338 Sunday Update: What Will Be Left for the Liberals?

With the Liberals coming up short in Toronto—St. Paul's, few seats across the country should be considered "safe" for the LPC.

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The Liberals lost the Toronto—St. Paul’s by-election on Monday night, and it appears as though the stunning defeat sent shock waves through Liberals ranks, as it rightly should have. St. Paul’s had been in the Liberal column since 1993, and that included the Ignatieff-led LPC shellacking of 2011 when the party was reduced to 34 of 308 seats.

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For those unfamiliar with the party pages on 338Canada, we include rankings of ridings from safest to least likely for each of the major parties (see federal party pages here: CPC, LPC, NDP, BQ, GPC). In last Sunday’s update, Toronto—St. Paul’s was ranked 221st on the CPC page, meaning that, according to last week’s numbers, if the Conservatives took St. Paul’s in a general election, the party would most likely win 220+ seats.

Consider the following:

1. Federal polls (see full list here) have indicated Liberal support has been consistently tanking since last fall, with only the Conservatives benefiting from this slide. NDP support has remained mostly flat.

2. Although few expected the Liberals to win the Durham by-election last winter, the results suggested the LPC had lost ground in the GTA by roughly the proportions polls and projections had forecast.

3. Now add to the pile Monday’s results in Toronto—St. Paul’s, which pushed this narrative further, since the results were even higher than anticipated for the Conservatives (a 17-point increase from the 2021 results, from 25% to 42%).

The data points add up, and pile on.

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Let us first review last week’s poll and get to the 338Canada update (which, naturally, includes the St. Paul’s by-election results).

(The following is for 338Canada subscribers only. The main site will be updated tonight. Please consider subscribing to support my work!)