people out there are kind of sick of the cancel culture that you're advocating, right? Let's just put on the record here, Katherine McKenney is the candidate for the NDP. An extraordinary candidate. People will potentially remember their name. They ran against Mark Sutcliffe, lost for mayor. I did an interview with Katherine McKenney during the course of the campaign. They said, never thought I'd run again, not a party person. She liked, excuse me, they liked what they saw in Marat Stiles.

Decided to put their name on the ballot, and that is why they are running for the NDP there after all. Jackie, let's get to your writing. You wanted, I'm not particularly surprised at the one you wanted to keep an eye on. Tell us why. Kitchener Center, yeah. So for a young party, we've picked up a second seat

in 2023 in the by-election just 15 months ago. So Ash and Clancy trying to defend that, get elected in a general election. And so it'll be interesting to see what happens there tonight, hopefully, as much of a large margin that she received in the by-election. But we'll see in the general, and it's anyone's game.

She got almost half the votes in the by-election. But of course, that was with Greens from all over Canada descending on Kitchener Center and helping out. Right? It was an all hands on deck. The Greens are running in 124 writings right now. That's right. Not only that, there are a couple of nearby writings

where Green candidates have actually told green supporters, please vote NDP. The greens can't win. And I know the Clancy campaign is nervous about that. What do you think the impact of that could be there? Yeah, I think that Waterloo region as a whole, they are very independent. So if you're from Kitchener, you're from Kitchener.

From Waterloo, you're from Waterloo. So I actually think that it won't have as much of an impact on Ashlyn's riding. And that's also a great demonstration of green politics. We encourage our members to vote independently. And so for those two ridings, those candidates felt that that was the best course of action

for their community. And so they're free to do that. And so for Ashlyn, I mean, she's been working her butt off. Like, three months after getting her constituency office, she was already knocking on doors again. So she definitely has not taken the seat for granted. And I think the team there is really strong and has been working since November 2023 to get her re-elected.

I did an interview with her when she was on the hustings as well, and she said, I got 10, 15 minutes max. I got to get back out there and knock on doors. So it was a shorter conversation than I thought we might have. JMM. Dan, on the issue of candidates and tweets, the liberals had a few cases in this election where they had to explain candidates a little bit that way.

I'm just wondering if you think the position that the liberals went into this election in, were they prepared to do the kind of candidate vetting that you have to do in a modern campaign? Well, I mean, the election wasn't meant to have been held for a year and a half from now. So every party, except for the conservatives, frankly, were, I think, rushing to find candidates

to feel the full field of candidates, 124 ridings. And that obviously leads to some errors. But I do think we're starting to move to a point, and we should be moving to a point, where when people are young and they're stupid and they're posting dumb stuff on the internet, we don't need to trot it out and try and cancel candidates across the province.

I think we want to move past that politics. I think people are getting kind of sick of it. There were some cases where it was more recent, and people were held to account for that. Campaigns were suspended. And I think that decision was- Something about the prime minister in 2022 or whatever it was.

Right, yeah. There was more recent comments. And I think that it was dealt with in the way that it needed to be. But I mean, the reality of a rushed election like this that was held in a snap is that you are going to have to rush vet at some candidates. And it makes it kind of difficult, particularly when

you're strapped for resources. And frankly, I think we can acknowledge the liberals have been. Now that the polls have closed, we're going to say not goodbye, but see you soon to our panelists as they head back to the green room. And we walk over to Aaron Kelly. Steve will give us an idea of what Pauli was seeing.

And I'm going to talk to Aaron Kelly in just a second. But first, let's reset things here. It is 9 o'clock Eastern time. And we say good evening everybody. On behalf of John Michael McGrath, I'm Steve Pagan. With a very few exceptions, the polls are now closed and Ontario's 44th general election results are soon going to be coming in. A few notes on tonight's proceedings.

Whether you are watching us over the air or streaming us on tvo.org, or on X, or on our YouTube channel, which is youtube.com forward slash the agenda. You can get us all over the place. We are going to be here on the air until the final speech of the evening is over. We'll bring you returns from all 124 ridings with special guests and analysis as long as my throat holds out. That hockey game, I'm telling you, it was just the end of me and I haven't recovered since. Now, we can see up on the screen right now

how we're gonna be bringing you all the returns during the course of the evening. At the bottom of the screen, riding by riding, riding by riding, the top four vote-getting candidates you will see in order. In some of these writings, we expect it, obviously, in the vast majority of writings, to be conservatives and Democrats, liberals and greens.

There will be a few writings, as we've just indicated, where you will see just gray. It will be an independent candidate who may be among the top four. We're certainly going to be looking for that tonight. And then along the side there, we're going to have the party standings as we go towards whatever the call ends up being tonight. You folks along the side there, we're going to have the party standings as we go towards

whatever the call ends up being tonight. You folks know what the polls have been saying. And certainly, we are going to be counting down to whatever the winner looks like over the course of the evening. At the moment, leading and elected are the liberals in three, new Democrats in three, progressive conservatives in two, and the Greens in one.

You need 63. The magic number is 63 seats for a majority government. Doug Ford, as you know, has won two consecutive majority governments going into tonight's 44th general election. He's looking for the three Pete tonight, folks, and we'll see whether he does it. OK, can I go talk to Aaron? Let me do that.

Guys, we'll see you later. And here's Erin Kelly. Now that it's 9 o'clock, you are able to say more. So let us do that. Let's start with this. Paulie's been doing a lot of surveying. Your artificial intelligence polling entity has been doing a lot of polling since this election began.

Anything at all surprised Paulauley during the course of the campaign? I don't think so. I don't know if it surprised Pauley. No, I don't think so. It was pretty, this was not, we didn't have any major change, any big pivots, any scandals that really took hold. No, it was pretty steady.

This was an election where unless I missed the mark almost nothing seems to have moved the needle. Is that right? That's right. Yeah. Do you want to I guess you're allowed to now. Pauley has been doing seat projections based on the total vote. Why don't we bring those up right now? Sounds good. Let's see what we got. Take us through it. So PC majority government, we see at the minimum they're going to get a majority. Where the big race is going to be tonight is here. This is a statistical tie between the liberals

and the NDP. We have the liberals slightly ahead because we see them ahead in the popular vote. But the NDP has better vote efficiency, just like in the last election. So this really is a statistical tie, with the median being 17-15, but with a wider spread for the liberals.

So tonight is going to be that important night to see if Bonnie Cromby can break through to official opposition. The Greens, we have them getting a minimum of one, but up to three. So they're running in 124 writings. We see them potentially getting three tonight. That is a fairly wide swath, right? Yeah. Pauli is saying there's a 40 seat minimum versus maximum, which feels like a lot.

Why is it such a broad gap there? So we have some ridings where it's close. We have, and it's a statistical tie. So we don't know. And one of the compounding factors is that low voter turnout that we're anticipating. Because like I said, we have more people talking online this year than we did in the last election. But the fact that there's no excitement tells us historically that when there's little excitement, there's little turnout fact that there's no excitement tells us historically that

when there's little excitement there's little turnout at the polls but we don't know who's going to turn out and who's not right it's snowed today and you know there's all sorts of factors so we don't know how those writings will turn out what does it tell us that the big suspense of the night is who comes second what it tells us that neither one of these two candidates really broke out. Crombie or Stiles. That's right. You know, Stiles has better vote efficiency, but the popularity is not there.

She didn't get herself known. And Bonnie Crombie is failing to get out of those major writings. If you like Bonnie Crombie, you like her a lot. Unfortunately we're not spreading that love around. So she needs to, you know, get out into the rural areas, get that lift if she wants to break through. Paulie has her eye on three tight races in particular, at least what she thinks will be. Why don't you take us through those starting just across the road from us? So this one is, I put it in here, it might not be a tight race.

It's an interesting race because the NDP candidate dropped out in order. This is strategic voting on steroids in a way, when the candidate decides that you should do strategic voting. Not a big fan of strategic voting myself, but you know, this will those as the candidate had hoped will those votes go to boost up the liberals because the candidate felt that putting those NDP votes to the liberals will help them beat the PCs. Remind everybody you don't see a new Democratic candidate here because she dropped out just before the deadline. Yes, right on the razor's edge. So the NDP could not replace her. So there is no new Democrat option in this writing. Yes. Right on the razor's edge. So the NDP could not replace her.

So there is no new Democrat option in this riding. Exactly. So the liberals, if they don't win, the reason I put in here, if they don't win this, it's a really bad signal for the night. Right? And they win because people, a lot of people are strategic voting. We can mention that. Maybe we'll talk about that later.

But if this strategic vote did not work, it's so I think the liberals will be probably watching this writing very closely. Pauli also is interested in Niagara Falls. How come? Yeah, in Niagara Falls, it's so the PCs are sort of perpetually in second place here. So if the PCs, if they're, you know, we're seeing a surge for Doug Ford, because they've been perpetually in second place, the, all the votes are

changing now, will this be, if they're going to break through an election, it probably should be in this one. So will they be able to unseat the NDP? Right. Wayne Gates has been the former sitting member there for a few elections now. The conservatives don't have all the seats in the Niagara Peninsula, but they want them all. And this is one of the seats they had their eye on, despite the fact that't have all the seats in the Niagara Peninsula, but they want

them all. And this is one of the seats they had their eye on, despite the fact that Wayne Gates has the best mustache at Queen's Park. The last riding that Polly has her eyes on, University of Rosedale in downtown Toronto, how come? Again, this is one where if the liberals are going to see how close we are, if the liberals are going to have a good night, because it's a statistical tie between the NDP and the liberals, I'll be watching this writing to see because Bonnie Cromby does, she is doing well in urban centers,

can she, if she does well tonight in this writing, it indicates that, you know, maybe she's pulling ahead in that statistical tie. If she doesn't, so this is a riding to watch. Only 3% of the polls reporting right now. Jessica Bell, the former sitting member, multi-term for the NDP. Yeah, she's got two elections under her belt already and looking for a third straight victory tonight.

OK, Erin, thanks a lot for this. We'll check in with you as the evening goes on, OK? Great. Thanks, Steve. Thank you. Erin Kelly, Advanced Symbolics Inc. Let's come back over to the table here. Hey, partner a lot for this. We'll check in with you as the evening goes on, OK? Great. Thanks, Steve. Thank you. Erin Kelly, Advanced Symbolics Inc. Let's come back over to the table here. Hey, partner. Hello, sir.

How's it going? Good, good. Just seeing that voting has been extended in, I believe, nine polls. I imagine some of that is weather related, both in places like downtown Toronto and also in some writings like Algoma Manitoulin. OK, we had Dan Bolton tell us that Ottawa Center was

one of the writings he was keeping an eye on. So why don't we bring that one up and just see what's happening there. This is a writing that the NDP had held in the previous house. The former sitting member had decided not to run for re-election. He instead will run for parliament. And as a result, there are all fresh slate

of candidates in this riding. Catherine McKenney is off to an early and very strong lead. Only 14% of the polls reporting there. But this is a riding that, for the last 50 years, has gone back and forth between liberals and new Democrats. And the NDP certainly looks like they're going to prevail tonight. Yeah, absolutely.

There are other writings where the NDP candidates have opted to run federally. I don't know if we can bring up Parkdale High Park, if we have anything from there. But that was a writing where the NDP MPP, Petit Le Carpoche, opted to run federally. And then also Hamilton Mountain, where Monique Taylor also opted to run. There's your Parkdale High Park.

Right. We've got no returns in just yet. But yeah, clearly this is, again, a fresh slate of candidates. And Alexi, you're going to get it. Although Magic Herrera did run in 2018, if I remember correctly. So not entirely unknown there.

Look, we want to keep an eye on that right-hand column, because admittedly, these are numbers based on only a very small percentage of the polls reporting. But we said 63 is the magic number for a majority government, and the conservatives are already leading in 77 writings. So that's a majority government already right there.

Obviously, not prepared to call it just yet, because it is. Only 10 minutes after 9. I thought we had a few more. I think we can wait for a few more percentage points of votes to come in before this thing gets called. The reality is the numbers, as they are unfolding right now, will not come as a surprise to anybody. What is interesting is the race for second and third.

And it looks like if this pattern were to hold up tonight, two important notes, the New Democrats would still be the official opposition, which they desperately wanted. And the liberals have official party status for the first time in three elections. Right. And if this pattern were to hold, let's say that Bonnie Crombie does not

win her seat in Mississauga East Cooksville. With 15 MPPs, you've got room for somebody to give up their seat for the leader. And Bonnie Crombie might not win a seat in the House tonight, but she could still join the legislature in a month or two. Here's what Bonnie Crombie would love to see in her own writing. But Marat Stiles is going to show you how you get it done in her own writing.

This is the writing of Davenportport where Stiles, our decision desk, has declared elected. Marit Stiles will hold that seat now for a third consecutive election. There's never been any difficulty with her holding that seat in downtown Toronto. The question is, how many more across the province would she get?

