Thousands of Liberals will be in Montreal this weekend for the party’s annual convention just as voters in the suburban riding of Terrebonne, about 40 km north, get ready to cast ballots in a key byelection on Monday.
The nearby location is coincidental, said Marjorie Michel, the minister of health and a longtime party organizer in Quebec.
But that doesn’t mean it isn’t helpful to have so many potential door-knockers in the neighbourhood.
“I can tell you, we are giving it our all,” Michel said.
The convention in Montreal was scheduled and planned long before the Supreme Court of Canada annulled the result of last April’s election in Terrebonne in February.
That also means Prime Minister Mark Carney knew where the Liberals would be on Saturday when he set the election date for Monday.
Voters in two Toronto-area Liberal strongholds will also go to the polls on Monday, but the byelections in Scarborough Southwest and University—Rosedale are not seen as competitive races. Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner said recently on her own podcast that the Liberals are “expected to win hands down” in both.
In other words, barring something extraordinary, Carney’s year-old minority government will morph into a majority on Monday.
The question is whether the Bloc Québécois can win back its traditional stronghold in Terrebonne and make the Liberal control over the House of Commons more tenuous.
Both parties are working hard in a rematch between Liberal Tatiana Auguste and Bloc Québécois candidate Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné.
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Wins in both Toronto ridings would give the Liberals 172 seats in the House of Commons, the minimum number for a majority government. But because the House Speaker is a Liberal, the government and opposition parties would each have 171 voting members.
Speakers do not ordinarily vote in the House. They can be called upon to break a tie, and in that case the Speaker will vote to maintain the status quo.
Sinclair-Desgagné said voters aren’t worried about that.
The fact that four MPs — three from the Conservative benches and one from the NDP — have crossed the floor to join the Liberals in recent months means the campaign isn’t about the government’s hold on power, she said.
People are focused on things like public transit, the cost of living, “and the proposed corridor for the Alto high-speed rail line, which encompasses more than half of the city of Terrebonne,” Sinclair-Desgagné said in a written statement in French.
Michel agreed people at the doors are focused on the price of gas and housing.
Carney tapped Michel to lead the Liberal efforts to win in Terrebonne. She said in an interview Wednesday that it’s a close race.
Dozens of Liberal MPs have stopped by Terrebonne to lend a hand, including all 43 from Quebec.
Carney’s office wouldn’t say whether he planned to campaign in Terrebonne on the weekend, but he was in the riding Feb. 17, shortly before calling the byelection.
Housing Minister Gregor Robertson and Quebec lieutenant Joel Lightbound are both scheduled to host announcements on Thursday in ridings next door.
“It means that Canadians are supporting Prime Minister Carney and his team if we win this election,” Michel said.
The governing party has a significant financial advantage over the Bloc.
North Star Public Affairs partner Fred DeLorey, a former Conservative campaign manager, was the first to point out that Elections Canada’s rules cap spending per byelection, but a party with candidates in more than one race is able to allocate that money as it sees fit.
The Liberals, who are running in all three races, could outspend the Bloc in Terrebonne three-to-one.
A spokesperson for the Liberal Party of Canada would not say whether the party has taken that option, only saying in an email that the Liberals follow all Elections Canada rules.
Michel said the vibe is very different from the last byelection in Quebec, when the Liberals lost a stronghold seat in LaSalle — Emard — Verdun in the waning weeks of Justin Trudeau’s government in 2024.
“We had an army, and you can see even with the army, we didn’t win it,” she said.
This time, Michel said, people are feeling positive. “I would say the difference is, now we are fighting to win.”
For its part, the Bloc has hosted events and press conferences in Terrebonne with Parti Québécois Leader Paul St-Pierre Plamondon.
Bloc Leader Yves-François Blanchet, who was not available for an interview, plans to hold a press conference on Thursday in Terrebonne flanked by his 21 MPs, before heading out door-knocking.
The push from both parties is to ensure their supporters actually get out to the polls.
Elections Canada reported some 18,200 people voted in advance polls over the weekend, about 20 per cent of those eligible to cast a ballot in Terrebonne.
Voters will be faced with a special write-in ballot, after dozens of candidates signed up as part of the Longest Ballot Committee protest, and Elections Canada has said that could slow the results on Monday.
Blanchet brushed off concerns about that last month.
“The easiest solution is for Nathalie to win with a very large majority,” he told reporters in the House of Commons.
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