Manitoba’s forty-second general election, held on September 10, is in the books, and Premier Brian Pallister’s Progressive Conservatives have won a second majority government. Unofficial tallies as of Tuesday night peg the seat counts at 36 for the PCs, 18 for the NDP, and 3 for the Manitoba Liberals.
This majority is only second in magnitude to the one won by the PCs in April 2016.
In the Springfield-Ritchot riding, newly created in advance of this year’s election, PC Ron Schuler came out victorious with 5,661 votes (59.5 percent). In second place was Sam Okoi of the NDP (1,976 votes, 20.8 percent), followed by Garrett Hawgood of the Greens (1,065 votes, 11.2 percent), and Sara Mirwaldt of the Manitoba Liberals (813 votes, 8.5 percent).
The election saw 468,959 votes cast, which accounts for an overall voter turnout of 55 percent. In Springfield-Ritchot, the turnout was much higher than average, at 65.1 percent. In fact, that’s the fourth highest voter turnout figure in the entire province, taking into account all 57 ridings. The only constituencies with higher turnout were Interlake-Gimli, Lac du Bonnet, and Red River North—all of which remained in the hands of the PCs.
The communities of Île-des-Chênes and St. Adolphe previously belonged to the Dawson Trail riding, which the PCs had won in 2016 with 52.9 percent of the vote, while Niverville and Ste. Agathe belonged to the Morris riding, which the PCs had won with 74.6 percent of the vote.
The Morris riding had been represented by PC MLA Shannon Martin, who made the shift this year to the McPhillips riding north of Winnipeg. He squeaked out a victory there by just 105 votes over his NDP opponent, meaning the result is likely to go to a recount.
PC MLA Bob Lagassé was comfortably re-elected to his seat in the redrawn Dawson Trail riding.
Although Manitobans may be election-weary, they’ll have another go-round with democracy. This morning, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a federal election, meaning we will be going to the polls again 41 days from now, on October 21. The entire southeast region falls into the Provencher riding and is currently represented by Ted Falk of the Conservative Party of Canada.
As the federal campaign begins, polls show the Liberals and Conservatives in a virtual dead heat in terms of the popular vote, although the Liberals are strongly favoured to come out ahead in seats.
Niverville residents will then go to the polls a third time, on November 26, for a plebiscite regarding the possibility of cannabis retail.