She started the night with 29, I believe. That's right, yes. At 22 right now. Guys, I wonder if we can, let's just follow up on a few of the others that we talked about earlier. Sheldon, can I get 36, Hamilton Center? This is the writing where Sarah Jama, the former sitting member, is running again

as an independent, and we did wonder whether or not she might split the social democratic vote. Robin Lennox is the NDP candidate, and she very much hopes to carry that riding. And at the moment, well, this often happens, I have to say, when an independent, and admittedly, this is early. I'm not sure what percentage of the polls reporting so far,

but Sarah Jama may have overestimated her ability as an independent candidate to hold that seat. At the moment Sarah Jammer running in fourth place in Hamilton Centre and the strength of the get-out-to-vote for the NDP looks like it will prevail in Hamilton Centre. And we saw just at the bottom of the screen there Stephanie Bowman looks like she has carried Don Valley West. So she was one of the candidates that was recruited. If the liberals were to inform government tonight, she was on the fast track to be a cabinet minister.

At the very least, her voice will continue to be in the Liberal caucus. Sheldon, can I have 37, please? Hamilton East, Stony Creek. I'm keeping my eye on this one because cabinet minister Neil Lumsden, this is his seat. And because of the way the votes split last time, he barely won.

I mean, he got not even 35% of the vote 2 and 1 half years ago, but it looks like he's going to have a much easier time holding the seat tonight with just over a third of the votes reporting so far. Lumsden in a really strong lead at the moment, considering conservatives have never traditionally done well in that riding. But it looks like Lumsden is going to go back to Queens Park. He was the culture tourism sport minister, yes, in the last house. So well, still holds the portfolio right now, but there is that. Let's go up

North Sheldon. Can I please get number 92, Sault Ste. Marie. This is a riding that we were most interested in because the Tories were parachuting a candidate in from Sudbury and yet it does not seem to have affected them yet. Now this one's way too close to call so far, JMM, but look how strong the conservatives are doing despite the fact their candidate isn't from there. Right, the other one that I would love to see if we can bring it up is Sudbury where I know the Premier talked about challenging Jamie West there the former sitting New Democrat the Tories have obviously made a lot of inroads with Labour they would love to take Sudbury from the NDP but

here's where I jump in and say it is 914 Eastern Time. And based on the returns we have seen so far, we've seen enough. We are prepared at this moment to declare Doug Ford three Peets tonight. The progressive conservatives will win a third consecutive majority government, yet to be determined is the size of that majority government. We heard at the beginning of the evening some predictions.

Pauli was doing her own predictions that the conservative majority tonight could be as high as 100 seats, even 105 seats. We are a long way from that right now. At the moment, and admittedly, this is only a very small percentage of the polls reporting so far, the conservatives only have 75 seats. I say only.

Look at a majority is a majority is a majority. But at the moment, the seat count is a long way from what people thought. Mind you, lots of seats still out there to hear from. So we'll see how things go over the course of the evening. Let's not lose the forest for the trees here. Doug Ford is the first premier in 66 years to win back to back to back majority governments. That's a hell of an historic achievement. You know, I think it's fair to say at this point that Doug Ford is really going to be

the most, one of the most consequential premiers certainly of my lifetime. That list would include people like Mike Harris. I was a bit young for Bill Davis, but I did live through the last few years of the Davis Premiership. But yeah, Doug Ford, three elections, lived through, you know, he governed through COVID. He has had the opportunity to reshape a lot of things about this province, and now he's going to have four more years to continue reshaping policies and things in this province. Now that we know who's going to win, we really want to do a deep dive on some of the more consequential races individually in the ridings.

There isn't a bigger one across the province of Ontario tonight than the one we're about to show you right now. In Mississauga, East Cooksville, the leader of the Liberal Party is fighting for her political life tonight. I spoke to people in the Liberal campaign this morning, and the Conservative campaign for that matter. They all acknowledged it was a 50-50 race, and they were not sure how it was going to turn out.

Let's keep in mind there are 34% of the polls reporting so far. It is way too early to call this seat, but let's simply say this was really battleground number one in the province of Ontario tonight, you had so many liberals, no doubt, taking resources away from other writings in the hopes that they could get their leader elected in Mississauga, East Cooksville.

But the strength of the Ford brand in the 905, particularly Halton, Peel, and York, is clearly helping Gaultieri, the candidate for the Conservatives, who, as we know, happens to be the mother-in-law of the mayor of Brampton. clearly helping Gaultieri, the candidate for the Conservatives, who as we know happens to be the mother-in-law of the mayor of Brampton. If that seat holds out, well, let's not speculate yet. There's Mike Schreiner.

He's the leader of the Green Party of Ontario. He is watching the returns coming in from Guelph, surrounded by his family, a wife and two daughters. You know, you could say not a lot of nice things have come up from the United States to Canada lately, starting with threats from Donald Trump to annex us, but one of the nicer exports the Americans have sent our way is this guy. He's from the state of Kansas originally, moved to Canada for love. And it looks like he will, I see two green seats on the board right now.

Surely Guelph is one of them. I suspect Kitchener Center is the other one. Mike Schreiner is widely perceived to be one of the not only most respected, but kind of good guys at Queens Park. Yeah, I mean, I think you and I have all sorts of people we get along with from all of the different parties in the legislature.

But Mike Schreiner really one of those people who it's really hard to find anybody who has a crossword to say about him. Sheldon, can I go to 111, please? TVO is in the writing of Toronto St. Paul's. And this writing was important to keep an eye on because it would really be an indication of liberal fortunes across the province. Jill Andrew was thought to be vulnerable. She's the New Democrat, former sitting member member has won the area twice in a row, but by small margins both times, only 1,200 votes or so,

in a riding where 50,000 people, 60,000, 70,000 people are going to vote. So the liberals put a star candidate in former CP24, breaking desk anchor Stephanie Smyth. And the new Democrats were right to be concerned about holding this seat. Smyth looks well on her way to taking this seat, rather, for the liberals, with half the votes counted.

And it's too early to call this seat because St. Paul's is a funny riding. There are pockets of it that are incredibly wealthy. There are other pockets of it which are very low income. Half the people who live here are tenants, and we just don't know where all of those votes have come from yet. The progressive conservatives, even though they just want to buy election here federally, are really not

a factor provincially. This has always been a two-horse race, as long as it's been the current boundaries of St. Paul's, which goes back 25 years. So this was a two-horse race from the get-go. One the liberals really hoped to make a breakthrough in, and it looks like that's happening. Yeah, I mean, this was a riding that they had held for such a long time

before Andrews won in the 2018 election, where, of course, liberals fell all over the province. I mean, this was one of those ridings where it was really shocking to see a liberal go down to defeat, even as bad as the liberal members were that year. And then Andrews held the riding in the 2022 election. But if those numbers hold up, it looks like her luck may have run out. You want to see how the Greens are doing in Perry, San Muskoka? Sure.

Let's take a look. Here's Matt Richter running for the ho. Can you believe how close this is? This is what, his sixth or seventh time running? Yes, seventh. or seventh time running? Yes, seventh, yeah. Seventh time running. He got 40% of the vote last time, but lost to Graydon Smith. Graydon Smith is now a cabinet minister.

And when you look at the margin of difference between the two of them there, Deb Hutton's joining us on the set right now. Deb, I just want your comment for starters on what's going on in Perry Sound, Muskoka. That is one of the safest progressive conservative seats in the whole province. And a cabinet minister has a 100 vote lead,

with a third of the votes reporting on the Green Party candidate there. What are you seeing? Well, I mean, the Greens put most of their resources into three places. And this was the third. It was a very tight race last time out. So I'm not, I'm disappointed.

But we'll see as the rest of the polls come in but not really really surprised. If the Greens were going to pick up anywhere it would be in Perry, San Francisco. I want to Sheldon if I can have number six come up. This is Bay of Quinty and again while we're checking very safe Tory seats or at least what we thought were very safe Tory seats this is another one. The Bay of Quinty is thought to be a very safe Tory seat. This is another one. The Bay of Quinty is thought to be a very safe Tory seat. Todd Smith used to hold it for the Progressive Conservatives. He left.

They had a by-election. The Conservatives won the by-election, but by that much. So I'm very curious tonight to see whether or not they are going to be able to hold that seat and by how much. And here we go. Well, Deb, that's got to give you some comfort. I would think so. David O'Neill, for those who have been around politics

for a very long time, is former cabinet minister for the Liberal government, longtime MPP Hugh O'Neill's son. And in some of these rural ridings, name rec like that lasts a very long time. So it could have been tighter. We'll see what we got. 51% of the polls reporting in. But that looks pretty solid for Tyler Alsop.

Can I as well, Sheldon, can I get you to go to 25? Eglinton-Lawrence, this was a riding that, again, the conservatives have won several elections in a row. But the last time by only 500 votes, it was very tight. Deb, what do you see in those numbers there? I see a lot of excitement in those numbers there, Steve. It's tight.

It's an 1,100 vote margin with almost half the polls reporting. Almost half. Yeah. Michelle Cooper, longtime conservative stalwart, Vince Gasparro, has been a liberal operative in the back rooms. If you had put me on the spot, I would have said it would go liberal. So I'm very happy to see that result tonight. That's the writing I lived in for many years. We just moved across the street, but it, that's good news for the conservatives.

And do you think it would have gone liberal because of the absence of a new Democrat candidate there? That was really why. And of course, because the conservatives don't have an incumbent there, Robin Martin decided to retire. And so the combination of those two things, I would have actually put money on it being a liberal seat tonight. So we'll still see.

But that is great news. That's a 1,000 vote gap at that many polls reporting in is pretty solid. Let's go, Sheldon, to number 77. We want to see Oshawa. Oshawa is a big rematch tonight. Oh, this is, excuse me. This is Haldeman Norfolk.

This is the writing. This is the one I said to watch. Yes, indeed. And looks like it's all over. You know what? When is your premier or your organization gonna stop telling the people of Haldeman Norfolk who to vote for and just make peace with Bobbi Ann Brady?

She's a juggernaut in that writing. Appears to be. That's almost, what, three to one? Yeah. Getting pretty close to that. So as I said, it was an interesting one for me because there's no doubt that an incumbent running as an incumbent, not once, but twice winning is pretty phenomenal. The other, sorry, independent, I didn't mean incumbent. The other independent is Sarah Jammond.

It looks like she's not doing particularly well tonight. Fourth place last week. Good news for the new Democrats. Let's go to number 77 if we can now, because this is Oshawa. And I know Oshawa set up one of the great rematches that is happening tonight between Jennifer French, who is the former sitting member, and Jerry Willett, who held the seat when Deb Hutton was running things

at Queens Park as a member of the Common Sense Revolution team. Deb, that's pretty close but it looks like Jerry may come up a bit short tonight. 78% of the polls reporting doesn't look like it's in the cards. 1,500 votes is pretty significant so won't count it over until it's over obviously tonight but I thought we might be able to take that from Jerry. Again, good news for the new Democrats. And it looks like they are rapidly retaining

their official opposition status. I want to bring up, if I can, something John Michael mentioned a little while ago, Sheldon, 103. Sudbury. Sudbury hasn't been conservative in 40 years. And I know the Premier works hard in northern Ontario and really thought he had a shot at bringing it in house. It looks like he's going to come up about 1,700 votes short so far.

This is not even half the polls reporting yet. But Deb, I got to hand it to the Tory. He's running a very competitive race there tonight. Absolutely. Again, about 1,500 votes, a little bit more. It's good news. The Premier spent a lot of time in Northern Ontario. And one of the reasons

for that is he believes fundamentally that because of their resources and because of the shift that we were starting down the path of in terms of making sure we are using our own natural resources, particularly in EV development and other things, and as well now with Trump tariffs or the potential for Trump tariffs, that becomes even more important. And so I think that's why the North has been so important to the Premier and I think that's why you're seeing some results that you are tonight. Great. Let's bring up one more here.

We'll get Deb to comment on one more and that is the return so far in Sault Ste. Marie. Again, another seat that the Premier had hoped to keep in-house despite the fact the NDP are running a really popular local city councillor, Lise Vizot Allen, against Chris Scott. Look how tight this one is. What's the difference there? 73% polls reporting in.

That's not even 100 votes. It's not. About 90 votes. This one's going to the wire. We will watch that one. But again, evidence of the Premier's popularity, his party platform popularity, his approach to protecting Ontario in Northern Ontario.

Great results for the Conservatives so far tonight. We should actually, since we haven't had a chance to yet, get you to comment on the fact that this is a three-peat tonight for Doug Ford. Amazing. If I had sat here seven and a half years ago before he had won his first election, and said to you, Deb, do you think Doug Ford's got a chance to win three majorities in a row, given that he's a bull who brings his own China shop with him wherever he goes? What would you put the odds on that of happening?

I would have said it was highly unlikely, largely because, I mean, a three-peat for anyone is pretty uncommon these days in politics. he's done it he's done it entirely of his own style his own like he is so authentic and I think people see that whether they like it or not they see it and sort of what you see is what you get okay and if we'd said in the fall of 2018 that Patrick Brown and Doug Ford would be conspiring to defeat Bonnie Cromby. To work together. I mean, it would sound like fan fiction. But John, I mean, you also raise a good point.

Keep in mind, this is a premier who started just before an election with weeks to go, way back in 2018, because of the challenges our party had. This isn't just an amazing result for any premier. But given the sort of short runway he had to start, it is really quite phenomenal. Deb, we're going to let you go get your coffee refreshed. Tina, when you're out there, could you

please ask our liberal and New Democrat representatives together to come in? We'd like to have the both of them come in. And thanks, Deb Hutton, for those updates. We'll see you a little bit later as well. Have we got Hamilton Mountain standing by? Because Hamilton Mountain was one of those seats, yes, where there was no former sitting member.

The previous member, Minick Taylor, had decided to hang him up. This one is a bit of a shocker. Wow. This is the progressive conservatives taking a seat away from the New Democrats, which happened eight times in the last election, JMM. Looks like it's in the process of happening in Hamilton

Mountain, although two-thirds of the polls reporting, too soon to call it. But a 1,500 vote lead there at this stage of the game is awfully impressive for the PCs. Right, and with the NDP currently in third place, I mean, that just goes to show you the power of incumbency, of name recognition, of having that relationship with the community.

The New Democrat candidate maybe doesn't end up in third place exactly, but clearly struggling to make the same kind of impact that Monique Taylor did. OK, let's bring up Kitchener Center while we're at it. We assume Ashlyn Clancy is leading, because we see two Greens up there. And in fact, she is and has won. And you've got to say, what happened last time, where

she took almost 50% of the vote, looks like it's about to happen this time as well. She's got a two to one vote margin lead over her progressive conservative opponent. So the Greens make history tonight by winning their second general election seat, Mike Schreiner being the first, Ashland Clancy the second. OK, let's bring our two friends back here from the New

Democratic Party, Kim Wright. And there's Dan Moulton from the Liberals. And we want to show you guys a bunch of seats here and then get you to comment on them. And I think the first one, Sheldon, the first one I would like to take a look at is, let's take a look at Sudbury, 103 if we could. I know we just took a look at it,

but I want these two to have a chance to comment on it. Sudbury is a seat the Tories have not won in 40 years. It is almost always a liberal, New Democrat standoff. What's going on there tonight? Kim? Well, it looks like Jamie West, who has done a lot of really great on the ground, neighborhood by neighborhood, community by community,

building in Sudbury, incredibly personable inside Queens Park and up in the riding. He has an adorable dog, for those who find him on social media. This is one of those ones where we're seeing where the Premier and the New Democrat, those blue orange ridings, those blue orange seats that we've continued to talk about,

that Mara has talked about throughout the course of this campaign. This has been one of those. Similarly, what we saw where the Premier decided to take a shot at Timmons' last election, really marshaling resources into Sudbury, into a couple of places. But this is what I don't get. Dan, this was a liberal seat for four straight elections.

There's virtually no liberal vote there tonight at all. What's happened? I think northern Ontario is going to be a very difficult region of the province for liberals tonight, and certainly an area that liberals have been struggling in the last three elections, frankly. I mean, Bonnie Crombie has great name recognition in the GTA, not so great name recognition in North. And I think she spent a fair amount of time there in this election.

But if you look at the issue set for a lot of northern voters, frankly, the Conservatives performing very well there doesn't surprise me. They are connecting with voters on a lot of the issues that are top of mind to them, particularly working class voters in Northern Ontario. And I think they've taken a lot of the share of vote away from liberals. And frankly, we talked about earlier, this election was up for a lot of voters about do you want change?

And I think we're seeing pretty much the same parliament about to be returned. And so the answer is, no, we're good. We want to show a few more writings across the province that are liberal, New Democrat standoffs, starting in Ottawa Center. This one, again, was supposed to be close. This writing for 50 years has been split almost evenly between liberals and New Democrats.

Dan, tell us why the liberal vote basically, again, I don't want to say it vanished tonight, but that's not a competitive showing. No, it's a demonstration. It's not going to be a great night for the Liberal Party. I think let's be real here. But it's also an interesting one from my perspective in terms of what's happening province wide.

If you look at the province wide turnout, it's looking about just north of 30% right now. That's an exceptionally low number, a historically low number. And I think it's going to lead to a lot of results that despite liberals achieving 30% of the vote province wide, which is almost double where the Democrats are right now, they're still going to fall short

in lots of parts of the province. And it's just because voter turnout is so cataclysmically low. It is historically depressing. And I will say, I think it's going to just lead to this reality in which unless we see an election where there's voter engagement and voter excitement, liberals are going to continue with results

like the ones we're going to see tonight. Kim, I want to give you a chance to speak to York Southwestern. Let's bring that one up right now. This was a seat formerly held by Michael Ford, the premier's nephew. He decided not to run again. New Democrats were extremely hopeful to take that seat back.

Faisal Hassan's the former sitting member. How's it possible he's in third place right now? Yeah, I'm not sure where the polls are coming in at, and that's always a question mark in New York Southwest. And there's always some that come in at the last minute. We see this municipally. We see this at all levels of government, depending on where those are coming in. But ultimately what we have been

seeing in these writings, in a number of writings, not just in this one, has been those neighborhood by neighborhood conversations. I'll also say that some of those pollsters who like to bump up the aggregate numbers and talk about province-wide Miss the ground game conversation, right? They they miss that voter efficiency. They like to they like to over Estimate those province-wide numbers But when we start looking at community after community certain areas that that show up and turn up for New Democrats These community by community conversations. That is actually part of the story of the night.

And I think there is a disservice that gets done when we talk about these province-wide numbers. What we're seeing tonight is that Marat Stiles and the New Democrats have resonated. They had that voter efficiency in the communities that they were going after. And this is a good foundation for Marit Stiles to build off of because what we know to be true, and we've seen it internals and externals, is people liked her.

They liked what she was talking about. They believed in her. And when they met her, they really enjoyed her. And she's got a lot to build on tonight. John Michael, we should just point out as we look in the right hand column there, yes, it is a third straight majority government for the Ontario Progressive Conservative Party. We will still see whether or not it is a three-peat of historic proportions, meaning that in each successive election, the seat count rises for the PC party.

No one's ever done that in Ontario history. No Premier ever has had three straight elections where they got three straight majorities and the seat count improved each time. So we're still watching that tonight. What we can point out so far, it looks like the official opposition will remain the New Democrats

and it looks like the Liberals will still have, will finally have rather, official party status. Yeah, first time since 2018. That will go a long way to solving some of the wounds of this night, because it does look like there's some disappointment coming for certain liberal members, or liberal candidates, rather. I believe we're going to Sault Ste. Marie next to take a look at that. I believe the results are quite close still. Oh wow. Look how tight that is. Look how tight that is.

67, is that? Wow. With 90% of the polls. That's 67 votes difference out of 25,000 cast. I mean, we're looking at a very likely recount request here. Unless that last 10% really moves the needle for somebody, I feel like this is potentially a race that we're actually not going to have a final decision on tonight

because of course candidates can ask for recounts. I don't know if Kim what do you want to say about Sault Ste. Marie? Yes, Sault Ste. Marie. I was talking about it at the start of the program. This is going to be one of those neighborhood by neighborhood communities. This is an old-fashioned, you know, get out the vote effort. And what I've been very excited about our candidate there from the beginning of this campaign, Maura's been up there a couple of times, this again is you know these these notion these bogeymen's that

liberals keep putting out about strategic voting don't come to fruition on election night. I'll also say as much as you know congratulations to to Premier Ford but at the start of this election, Nick Kouvalis, the pollster for the Liberal, for the Conservative Party, was saying we're going to win 100, 104 seats. We're going to win all of the marbles like it's a game of hungry, hungry hippos in the legislature. And that is not what came through tonight.

You know, yes, big majority, but... In fact, the number right now is the same as the seats at Disillusion. Yeah, exactly. Right. 79 coming into tonight. Almost no change. 79 at the moment. So not quite the bravado of, you know, having to take out more seats in the house. That is problematic for the Premier and that's going to be a caucus management problem. He was already calling this election was partially

a caucus management exercise because he was having so many of his caucus members looking at maybe going federal or having some conversations internally. So how they manage that will be a challenge. Go and check a writing that I know you're going to be interested in. Let's go north.

Algoma, Manitoulin. John Michael referred to this at the beginning in the evening. What happens if you run both a former New Democrat MPP know you're going to be interested in. Let's go north. Algoma, Manitoulin. John Michael referred to this at the beginning in the evening. What happens if you run both a former New Democrat MPP against a current New Democrat candidate? Can somebody else win by splitting that vote? John Michael, it sure looks like that may happen. Yeah, absolutely.

Now, Bill Rosenberg is the mayor of Thessalon. So he's certainly somebody with roots in the community and the riding. Not entirely shocking that he would do well and as we say the the New Democrat is a first-time candidate. So it's not an entirely unexpected result, but it is not the final result yet. I believe I see 35% of polls reporting so room for that number to change yet.

I see 35% of polls reporting. So room for that number to change yet. But certainly, I mean, if that holds up, the Tories are going to be very happy to pad their numbers in the North. And if I could just say about the North, I mean, we look at Al-Ghomam and Manitoulin, and we... No, no, you keep talking. I want to talk to the control room.

I don't want that writing next. I want to go to two other ones before you go to that one. OK? So anyway, you keep going here. I'm talking to that writing next. I want to go to two other ones before you go to that one. OK? So anyway, you keep going here. I'm talking to the control room. But I'm just thinking about Sousa Mourinho. It's not that long ago. It was represented by a liberal, Dan.

I mean, David Orzetti was there in 2017. I know you've already spoken a bit about the Liberal Party struggles in the North, but this is a bit of a rough result here, where the liberals, in some cases, are sort of barely showing up. I don't want to belabor the point, but it's rough to look at, right? Well, you know, I grew up in rural Ontario,

and it's the reality I think liberals have been facing in the last number of elections. I think what's really interesting, though, John Michael, is if we look at some of the writing by writings, it's super uneven. I mean, you see writings like University of Rosedale, where the New Democrats are running away with it. And next door in St. Paul's, the liberals are winning, right?

And so there's just this really uneven reality across the province. Can we show you the third one? Please. Bring up the next one. These again, liberal New Democrat fights across the province. 109, Toronto Centre. It's tight.

Wow. It's fairly tight. Shockingly tight. I would not have expected that close of a race right now. And I think it is a symptom of such low voter turnout that as these final polls come in, we're still 50% there in Toronto Centre, and I don't think that much more province wide, if even that, and we're going to see some really weird close races at the very end. I think Eglinton Lawrence, I was just looking at your screen here, very tight.

York South Weston, very tight. The Lakeshore across Mississauga, all very, very tight races still. Bring up 112, guys. With this low voter turnout, I just, I don't know, I don't think there's any need to spin here. It's a weird election, and it's going to be a weird night with such tight races and such low voter turnout. Yeah, if the Liberal Party were going to make a comeback tonight, you would expect to see them doing well in St. Paul's, and they are. You would expect to see them doing well in St. Paul's. And they are. You would expect to see them doing well in Toronto Center.

Kind of are. Let's see what's happening in University of Rosedale, where again you would expect them to be doing really well. They're not. They're well off the pace. You can put a check mark by that one. Jessica Bell's going to hold that writing. So Dan, help us understand it.

What's going on with liberal fortunes across Ontario tonight? Well, I think that the reality is the vote is just too far dispersed, right? I think you've got pollsters, and it looks like the results are really consistent with where pollsters were province-wide. Kim's right.

It does matter community by community and riding by riding. But it's so uneven. It's very bizarre. I mean, there's no reason why in University of Rosedale, or community by community and riding by riding. But it's so uneven. It's very bizarre. I mean, there's no reason why in University of Rosedale, the liberal should be that far behind a New Democrat, when in Toronto, Southern, and St. Paul's, it's as tight as it is, right?

There are some very strange things happening here. And I think the reality is, I mean, this was an election that nobody paid attention to. No one was really engaged in. And voters aren't turning up to the polls. And it's going to lead to some strange results tonight. Let's do number seven, Beaches East York. This is a race again where, Marit Stiles was in the studio

last week and she said, I'm coming after the Tories. I'm not going after the liberals, I'm going after the Tories. And then she went to Beaches East York, which is a formerly liberal hell riding. So she clearly going after both. This wasn't even close. It's a blowout for Mary Margaret McMahon,

or 3M as they call her down at Queens Park, and it's a rematch against Kate Dupuis, who's a well-known new Democratic candidate in that area, not even close. Yeah, Mary Margaret, so, Triple M, as she is factually referred to as, she's a longtime city councillor, talk about those councillors, and viewers of TVO know I love city halls across this province

and I love a good hustle of a candidate. And Mary Margaret hustles, knocks on every door. These are riding, these are, again, neighborhood by neighborhood. It's showing up who your neighbors are. How are you community building? And those are really the big conversations. And I think there is a lot of stories to unfold tonight,

and Triple M is gonna be one of those spots. Now again, this was back in the day, it was a Michael Prue held spot, but then it became a bit of a liberal spot, and we would really have liked that back in our column tonight. Mary Margaret's a dear friend, and congratulations. Dan, you want to see how your leader's doing?

Yeah, let's see. I mean, Mrs. Saga's looking weird. Mrs. Saga? I mean, look at this Nepean. Sorry, can we just pause there on Nepean? Tyler Watts just won Nepean. That is a very strange outcome, given where liberals are across the rest of the province.

I find it just absolutely bizarre. The liberals took Nepean. Yes. Former conservative seat. Exactly. Like that is a very strange outcome, given where liberals are across the rest of the province. Like I find it just absolutely bizarre. The liberals took Nepean. Yeah. Former conservative seat. Exactly. It makes no sense. I mean, OK, so here we've got Mississauga.

It's certainly an interestingly tight race there. It's not looking good. But if you look at other Mississaugas, I mean, it's within a couple hundred votes north of the Lakeshore. Usually liberals do very well in Mississauga Lakeshore, Mississauga East Cookeville, where Bonnie's run in this election.

Obviously, the Tories threw everything they had at those two ridings trying to stop the liberal victory. They may just do that. But in neighboring ridings, Mississauga-Aaron Mills, it looked to be within a few hundred votes there, which is a very bizarre set of circumstances. And I think, as I've said before, as polls close here tonight,

we may see some just very weirdly tight races because of how low the turnout is. It was also very strange, Stephen John Michael, that at the 11th hour of the 11th minute, you know, Bodie Crombie finally chose a seat. And it wasn't like she had a whole bunch of liberal incumbents to work around. There were only eight of them.

So it took her to the very last minute, to the campaign starting, before she finally ended up in a game of musical chairs. She could have chosen any other writing. She wanted, she chose that one for whatever reason. And tonight's results are what happens when you know you don't have ground game and you don't you know work a community and this is not a good night for the leaders of the Liberal Party who promise that they were going

to be all things to all people and couldn't get a seat in the last two elections neither Stephen Del Duka last time time or Bonnie Cromby tonight. I want Deb Hutton back out here because we want to show, Sheldon, 29 please. This was one of the seats the conservatives were concerned about holding onto tonight at Tobaco Lakeshore because they only won by 800 votes last time and they're losing it tonight

to the liberals. This is a rematch from last time. Dan, apropos of what you said, there's no rhyme or reason for the Conservatives to be losing in Doug Ford's backyard. This was number three for me. I mean, in terms of our pickups tonight, I was really looking at it closely

in terms of if we were doing well here, if we were winning it, we were going to have a great night. And I expected us to be winning in the range of 20 to 25 seats. We're not. It doesn't appear as though that's going to be the end result but we are winning Etobicoke Lakeshore. Now a lot of work was put in by Lee Fairclough and since the last election this is a rematch as you point out. I wouldn't expect the spread to be this large. I just think we're going to see some very strange outcomes in

riding by riding. Some very strange outcomes like this. I need Deb Hutton to explain to me how it's possible that you can win 79 seats last time, 78 so far tonight, and one of the candidates who's a former sitting member from Doug Ford's backyard is going to lose as big as she is to a liberal who are doing a little better tonight, but frankly not that much better. How does that make sense?

You've got the wrong person, I can't explain that. No, I honestly am surprised. I know Etobicoke Lakeshore had been one that the liberals were targeting and as you said it is a rematch, but I truly am very, very surprised given where all the numbers are breaking out. I have to say I'm not surprised that the New Democrats are in second. I did predict that they would hold official party status because of some of the things we've talked about, their ground game, the lack of organization for the Liberals given their decimation in the last couple of go-rounds. And I also think, Kim pointed this out earlier, New Democrat vote is very much more efficient than the Liberals has been.

So the 25 number for the New Dems doesn't surprise me. 13 is a little bit higher than I thought for the Liberals. And again, I cannot explain some of the side-by-side writings. It's very strange. It's hard to look at a writing like Etobicoke Lakeshore and see that much of a spread. And then look to Eglinton Lawrence, where there's no New Democrat on the ticket.

And it'd be as tight as it is. Can we see 66? Let's get Mario Lemieux's writing up here, please. 66, Nepean, Sheldon, this is the writing. This was Lisa MacLeod's writing. She used to win it by huge margins in Eastern Ontario. How are the liberals 4,000 votes ahead in Nepean? Deb.

You're not going to tell it to me again, because I can't explain it. So I think the only thing I'd say I can maybe give a little bit here is that Tyler has put a lot of effort into that writing. He was on the ballot in the last election. He's popular on social media. He's been working really hard in between the election to build a community of supporters there. And I think it is one of those places

where you just look at, as a community, someone who's put a lot of effort into the writing. Again, though, because of all that, it would make sense to me if he was winning by a few hundred votes. But to be winning by 4,000 votes and taking that writing so handedly is a real shock. And it's an impressive one.

Congratulations, Tyler. So I mean, Dan, in terms of the number of candidates who we're seeing win, I mean, Tyler being one of them who ran either in 2022 or 2018 in some cases. I mean, is this, in fact, seeds planted by Kathleen Wynne or Stephen Del Duca that are finally bearing fruit? You know, I'm not sure I go that far. But I do think we are seeing, because of the numbers

you've got on the right-hand side there, the reality is we're going to see a parliament return that rewarded incumbents, right? I think if you look at writings where incumbents are being re-elected, it's pretty consistent across the board. And where there isn't an incumbent, somebody who was on the ballot in the last election whose built name recognition seems to be doing well. I think that Etobicoke Lakeshore is the only reason I could see it being so successful for the Fairclough.

She was quite successful in the last election. She didn't win it, but she did very well. She ran a great campaign. She did the same thing this time around. And I think we're going to see the results in the last election. She didn't win it, but she did very well. She ran a great campaign. She did the same thing this time around. And I think we're going to see the results in the PN of that and in Tobacco Lakeshore. Can we get 61 back up here? We want to see how the leader of the Ontario Liberals is doing.

Bonnie Cromby fighting for her first ever seat at Queen's Park. And at the moment, falling short. But it's narrowed. Since the last time you had that on the screen, it was a bigger gap, and so it's narrowed a little bit, and there's still some writings that come in. I got a question for Deb Hutton this time that I know she can't answer.

And that is, okay, this is one of those writings where there was just incredible drama, because number one, you've got the Crombie versus Ford angle. And we know the two of them pretty much can't stand each other. You've got the Crombie-Patrick Brown angle because the mayor of Brampton's mother-in-law is running, and you know Patrick Brown is using his entire organization to help get his mother-in-law elected. One of the angles we haven't talked about tonight is that there is the possibility,

I think, of the first brother-sister combination in Ontario history being elected in the same election. Rudy Casetto is a former sitting member from the South End of Mississauga. And he's winning. And he's winning. Yep. And his sister looks like she may defeat Bonnie Crombie. Can you tell me what you thought about the advisability of Doug Ford going in on the last day of the campaign to Mississauga, East Cooksville, and doing an event with the Polish community?

Bonnie's backyard, Bonnie's community. Correct. What did you think of that? Well, it's funny because initially I thought, oh, that's just a little bit too harsh. But then I thought, you know what, go for it, Doug. I'm going to bring some old names for people that don't go as far back as we do, Steve. Alan Pope, a rivalry. Up north.

Up north, Timmons. A rivalry for many years with Mike Harris. And we flew on the very last stop of, I think, a nine stop day, the day before voting day, and ended up in Timmons because Mike Harris, knowing he was going to be premier in 1995, wanted to have his last official event in Alan Pope's riding. So I was reminded of that when I saw the premier's itinerary for yesterday.

Gutsy. I want to bring up just for fun, 82, please. Not because anybody thought this was going to be a close contest. It isn't. I mean, it is the writing where young Dan Moulton ran as a candidate many, many moons ago. Dan, I don't want to rub it in, but the liberals are in second place in Oxford.

I mean, better than I did. Yeah. I mean, 2014, we came third in a lot of parts of the province. Ernie Hardeman is a longstanding member. Well, this is why I wanted to bring it up. Ernie Hardeman will be the only person in this legislature elected in the last century. Right?

He goes back to 1995. Yeah, 95. Everybody else. He's the only one left. Now that Ted Arnett has stepped down. Ted stepped down. Ted was the only other one. When was Bob Bailey elected?

2007. Yeah. 2007. Yeah. So Ernie Hardeman's the only guy elected in the 20th century. I won't tell you what trade I was in when Ernie was first elected. But I will tell you what one of the things Ernie

loved to say when we were on all candidate meetings together was that he mowed my great, great grandfather's lawn for a nickel. And he loved that story. I don't know, Ernie, if you're trying to make me sound young or you old, but that is a great story to tell. Now, while we're talking, he's 77 years old. While we're talking, senior citizens, can I have 96,

please? The oldest member of the Ontario legislature ever, 88-year-old Raymond Cho, is going back to Queens Park. He always seems to enjoy a rather solid victory in the North End Scarborough. And he's a cabinet minister in Doug Ford's government. I have no doubt that he will be again. It's difficult to explain to people

what an earthquake it was at Queens Park when Raymond Cho won. I mean, literally the last several years of liberal energy policy seemed to be a reaction to Raymond Cho winning the first Tory riding in Toronto in certainly more than a decade at that point. And no surprise that he made it into Doug Ford's cabinet and has stayed there and continues to rack up the wins. I believe we also have Ajax queued up, where last time I looked, a former sitting cabinet minister may have been defeated, which was Patrice Barnes. OK, that would make no sense, but let's take a look. No, this election makes no sense, I will say.

Can we have writing number one, Ajax? This is right next door to the minister of finance. OK, if you can't do Ajax, what was the other one I? Oh, you are getting it. OK. Ajax is right next door to the minister of finance's writing. It's in a 905, which as we know, votes as a block. And if the liberals take a seat in the 905

away from a Conservative Cabinet Minister who's right next door to Peter Bethlenfalvy, that makes no sense, Deb. You keep looking at me and I don't have the answers, dude. It's interesting about the Liberal candidate there. I've known him a long time. He actually is a former Toronto City Hall staffer, and also was the communications person for the Durham School Board for a while. But again, those old school municipal counselors

who know how to hustle. Raymond Cho, great example of a former city counselor who's ran for everybody at some point or another. I mean, he has been around so long. But he becomes that stalwart vote out there. And apologies for the coughing fit, but I also, you know, you know, I love the family dynamics that are coming in back in. You know, we've got Ernie Hardeman and John Van Toff, literally Uncle Ernie to John Van Toff. Uncle and nephew. Uncle and nephew. And so these are some really interesting things.

Kim, look at the right-hand column on the screen. The Tories were at 79 coming in tonight. They're at 79 right now. This whole election, $189 million, is about switching four seats from the NDP to the Liberals. Are you kidding me? Really? Steve, it's a four-year mandate. Or two and a half.

Well, that one was. Yeah, that's right. There are definitely some interesting things happening. And some of it is weird, for sure. But election night, that's why we do this, right? They're weird. Every vote literally matters. Former Premier Ernie Eaves will talk about his first election,lide Ernie where he I believe won on election night by 14

votes and then it went down to 6 in the end but ultimately every vote actually does matter and we're seeing some of these writings that are a hundred a hundred here a hundred there that is GOTV. That is the get out the vote. That is on the ground. It's identifying those supporters. You know, the Mart Stiles team identified they had knocked out about a million doors. They had made 1.3 million phone calls. That arms and legs across the province and being able to then on election day have people getting those votes, those folks to the ballot box is really critical. And what we're also seeing are a lot of candidates, Tyler Watt being one of them, who didn't stop running.

We see this on election night municipally. People who ran in the previous election and continued, didn't stop, didn't just show up when the ballots were called, but actually worked their communities and engaged. And those are the kinds of things we're seeing that poke through on election night. I could ask Dan something. The night's not over.

No. The liberals look like they will have official party status by the time the night is over. It looks that way. You need 12. They'll have 13. It'll be the first election in three, in which they've had it. But it's possible the leader won't hold the seat

that she tried to get. Can she stay as leader of the party without a seat? Well, I think with party status, it makes it a far more tenable path forward for Bonnie. Frankly, liberals just had a leadership process. It wasn't that long ago Bonnie Cromby became the leader of the party. It was a highly competitive leadership race.

There aren't a lot of folks, I think, waiting in the wings with sharpened knives trying to get rid of her. I think, honestly, if party status is the end result tonight and Bonnie wants to run again in the next election, she's got a real shot at it. I mean, if you look at it, I don't feel the need to provide a lot of spin or partisan talk here tonight. What I will say is, throughout this campaign,

in the coverage that did occur on it, it was a race between Bonnie Crombie and Doug Ford, two people head to head, in a lot of ways in the coverage. And I think the reality for liberals is, party status, a strong leader, yeah, I think she'll find a seat where she can put her name forward. Certainly there are, looks like there'll be a couple

that would be available to her where the member could step aside and she could run. I'm waiting to see the final results here though, Steve, because I do think it's what I will say is, yes, it is community by community and riding by riding, but if liberals are winning in Ajax and Nepean, and not Mississauga, Aaron Mills at the end of the night, it's going to be a very surprising outcome.

OK, Jackie's back at the table. And I want to show her Perry Salmascoca, because I know she's dying to see what the story is there. Oh, it's gotten wider. It was 100 votes a while ago. And it looks like it's almost 2,000 votes now. Is Matt Richter going to break your heart again tonight, Jackie?

I think he just might. And looks like 300 volunteers locally. That riding has been building for years. He's run seven times. The last election, there were less than 2,000 votes from the incumbent. And they've been working their tails off ever since. That group there, there's a huge group of retired teachers,

there's climate activists, there are there's mothers, there's there's teenagers. It is an incredible incredible team in Perry's Amoskoka. So yeah, definitely breaks my heart to see the the margin widen and hopefully we can continue to keep building there because they've done a really great job. Will the disappointment, if it goes this way, will the disappointment of losing Perry Sound overwhelm the satisfaction of holding Kitchener Center for Ashlyn Clancy? No, I think that's pretty exciting to see.

I think it's also clear to show that when Greens are elected, people are happy. Their community are happy with them. The margin that she won by, again, shows that the team there is strong, that she won by again shows that you know the team there is strong, that she's an incredible representative and you know it's let's be real in a first-past-the-post system it's hard for Greens to get elected and I think that we'll look at the voting results or the

turnout tonight and see are the majority of Ontarians happy with our voting system. John Michael hold the hold the fort for one second, because they want to do tight races here, OK? We've got eight really tight races to show you tonight. So we're going to bring those up, riding by riding. And folks, just jump in if you want to comment. Look how tight this one is. Wow.

This is fewer than 300 votes between the former sitting member, Patrice Barnes for the Conservatives, and the liberal candidate. And again, Dan, this makes no sense. It's certainly a surprising outcome I think if we think about province-wide trends where the Liberals are bearing out here it isn't the outcome that I would have expected. The one reason I'm not surprised is I know the Tories were very worried about this riding over the last two weeks they redeployed staff from other ridings to go to Ajax

to help pull out the vote there. So I know they were concerned about it. Clearly, they were seeing something in their internal polling in that riding that gave them a cause for concern. And obviously, a race that tight, not what I would have expected. Let's go to the city of Burlington,

where Natalie Pierre is the former sitting member for the Progressive Conservatives. But look what a strong race. The Liberal candidate, Grabenens, is running there. What's the difference there? It's 400 votes or something like that. Yeah. I think we're going to see that across the Lakeshore, which

are traditionally strong writings for liberals. Mississauga Lakeshore, East Cooksville, Oakville, Burlington. These are writings that will be tight tonight, I think, the final results, and where New Democrats look like they're gonna play the spoiler. Eglinton-Lawrence, 200 votes difference. The absence of a New Democrat candidate there, Kim,

is clearly helping the liberals you'd have to say. Yeah, you know, there was an article in Poly Corner, which is a Queens Park newspaper, that talked about how an organizer approached the New Democrat candidate and asked them to get out at the last minute and they made a conversation to get out with no ability for the New Democrats to put in a candidate. They came in three minutes before the close of nominations. That to me is a situation in Eglinton-Lawrence that if it continues to be able to do those types of shenanigans, that is bad for democracy.

And I'm really sad to see that. There are a lot of new Democrats who didn't get to have their voice heard. And that is a big problem for democracy. Well, the only thing I'll say on Eglinton Lawrence is the last election, it was 600 votes split between conservatives and conservatives. And the election before that, it was just as close. New Democratic voices are being heard, however,

in Hamilton West and Castor Dundas, or as we affectionately call it in the Steel City, HWOD. Sandy Shaw is the former sitting member there two times. And she has about a 1200 vote lead over the conservative challenger in that race. That is, again, very strange. Hamilton West and Castor Dundas is sort of one of the more affluent suburbs of the city of Hamilton.

And, Deb, that's the kind of riding that ought to be voting progressive conservative in this election, and they're not. We're not quite there yet. 80% of the polls reporting in. I know John Demick quite well. He's my husband's former campaign manager, great guy. Tell the people who your husband is. Oh, Tim Hudak.

Former leader of the PC party. On that though, before he's been affectionately referred to by some as the chipper wonk comes up, Mike Schreiner and which might be the best nickname that came out of the campaign but Sandy Shaw is also well known in the Hamilton area as an incredibly fierce advocate who fought against green belt expansion and urban boundaries and and people remember those types of battles. Now let me just warn everybody here, there's a choreography that usually happens

on election night where the leaders all speak in inverse order of how they finished. So of course we would expect to hear Shriner, Crombie, Stiles, and Ford, but Doug Ford has not followed that practice in the two previous elections. He sort of speaks whenever he wants to. Let's see what happens tonight.

In the meantime, it looks like the leader of the Greens is at the microphone. Here is the former and incoming member for Guelph, Mike Schreiner. Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Thank you. Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, I love you, Guelph. Thank you.

I love you Guelph. Thank you. In 2023, the Ontario Greens made history by electing the second Green MPP in Ontario's history. And I just want to say to Ashlyn Clancy, from the day you decided to run until the moment you joined me at Queens Park to be the second Green MPP, I've been inspired. Inspired by your courage, your intelligence, your tenacity, your passion, and your commitment to the people of your riding into this province. Together we held Doug Ford's feet to the fire and delivered for our communities. And so I look forward to teaming up with you again to go back to Queens Park and represent green voices across this province and to stand up for what's

right for our communities and the people of Ontario. our communities and the people of Ontario. You know what, anyone who thought Ashlyn Clancy's by-election win in 2023 was a fluke was wrong. And we proved them wrong tonight. And we will keep proving them wrong as we build momentum for the Ontario Green Party across this province. Our party is powered by people. And so I say to the people who ran, the people who knocked on doors, the people who put up signs, the people who braved the cold.

And I gotta tell you what, there were a lot of cold hands and warm hearts out on the campaign trail over the last month. I want to say to each and every one of you from the bottom of my heart, thank you, thank you, thank you for working so hard for the Ontario Greens. Each and every one of you is a local champion, and I'm forever grateful for the work that you do. I also want to take a moment now to thank a good friend, Matt Richter, the

deputy leader for the Ontario Greens. Matt has run many times. In this time, yet he came so, so close. I know that tonight was not the results we had wanted and I know they're not the results that Matt wanted, but I want Matt to know that you will always be a champion in my heart. You lead with honesty, integrity, and a commitment to your community. And if there was ever anyone who deserved to be an MPP, it's Matt Richter. There are real and serious challenges facing the province of Ontario. In climate, housing, health care, education and tariffs, you could put the word crisis after each and every one of those items. As a matter of fact, it feels like crisis has become the new normal in Ontario. I know that Ontarians want us to do better, and I know that we can do better. And so I say to Mr. Ford, congratulations on a majority government. The two Ontario Green MPPs will do our job to hold your government accountable.

We will do it as the unofficial official opposition. And I also want to be clear at the same time, we're ready to work across party lines to put people before politics and deliver for the people of Ontario and the people of our communities. And tonight I say to progressive voters across the province of Ontario, don't agonize, organize. Just, yeah. Don't agonize, organize because just in the same way that people power saved the green belt, people power can fight to build homes that people can afford, to fix health care and education and to protect the people and places we love in this province.

We owe it to the people of Ontario to fight for progressive values and that's why Ontario Greens are going to continue to organize, organize, organize for the people of Ontario. In this election, Greens fought for fairness, and a livable future, an affordable future for our children. And Ashlyn Clancy and I will continue that fight for you at Queens Park as your champions. I want to say to our Green family across Ontario, we're not going to give up. We're going to keep fighting and building for a better Ontario. And I want to say to my family on stage tonight, from the bottom of my heart, thank you for all the support you have provided me.

I couldn't do this job without you, and the only reason I work so hard is for you. My two daughters, these two daughters, these two daughters deserve a livable, affordable future and a stable planet. So tonight I raise a glass to Ashlyn Clancy to congratulate her on her re-election. I'm inspired by how much all of us together has fought for fairness and fought for a better Ontario. And Ashlyn Clancy and I will honor your hard work

by working hard for you at Queens Park. Thank you, everyone. Thank you so much for all the great work that you do. for you at Queens Park. Thank you everyone, thank you so much for all the great work that you do. Thank you for your support, thank you Guelph for your support. Thank you, thank you everyone. That's Mike Schreiner, the leader of the Green Party,

celebrating personal reelection and the riding of Guelph, congratulating Ashlyn Clancy, who of course becomes the second, only the second ever Green MPP elected during a general election campaign. Sheldon, can we get a wide shot here and show how we've got the cast of Ben Hur with us right now out here on our big table in the William G. Davis studio at TVO. Great to see everybody.

This has been one of the most, and I've only covered 12 of these things. This is the most bizarre Ontario election I think I have ever covered. We're going to go through some of the very close races right now. They are not the kind of close races we thought we would be looking at at the beginning of the evening, but you know what? Elections are full of surprises, and this one is. Let's also remind you that the Tories came into tonight after dissolution with 79 seats. They are at 79 seats right now. The New Democrats came in with 29 seats.

They're at 25 right now. The Liberals came in with 29 seats. They're at 25 right now. The Liberals came in with nine seats. They're at 14 right now, official party status. The Greens came in with two. They have two. This election was about switching that many seats from the New Democrats to the Liberals. So much status quo out there in some ways,

and some very crazy races in others. Sheldon, let's start bringing them up, shall we? Here are razor thin margins across the province of Ontario. This is, again, makes no sense. All the Brampton seats went for the Tories. All the Mississauga seats, except this one at the moment, are with the Tories. And this is an eight vote difference.

How is it that Mississauga votes liberal in Aaron Mills, but not for the former mayor in East Cooksville? I don't get it. But anyway, let's keep it. The only thing I'll say about that is I understand the Tories pulled everybody they had working across Mississauga and redeployed them to East Cooksville and Lakeshore. They wanted to stop liberal victories in those two

writings. Looks like they've succeeded. But the inverse impact may be that with a squeaker win, liberals are going to win in Mississauga and Aramils. Let's keep going. Razor thin margins. This is way up north. Muskegon James Bay, the conservative,

leading the New Democrat in what is widely thought to be a fairly safe seat for Guy Bourguignon. Wow, what does one say there? That one is razor tight as well, 75 votes. That one, it was created. I spoke to Tories who said, like, this writing has been created in a way that we will never, ever win it. And here we are, just an indicator of how weird this night is.

Razor thin margins. We're looking across the province of Ontario. What's the next one we're going to look at? You know, you've got to say Doug Ford's efforts in northern Ontario have really paid off. The Conservatives are winning seats that they have not won in years. Sault Ste. Marie is a hold for them.

And we can't say it's a hold yet, because this one is fewer than 100 votes difference right now. About 100% of the polls. Well, there's going to be a recount there. There's going to be a recount there. Yeah, there'll be a recount there. Let's keep going. We understand Bonnie Cromby, the liberal leader,

is on her way to the podium. We'll cut to her speech as soon as it happens. This, again, if it holds up, would be a hold for the progressive conservatives. But certainly, the New Democrats thought they were going to take this back. That's the former sitting member, Faisal Hasan, from the New Democrats, who is in third place at the moment.

And the liberal candidate there is a school trustee. And his father was a longtime city councilor, Frank DiGiorgio. So again, these are battles. These are building by buildings, neighborhood by neighborhood. But they are not the big swings that we were supposed to be hearing about throughout the, if you believe the aggregators, on these poll streams. Let me tell you something about vote efficiency.

The NDP is renowned for its efficient vote. The NDP's got 860,000 votes tonight. And with that, they got 25 seats in official part and official opposition status, 860,000. The liberals got 1.4 million. Yes, they have official party status at the moment, but 14 seats, sort of half as many. The vote's too inefficient for the liberals right now, still is.

There is rookie leader Bonnie Cromby making her way in Mississauga to give a speech. We will obviously be listening very carefully to see whether or not Miss Cromby intends to indicate whether she plans to stick around as leader of her party. This is her first election. She has got her party back after two miserable elections in a row into official party status. There's a hug for her two sons, Jonathan and Alex. And let's hear from the liberal leader now.

Thank you, everyone. Thank you. Thank you. Hello. Good evening, everyone. And thank you for being here. I want to thank each and every one of you for everything you have done in the last 28 days.

Oh my gosh, those snow banks, the salt, how many pairs of shoes have you ruined? You've really stepped up. And many of you put your name on the ballot that are in the room here tonight Listen running for office is no small thing so no matter Who you ran for or our province or and our democracy are better because of the hard work, right? So, thank you. I know tonight isn't exactly the result we were looking for, but you should be very, very proud of what we did tonight.

Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo! Woo!

Woo! Woo! People counted us out. They said the Ontario Liberal Party was dead. Tonight, you proved them wrong. The Ontario Liberal Party is back to official party status, and that's a big milestone. But it gets better. We increase our share of the vote substantially to 30%. Double digits over the NDP.

So this is a building block for us. It is a momentum that we can continue to push forward and to grow. So tonight, let's celebrate all our new MPPs that we're going to bring back and celebrate coming back to work making sure those other guys do their jobs. Look, voters have given Doug Ford another mandate tonight. Smaller, but nonetheless. But many, many of you are asking for a strong voice to hold them accountable as Premier. And you can count on me, okay? So I'll say this tonight, Doug, we'll be watching. We know Ontario can do so much better.

And I know, you know I'm not going to slow down, not for one second when it comes up to standing up for the people in this province. I'm going to continue to fight for our public health care system every single day. Doug, you promised a lot of things during this campaign, and one of them was to get people more family doctors. And I'm going to hold you to it. The Ontario Liberal Party is going to hold you to it, right? Because the people of Ontario deserve more than they've been, than they've gotten from you over the last seven years. You promised to protect Ontario, but you neglected

Ontario and we're going to make sure that you go back to protecting us. We'll make sure that you protect our public health care system, and our green belt, and everyone trying to get ahead in this province who doesn't have a direct line to your office. Ontario, I'm here. I am with you. And I commit to you today that I will stay on. Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie! Bonnie!

You like that? Alright, I'll tell you again. Okay. I commit to you that I'll stay on as Ontario Liberal Leader so that I can keep fighting for you. Thank you, everyone. Thank you. Let's enjoy the night. Well, that was what we wanted to find out from Bonnie Cromley, was whether in fact she intended to remain as Ontario Liberal Leader and lead her charges going forward, even though it does not look like she'll be able to lead that fight from the actual Ontario legislature. She is in second place in Mississauga East Cooksville at the moment, does not have a seat, does not look like she's going to win a seat.

So okay, Dan, first to you on that one. Did she make the right decision by saying unequivocally tonight she's staying on? Yeah, I think so. Absolutely. I mean, Bonnie's come a long way in the last few years since she was elected leader of the party, which really wasn't that long ago. That was a highly competitive race. She came out on top.

She's made a lot of progress the last few years. Look, there are no partial victories in politics. The winner at the end of election is the person who gets to call themselves premier afterwards. And so Doug Ford's won tonight. But I think where you could see some hope as a liberal in this election is that there are a lot of close races across the 905 closer than I think a lot of people

would have predicted or the polling would have predicted before tonight. And the turnout is historically what it looks like. And so I think if we could see an election where change was on the mind of voters four years from now, if some of the ethics challenges that the premier is facing and will continue to face in the next few years around the Green Belt scandal come to bear some more political fruit

than they have in the past. And frankly, if there's a different leader for the PCs on the ticket in the next election, I think Bonnie Cromby has a real shot at forming a government. It'll be a more change-oriented election. Well, there won't be. Doug Ford said he wanted to be the premier for as long as Hazel McCallion was the mayor.

Well, I mean, he said that. I don't know that we'll see that, frankly. I think that would be a surprising outcome. And frankly, I think the election call, if I may Steve, I think the election call tonight for Doug Ford and his party was as much about the history he gets to make tonight and then ride off in the sunset because that's the right way to end your time as a politician as the Prime Minister of Canada has proven in the last year and a half. We know who's going to be the next government. It's going to be the progressive conservatives.

Doug Ford three-peats tonight. What we still don't know are the results in a whole bunch of writings, because we've got some very, I don't know what else to call them, but very screwy results tonight that nobody would have anticipated. So control room, can we get these going here? Here are some of the really close races across the province of Ontario. Now that's 100% of the polls reporting.

And that's 13,082 seats for the PC, 12,964 for the NDP. John Michael, is that recount territory? It certainly could be. And if it goes into a recount, then we're talking about, I mean, there's a whole court process. It could be certainly days, if not weeks, before a final result is certified.

I mean, that's 100 and some odd votes. That's pretty close out of 30,000 votes cast in the writing tonight. So that one's super tight. Let's keep going here. Let's look at some other very tight races in the province of Ontario this evening, if we can. You got anything up in Ajax, guys, writing number one?

Let's see if we can take a look at that one. Here is, in the writing of Ajax, oh, Mike, go ahead. Put it back up. There we go. This is 93% of the polls recording, and it's a 300 vote difference out of like 40,000 votes cast tonight. I mean, don't tell me that every vote doesn't matter.

Every vote matters. Look how close that is. What else can we look at tonight guys in terms of razor-thin margins? Can I just say in that writing in particular the NDP vote is non-existent. Yeah. Which is obviously a challenge potentially for Conservatives but really really low. Well and that to me I think speaks to some of the strategic voting that we've like we saw a lot of this this year more so than other years And I think that's something we need to talk about I know it's been mentioned a few times, but People were using these sites these most these aggregator sites

And you don't know where that information is coming from that those sites can be gamed And I think and they have been and so and people are using this oh, look, it's really close between this and this here. Go vote this way. And I think that's why you're seeing it's getting stripped from the NDP and going to the liberals in a false way. Let's get you guys some more results here. And to that end, I want to see Eglinton-Lawrence,

but then I want to see, if I can, the battle of the independents after that. Here's Eglinton-Lawrence. It's not even 200 votes. John Michael, this, not having a new Democrat candidate to split the progressive vote in this riding, I know Kim's not happy about it. But it's given the anti-Ford vote a shot

to coalesce around one candidate. And this one's close. Now, that's 100% of the polls reporting. But again, we're probably into recount territory here. Yeah, we can absolutely see that. I mean, they might opt not to. But it's certainly in terms of giving the anti-Ford vote a shot of taking that riding, it came close.

Given, frankly, where the liberal seat count is, they probably wish that they'd gotten an extra few hundred or a few thousand votes some other way. But we're talking about awful turnout all over the province. But ultimately, Steve, voters get to decide these things. And not allowing for candidates to be on the ballot does circumvent democracy. It does circumvent the elections. And that is a big problem.

And I think what is particularly galling about this, and particularly in Eglinton Lawrence is whatever shenanigans got to a place where they decided to make it so they couldn't have a new Democrat, the aftereffects of this could be quite catastrophic for every other election where, oh some aggregator site says this or oh some aggregator site says this. This was liberals feeling like they have a divine right to a progressive vote. When they frankly, what we saw in Bonnie Cromby, a speech she gave to the Albany club talking about gutting public healthcare, that those things are really

troubling. Those are not progressive values. And Bonnie Cromby talked a good game about being this great, you know, mayor of Mississauga and won all these elections, predominantly unopposed. I would only say they did not come through for her. I would only say in Windsor West and in Oshawa it worked the other way around. There were no liberal candidates in those writings and the New Democrat. Yeah, and Steve, honestly, I think the election, though, if I may... No, no, hold on, Dan.

He asked me a dark question. So the liberals in Windsor West chose not to run a candidate. That is very different than having a party not be able to have a candidate on the ballot when they believe they had one. That is a very different situation. Agreed. And the fact is, and CBC had reported this in Windsor and other places, and I'm from that neck of the woods, this was a party of Dwight Duncan and Sandra Pupatello and all

the rest of them, and they couldn't find a candidate until the very last moment. That is a very different situation than what we saw in Eglinton, Lawrence. Okay, Dan, come on in. Well, honestly, I don't feel the need to be so deeply partisan here, because I think the election's over, and we can probably provide your viewers some more elevated analysis, which would be that in Eglinton-Lawrence, liberals shouldn't be that close. You're talking about the progressive vote coalescing

behind a liberal. When there was a new Democrat in the last election with a couple thousand votes to their name, liberals were 600 votes from winning. We should be winning that by a couple thousand votes, frankly. I also know the Tories abandoned that riding about two weeks ago and redeployed their teams elsewhere. So it should not be that close.

But there's some weird results happening. It'd be interesting to know, I think, what the turnout rate is in Egmonton-Lawrence. There's no reason we should be winning the PNN at that margin and losing Egmonton-Lawrence at that margin. On the topic of these really tight races, Bonnie Crabby now faces the dilemma

that John Tory did after 2007, where he has to find a safe seat to... Bonnie Crabby could find a safe seat to have a liberal step aside, and she would then run into a place. But looking around, I mean, I'm not seeing Etobicoke, I'm not seeing Mississauga, I'm not seeing a lot of places where the liberal who has won a seat has won by a large enough margin that you would feel comfortable starting that contest all over again. Dan, I mean, do you have any insight about what she might do next? There are a couple writings where I do see margins of that extent.

I mean, I'm not going to make predictions here about which of these candidates that's celebrating tonight might be somewhere where she considers that. But I'd also suggest that I'm not sure that Bonnie needs to be in a big hurry to throw her hat in the ring and get into the legislature. I think the pressure on that is a lot less than it has been in the past and it would have been for John Tory in that election. It was almost a different time. The media landscape at Queen's Park is radically different. I mean there is almost no media there any longer compared to what there used to be on a relative basis. And frankly, I think the leader needs to spend a lot of time traveling parts of the province

where liberals haven't done very well tonight. She should be spending a lot more time building support with people that used to vote liberal, showed up for liberals, and just aren't any longer. And also, John Tory did not win that by-election where he went to parachute in what was supposedly one of the safest conservative seats in Halliburton. And, you know, parachuting in doesn't always work out for the leaders. Now, I hope John Fraser didn't throw at all of those acting liberal leader business cards

that he's used in the last couple of elections. He may need them again. Let's do a battle of the independents. We talked at the beginning of the evening about the impact that independent candidates who were former sitting members running in these writings, what impact that might have on the vote, and let's see what happens.

Well, here's one where the conservatives definitely benefited. In Algoma, Manitoulin, the conservatives take a seat that they have not held since the 1970s. This is Algoma, Manitoulin. Michael Mantha, the former New Democrat sitting member, ran as an independent. I think, though, even if you take all 2,363 of his votes

and hand them all to the New Democrat, it still wouldn't have been enough to beat the Tory. Deb? It's pretty close. Some going on in northern Ontario, where Doug Ford suddenly is a viable option in places the conservatives never were. Yeah, well, we spoke about this a little bit earlier, Steve. I mean, I do believe the threat of Trump tariffs and I do believe the amount of time, effort

and policies that the premier has put into Northern Ontario, particularly around Ring of Fire and some of the resource-based communities is bearing fruit tonight without a doubt. One of the things that you do not see in the right hand column of your screen, you see 79 progressive conservatives, 25 New Democrats, 14 liberals, two greens, there's one independent. And let's go to that writing now. This is the one Deb Hutton told us to keep an eye on at the beginning of the evening. This is a writing where the independent was the MPP and will be again.

Can we bring up Haldeman Norfolk, please, 34? Bobby Ann Brady warned the progressive conservatives, don't do this again. Don't make the same dumb mistake by running somebody against me because I'm just going to smoke them. And she did it again. Bobbi Ann Brady wins, Haldeman Norfolk going away by almost a 3 to 1 margin.

You want to talk about doing your constituency work well. She definitely brought their voice to Queens Park and was re-elected handily by the people of Haldeman Norfolk. Can we go to another independent race, which was 36 Hamilton Center? In Hamilton Center, we wondered about the impact Sarah Jama would have on the outcome. As it turns out, not that much.

She comes forth. She does not prevent the official New Democrat candidate, Rahm E. Lennox, from carrying that riding. Kim, I'm interested in your view on what the loss of Sarah Jama to a particular wing of the New Democratic Party, which really respected her and her views on the Middle East and all of that. What do you think that could do to Marit Stiles' life

going forward? Look, Marit, you know, she had a really, Marit Stiles had a really great night tonight. And let's not take any of that away. Across this province every day, every community, Marit did what she had to do as leader to bring that trustworthiness and have those conversations. Not to also take anything away from the new MPP elect for Hamilton Center. Robin Lennox is an extraordinary candidate, was

always a great get for the NDP. She's a healthcare worker, a professor, really well-spoken, really great campaign that they ran there and I'm very proud of the candidate and the campaign that we ran there. Are there going to be activists in every party that are disappointed tonight? Sure. That is part of the political discourse. But I think Barrett did a great job across this province. It's interesting that former MPPs who run as independents, thinking that they can take their name recognition and personal popularity and parlay that into holding onto the seat,

it didn't work two and a half years ago in Hamilton East Stoney Creek. Paul Miller came forth. The burnt orange himself. It didn't work two and a half years ago in Hamilton East Stoney Creek. Paul Miller came fourth. The burnt orange himself. It didn't work in Algoma, Manitoulin tonight. Michael Mantha came fourth. It didn't work in Hamilton Center tonight. Sarah Jama came fourth. Bobby Anne Brady's showing everybody

how to do it if you want to be an independent. We've got one more independent race, Don Valley North 21. Can we bring that one up, please? Vincent Coe was the former sitting member there. He came third. A better showing there tonight. But Don Valley North, like Don Valley East, like Don Valley West, is in the liberal column tonight. Dan, I guess that's an indication

that if your name is Don and your last name's Valley, you apparently let the liberals come. Yeah, Jonathan also is a former temporary city counselor for the area, and so certainly has some recognition. Also a longtime liberal staffer and someone who has some connection to the Liberal Party's operations in that community. So there's certainly, I think, obviously the result being

so strong doesn't surprise me, but it's clear that Vincent Coe was the spoiler here as well, right? I think you see that in a couple places. That writing in particular if you put the votes together if the Independent hadn't run then that would have had a different result I think. Yeah. Unlike Sarah Jama. Exactly. I'm just surprised Kim didn't say that that is the best result of the night for Barrett Stiles because I think she is really heaving a sigh of relief. Yeah I think that there are a lot of there are a lot of really exciting people that won tonight, and there are some people who...

Kim's just not going to bite. ...who didn't win, and well, you know, look, I said it before we went on air to Steve. Kim, I have a question that you... Hold on one second. Let me finish my statement. I just took a breath. I know that's unusual. Look, at the end of the day, while there are votes I wish go differently in certain writings, the voters are never wrong. I may not like it on some cases and I may really like it in others, but the voters get it right. And it's up to all of us watching to be better. It's all about every candidate and campaign to get out there and have those conversations

where people are at. And it is a situation where I believe that we really do need to get better at how do we engage. Kim, I take your point, but, and this is where I want the pollster in here. I take your point, but, and this is where I want the pollster in here. I take your point, but. The progressive conservatives so far on 90, is Ford speaking now?

Soon. OK, you want to cut to the shot? Let me get this out quickly here. Oh, he's up. He skipped convention again. You're not going to wait for the opposition leader to speak? Here we go. Doug Ford.

So much. Together we have made history. Together we have secured a strong, historic third majority mandate. A mandate to protect Ontario from the bottom of my heart. I thank you for being here, for sharing this incredible moment with me. To the thousands of volunteers right across this province who braved the cold, who knocked on over two million doors, tonight belongs to you. Thank you.

I wanna begin by thanking Carla and my daughters for your endless support. I couldn't do this without you. I want to begin by thanking Carla and my daughters for your endless support. I couldn't do this without you. I also want to thank, I also want to thank Marit Stiles, Bonnie Crombie, Mike Schreiner, and every single person who put their name on a ballot. We can disagree on policy, but there's no question, no question at all, each one of them loves our province and each one of them loves Canada, the greatest country on earth. Democracy only works if people are willing to step up and step forward.

Our province is stronger because of your decision to do so, so I want to thank all the candidates. During my time in office, I hope I've proven I will work with anyone, I will work with everyone to get things done. Now as we stare down the thread of Donald Trump's tariffs, I will continue to do just that. I will work with every level of government and every political stripe. Because fighting back against Donald Trump, standing up for Canada, it will take a full Team Ontario effort. It will take a full Team Canada effort.

Friends, over the last seven years, we've made so much progress together. Over one million more people are working today than when we were elected in 2018. We've attracted over $70 billion of new investments into our economy in new auto and battery plants, in our manufacturing sector, in new life science facilities, in Ontario's growing tech sector. Now together, we have to fight hard to protect our progress. This election, we ask the people for a mandate, a strong mandate that outlives and outlasts the Trump administration.

A mandate to do whatever it takes to protect Ontario. Well, friends, the people have spoken. They're ready to stand up for Canada. This election, we asked the people for a mandate to make Ontario the most competitive place in the G7 to invest, create jobs, and do business? The people said yes. We asked the people for a mandate to unleash the awesome economic potential of the Ring of Fire.

The people said yes. We asked the people for a mandate to build up our economy by tearing down internal trade barriers and the people said yes. We asked the people for a mandate to cut red tape and the excuses, streamline approvals and build things faster. The people said yes. We asked the people for a mandate to get the federal government out of our way so we can get shovels in the ground on the projects that will build the true, nor strong and free.

The people said yes. We asked the people for a mandate to build pipelines, to build rail lines and transmission lines, to diversify our trade, find new markets, new customers, and rely less on the old ones. The people said yes. We asked the people for a mandate to clean up our streets, crack down on crime, end encampments,

and protect schools and daycares from drug injection sites. The people said yes. And we asked the people for a mandate to build Highway 413, the Bradford Bypass, Highway 3, Highway 7, Highway 11, Highway 69, to bring sanity back to bike lanes, to tunnel the 401, to upload Ottawa LRT and build the future of go transit across Greater Toronto Area. The people said yes. This is our plan to protect Ontario. It's a plan that offers big and bold ideas.

It's a vision for the future of our great province and a vision for the future of our economy. Ontario is blessed with everything we need to succeed the best and most skilled workers anywhere in the world. A pipeline of world-class talent with 70,000 STEM graduates each and every single year. Northern Ontario's enormous, God-given potential offering every critical mineral the world wants, every critical mineral the world needs, and one of the cleanest, greenest grids in the world

with the first small modular nuclear reactors in the G7. You know, folks, it's no wonder the world has their eyes on us. They're looking at Ontario with envy. Now it's up to us to unlock our potential, roll up our sleeves to get to work. We'll retrain workers for better jobs and bigger paychecks. We'll retool companies for new customers and new markets. We'll reshore supply chains to bring good jobs back home. We'll rebuild roads and highways to keep people working and keep our economy competitive. Friends, this election, we promise to do whatever it takes to protect Ontario.

And I'm so proud of the support we received. Together, we made more inroads into new communities, with more people seeing themselves reflected in our party firefighters, our great police, uniformed locals, hospitality workers, and more trade unions, mayors from every region of Ontario, and every day hard hardworking people in Thunder Bay, Timmins, and Sault Ste. Marie. In Eastern Ontario, Hamilton and Windsor. In Brampton and Mississauga. Your support is truly humbling.

I will never, ever take it for granted. I will never stop working for you because we're in a battle for the future of our province, for the future of our country. I promise you this, I will wake up every day and I will fight like I've never fought before. I will fight for every autoworker in Windsor, Woodstock, St. Thomas and Oakville, in Brampton, Ingersoll, Oshawa, Alston and Cambridge. I will fight for every miner in Timmins, Thunder Bay and Sudbury. I will fight for every steelmaker in Sault Ste.

Marie, Nanticoke, and Hamilton. I will fight for every worker on the factory floor, every student starting their career, and every senior starting their retirement. I will fight for First Nations communities, for newcomers, for everyone in Ontario looking to get ahead. I will fight for you. This election was about who we are, about the future we choose for ourselves. Donald Trump thinks he can break us.

He thinks he can divide and conquer, pit region against region. Donald Trump doesn't know what we know. He is underestimating us. He is underestimating the resilience of the Canadian people, the Canadian spirit. Make no mistake, Canada won't start a fight with the US, but you better believe we're ready to win one. So, thank you. Thank you, everyone. So, folks, let me be clear.

Canada will never ever be the 51st state, and Canada is not for sale. Over the last weeks and months, I've seen the best of our province, the best of our country. Hard-working people standing up for what's decent, for what's right. It's you, the people, who will get us through this, who will fight for our future. Together, we're going to emerge from this stronger and more united than ever before.

From coast to coast to coast, we're going to stand together. We're going to fight. We're going to fight for our province. We're going to fight for our country. Together, we're going to fight for our province. We're going to fight for our country. Together, we're going to protect Ontario. I want to thank you and make God bless the people of Canada. May God bless the people of Ontario. Thank you.

Thank you, everybody. There's Doug Ford winning personal re-election in the riding of Etobicoke North, becoming the first premier in 66 years to win back-to-back to back to back majority governments. And Ford will add to the trick this year by becoming the first premier ever in 150, where are we now, 157 years, 158 years,

158 years to increase his seat count three straight majorities in a row. They came in with 79 seats, they're at 81 right now. And we may still have one more riding to hear from. I think King Von, is that Stephen Lecce's seat? Yeah, I think they kept the polls open there longer tonight, so we may still have to hear from them. Hi everybody, we're still waiting to hear from Marge Stiles.

We'll cut to her as soon as she speaks. Here's what I've got for total vote tonight. PC is 43%. NDP, 18.6%. Liberals, almost 30. 29.65. Greens, almost five. How well did the pollsters do in this election?

Pretty well, I think. And just a little bit on the math. As I said in the beginning of the night, well, we saw Doug Ford, the PC majority. We could not distinguish between the NDP and the liberals because, as you saw, the liberals have almost twice the popular vote. So in those tight writings, you give them the benefit of the doubt because they're getting that momentum on the popular vote.

So that's how Polly does those calculations. But again when you've got low voter turnout depressing that it's very very hard to predict which ones are going to show up by the NDP. I think the liberals their voters are less likely to show up sometimes in those writings so it really makes those it really makes that difference. But I think we're bang on on the popular vote. And then the vote efficiency is really depending on people showing up.

And you know, always. That's the key, isn't it? The vote efficiency for the liberals is terrible. You get 30% of the votes, and you're still in third place. Right, and some of the polling had suggested they might get 31% of the vote. And given some of these tight races we're seeing, like the difference between 30% and 31%

would have been the difference they might have picked up another three or four seats, with just the margins we're seeing tonight are just that thin. The efficiency really, I think, follows from something the party's been struggling with since, gosh, maybe the 2011 election, where they really started to lose parts of rural and northern Ontario. And these days, really heavily reliant on urban centers

in particularly. But when you can't concentrate that support in a handful of key writings the way the NDP can, you get results like tonight's. So we're expecting by the time the night is over, one more progressive conservative seat. Stephen Lecce is going to win again. That'll come up to 82.

We're also expecting from Ottawa Orléans, or depending on how you say it, Ottawa Orléans, a 14th liberal seat, because they'll surely hold that one there. I know on a night, this is a terrible question for me to ask, on a night when you've just won your third straight majority government, however, comma, I listen to the curse of politics all the time. You guys were on every day during the writ period.

And I heard four people predicting 90 plus seats for the conservatives, and total vote numbers up around 47%, 48%. And they're not there. Are you a little bit disappointed? seats for the conservatives and total vote numbers up around 47, 48 percent. And they're not there. No. Are you a little bit disappointed? No, I'm not at all. I mean, this is a solid majority.

You would have also heard me say on Curse of Politics that I learned a very valuable lesson from Mike Harris on his first win as premier. And I thought I was in my 20s. This is amazing. The numbers kept getting higher and higher. And he said, oh, Deb, we're going to get some folks we don't really want. And I couldn't understand it, right?

I was like, how do you know? What a huge majority. What did he mean by that? Well, what he meant by that is that there are only so many people that are going to get into cabinet. There are only so many people that you can make parliamentary assistance, no matter how hard the premier has tried in the past.

And people recognize that. And so caucus management, caucus discipline becomes just all the more difficult. If you were writing Marit Stiles' speech that she's about to give, on the one hand you say we're still official opposition, on the other hand you lost a few good people tonight. How do you try and make this all sound great? So part of the conversation she is having with Ontarians and should continue to have is owning that New Democrat space.

She has performed exceptional by every measure during this writ period. People have gotten to know her, they have liked her, they've learned Newfoundland slang from her videos. They've really gotten a chance to understand who she is and resonate with her. And she touched about 50 different writings over the course of the last month, in the bus and on the planes and in different communities and meeting people where they're at. Continue to do that. Obviously it it's never fun to lose some seats. You know we're about where we had for you know where we were with incumbents

re-offering you know, some new, some not. But look, Marit ran a hell of a first campaign as leader, and I'm excited to see where the growth patterns are because there's some extraordinary growth that she'll have. And you know, a little bit of joy. I mean, that woman has so much utter inner joy. And I'll tell you, having been in and around the campaign for the last month, the fun the team had cannot be overstated

or understated. It was a good time. Well, let's pass the microphone over to the once and future leader of His Majesty's loyal opposition. Here's Marit Stiles. Cheers. Marit! Marit!

Marit! Marit! Marit! Marit! Marit! Marit! Marit! Marit! Marit! My name is Maret Stiles. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Maret! Maret! Maret! Maret! Maret! Maret!

Maret! Maret! Maret! Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. Oh, wow. Hello, everyone. Bonjour, tout le monde.

My name is Maret Stiles. I'm a singer. I'm a singer. I'm a singer. I'm a singer. I'm a singer. I'm a singer. I'm a singer. I'm a singer. I tout le monde. My name is Marit Stiles. Look, we set out in this election to form a government on your side. Now, the results aren't everything that we hoped for. But the people of Ontario made their choice.

They've reelected the government, hoping it will help protect them from Donald Trump and his tariffs. And they've entrusted me and my team to do a different, but also very important job. job. Folks, we've been tasked again to serve the people of Ontario as their official opposition. And our job will be... NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! NDP! Our job is to hold this government to account. And that is the job that we are going to do with our and hope and optimism. And you know what? In another few years, we are going to face a rematch.

And I'm there for it, my friends. Now listen, I want you to know that I am congratulating tonight Premier Ford on his victory. And I really do want to offer him any possible help that we can provide in the face of the threat of Donald Trump. The threat is real. And I deeply believe that we can overcome it with a strong Team Ontario and a strong Team Canada approach. So you know, my message to the people of Ontario is in the face of Trump, we will stand together and we, the Ontario NDP, it is so wonderful to see you all here tonight. As I think about the last few weeks and the people that I have met from one end of this province to the other, I know many people are going to be disappointed that we weren't able to make the change that I think so many people need right now.

Right? Like real rent control. And protection from the rising cost of food and everything. Like a stronger public health care system. like a stronger public health care system, and a stronger, better school system to support all our kids. And I heard from a lot of working people out there who want a government that respects them. Whether they teach our children, drive a bus, care for our sick or our elderly,

grow our food or make the products that drive our economy. I heard from people, you want a government that's going to stand up for you, and one day I will deliver that government. Well, listen, I want to say as well, I heard from a lot of people out there on the road that want us to bring back some integrity to government and to stop the wasteful government scandals and you can count on us to continue to hold the government to account every single day. And I want to be really clear to every single Ontarian, no matter how you voted in this election, I will always be on your side and I will never, ever take your vote for granted. ever, ever take your vote for granted. Not ever. So look, we have been given a really big job to do, right? And we are going to do it for

the people of Ontario. But most of all tonight, I really want to say a big thank you. I want to say thank you to every single candidate from every party who put themselves forward in this election. In Canada, free, fair, peaceful elections is what we do. It is a big piece of why we are going to keep our country. You got that Donald? But look, I want to say thank you in particular to all the candidates in my party, in our party who stepped up, who stepped forward to run. You know, I feel our wins. I feel our wins, but I feel our losses too, right? And I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Thank you as well to all the volunteers.

There are thousands and thousands of you, campaign workers and our staff teams who gave so many hours to this race. You made our campaign possible. You inspired me. And can I just say, I think that possibly the pollsters are gonna have to go back and take another look at all of this. Because if there's one thing we know it's that New Democrats, our volunteers, the people who want the kind of change we're offering, they show up every time.

Now listen, I want to finish with saying this. Thank you to the labor movement. All the workers who came out to canvas to make calls to talk to voters, you are the foundation of our party and our movement. Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart. Thank you. And thank you as well. I have to give a big thank you to the people of Davenport. I am so honored by your vote. It has been a privilege and continues to be a privilege to represent you every single day. And of course, my family. I wanna, I gotta thank my family for supporting me.

As always, you are my strength. I love you all so much. And now my friends, let's get back to work. Thank you so much. And now, my friends, let's get back to work. Thank you so much. Let's do it. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Well, there's Mark Stiles, the leader of the Ontario Democratic

Party, the leader of His Majesty's official opposition, coming back one more time. We are going to go around the table here. We've got a bit of time left. What have we got here? We've got about 10 minutes left here. And I want to do just a little post-mortem with everybody around the table here on what was one

of the more unusual elections I think any of us have seen in the course of our lives. But I want to know what is going to stay with you tonight. When you think about this election years down the road, what's going to stay with you? Deb? Well, it's where we started tonight, Steve. You said it, the premier has an opportunity to do something that hasn't been done in eons. And that is to take three back to back to back majorities and increase his popular vote every single time.

And that's hard for an incumbent. It's hard for an incumbent who's faced the pandemic, who is facing the Trump tariffs, who's faced a very difficult economy. And yet, he did it. Kim Wright, what's going to stay with you tonight? First of all, the joy on my face is reflected on the joy you heard from art styles tonight.

Are there always things in every election campaign you want to, you know, get a couple of them back and do a couple of things differently for sure? But I have worked in politics. My first campaign was 1990. And the joy that this woman brings every single day in every community is just palpable. She is scrappy. She is feisty. But she also just has a joy to her.

And I think Ontarians got to see that. And boy, am I excited for what the next four years brings. Dan. I mean, in many ways, it's reminiscent of the last election in 2022 when we had really low voter turnout, really low engagement, very little media coverage and interest in the election. And it's largely because at the start of it, the outcome felt very certain. It didn't feel like a very competitive process.

And voters just weren't longing for change, right? And so I think we end up in a situation where when you have that kind of incumbent advantage on the part of the premier, and the outcome feels certain the part of the premier, and the outcome feels certain every step of the way, it's kind of hard for people to feel that their vote's going to really make a difference. And I think that's why we're seeing such low voter turnout once again.

You want an intervention there? I did. I did. And I know you're trying to go around the horn. But there actually was a huge appetite for change. I mean, you'll be able to tell us exactly what it was. But there was a huge appetite for change. It wasn't translating'll be able to tell us exactly what it was. But there was a huge appetite for change. It wasn't translating, though, into getting

rid of the premier. Another really, I think, odd point on this election campaign, because when you did the numbers, people said, yes, time for a change. And yet, we want Doug Ford. And yet, I mean, turnout's at 40%, right? It is difficult. Look, I think one of the things liberals are struggling with

right now, if I'm to put some diagnostic on a liberal campaign, it's in part, how do we confront a premier that governs a heck of a lot like a liberal? And I know, Deb, you won't love me saying that. Oh my gosh. This is a premier. We've had such a great conversation tonight, Dad. Deb, this is a premier that spends more than any liberal

premier before him. I will concede that. He puts a lot of money into public services, frankly. Not always showing results, but he spends a lot of money. He governs a lot like liberals traditionally do. And when liberals aren't confronting a conservative politician that's planning to cut and planning to do the things that I think voters tend

to expect from conservatives, it's really hard for us to confront that and make the case for change. Jackie. Yeah. Green's making history again tonight. Two seats in a general election. Really proud of their results and punching above their weight, as always. Ashlyn and Mike are going back to the legislature to be the conscious of the legislature

and show what it's like to be an adult in the room and work across party lines. So I'm really proud of them. Erin Kelly. I think listening to Doug Ford's speech tonight, you can see why he won a majority government, how he thanked every region of Ontario. And I think that was the key for him in this. That's what got him a majority government.

I think the two, the NDP and the liberals really spoke to city centers, really spoke to the groups that they usually get. But he thanked Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie, and he talked about mining and aluminum, and all of those things that are Ontario, instead of just housing and health care and the things that people

tried to make the election about. The election was about a lot of different things and he addressed all of those things. JMM. You know I think Premiers don't control events and I think of you know Kathleen Wynne winning in her majority in 2014 and there were people writing about how she was the next Bill Davis that she had restored the liberal brand and four years later that was not Kathleen Wynne's reputation in politics how she was the next Bill Davis that she had restored the liberal brand.

And four years later, that was not Kathleen Wynne's reputation in politics. And so Doug Ford has had a very good night. A win is a win. We don't know what the next four years will look like. And I'm honestly very curious to see how this is an election about the uncertainty of Trump tariffs. I am very interested to see how this premier deals with the uncertainty of the next four years.

And it might not even be Trump's tariffs that are the most radical change that we see. I mean, Doug Ford has already governed through a global pandemic. So, you know, it would have to be something even wilder than that to really shake things up, maybe. Well, two and a half years ago Doug Ford won 83 seats. He's got 82 tonight so far. The New Democrats had 31 seats. They got 25 so far. The Liberals came back with eight seats last time. They got 14 so far. The Greens won one in the last provincial election. They're at two right now and oh so close in Perry Sounda-Moscowka. Sorry about that.

Can I ask one thing about Perry Sounda-Moscowka? I mean this is the third or the second time I've paid really close attention to Perry Sounda-Moscowka. Matt Richter has come so close but there are other Green candidates out there and I'm wondering if you think in the next election is it going to make sense to keep pouring resources into Perry Sound? Obviously we don't know if Matt Richter is going to run again yet but are the Greens maybe missing good candidates elsewhere in the province by focusing so much in Perry Sound? Well I saw in other writings in southern rural areas of the province

where Greens are actually building. We had double-digit results in Wellington Halton Hills, in Bruce Grayle and Sound, in Dufferin-Caledon. So you know I think there's actually a number of ridings where they could build for the next four years if we get four years out of this next round. It would be nice to be able to build in southern Ontario as well. But I'll tell you in in Paris, I'm still good at the appetite for an independent local voice, like a green will provide. It's there.

It's there from corner to corner of that riding. And I don't know if you know this, but it's actually almost twice the size of PEI. So. You know what? One of the fun things we do at the end of every election night is take a look at the map of the province of Ontario. And you're about to see, just through the changes in color this is

what the 416 looked like at dissolution and now let's dissolve to what it looks like tonight that's where it's leading and elected tonight so there's a bit more red on that map including the south end of Etobicoke which is kind of shocking I think to a lot of folks. Let's keep looking around. Where are we going next? 905, at dissolution, all blue except Oshawa. What's it looking like now? Oh, a little patch of red, but not in Mississauga, where Bonnie Cromby had hoped it would be.

No, it's still overwhelmingly blue. And Jen French in Oshawa. Yeah, yeah, she held her seat. Central, at dissolution, all blue. And Jen French in Oshawa. Yeah, yeah. She held her seat. Central, at dissolution, all blue. And did it change at all tonight? Nope, not at all. Next region of the province, please. Let's move to Eastern Ontario.

That's what it looked like at dissolution. And that's what it looks like tonight. Not a lot of difference in Eastern Ontario either. Let's keep going. Next region of the province, Hamilton, Niagara, at dissolution. No red. Well, the New Democrats pick one up there tonight.

Next area of the province, Northeastern Ontario, at dissolution. Lots of orange, a few patches of blue, a lot more blue there tonight. Look at the progressive Conservative Party in Northern Ontario. Northwestern Ontario at dissolution, again, no red, orange and blue. And how about tonight at dissolution, there's those two green seats in the top right-hand corner. No red there, still no red.

And how about tonight? Not much changes. Doug Ford had spent a lot of time in Windsor, started and ended the campaign in Windsor, and really thought there was a possibility of picking up some Windsor seats. Didn't happen this time. OK, well, I think that's it.

I think we got to go. So let me do some thank yous here, OK? We want to thank all of our guests who have stayed here really late tonight. Thank you for your insight. Thank you for mostly civilized discussion here this evening. Got a little intense at times, but it was great to have you all here.

Thank you so much for doing it. JMM, some sugar, baby. We got to have you all here. Thank you so much for doing it. JMM, some sugar, baby. We got to do this again tomorrow, eh? Yes, absolutely. You and I are doing an on-poly podcast, right and early tomorrow. OK, we'll do that.

Nam and JN, thanks for helping set up the conversation as well. Some thank yous to all the people who work behind the scenes here. Stacey Duncey, Hilary Clark, Colin Ellis, thanks a lot, guys. Our team of terrific producers, Brett the Dream Weaver, Maya Abramson, Mike Attenborough, Preeti Bhooyan, Eric Bombaccino, Carla Lucchetta, Sarah Sweet,

and Constantina Varla-Costas, who we call Constant Craving for obvious reasons. To the production crew, well done, guys. You made everything look terrific here tonight. That was really wonderful. OK, a couple of final comments. Strange election tonight, eh? Worst turnout ever.

Not great. First time, however, that the NDP has come second three times in a row. That's never happened before. First time ever the liberals have come third three times in a row. That's never happened before. First time in 66 years that a Premier of Ontario wins three majority governments in a row. Leslie Frost, the Silver Fox, was the last guy to do it in 51, 55, and 59.

This may have been, as Dan called it, a Seinfeld election where nothing happened. But I'll tell you what, in some ways, it was also one for the history books. So we put that on the record as well. Most of all, our thanks to you for sticking with us tonight. We have really enjoyed bringing you to this coverage of Ontario's general election,

the 44th general election in the history of the province of Ontario. We urge you to stick with us again tomorrow night. John Michael McGrath and I are going to do something completely different. We've assumed that you've heard a lot of analysis tonight. We're going to spend some time tomorrow night answering all of the questions that you've had about what's gone on

over the past month or so. Some really great questions, and we'll fill in the blanks. Is that it for us? I think so. That's it for us. With almost no voice left, let me just say, I'm Steve Pagan from Midtown Toronto. Thank you, and good night.

Ugh. There we go, guys. Well done.