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The NDP has a slight early lead in Winnipeg while remaining in a three-way race with the Liberals and the Bloc Québécois in Montreal as ballots continue to be counted in two crucial federal byelections.

Laura Palestini, the Liberal candidate in the party’s Montreal stronghold of LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, gave a speech thanking her volunteers just a little over an hour after the polls closed and early results showed her trailing in third spot.

The NDP are so far also holding on to their own seat in the Winnipeg riding of Elmwood — Transcona. The first 7,210 ballots reported by Elections Canada show 48.1per cent of votes have gone to the NDP and 43.8 per cent to the Conservatives, with the vast majority of votes yet to be counted.

While byelections aren’t usually credited with much significance on Parliament Hill, the votes in Winnipeg and Montreal are being treated as bellwethers of the political shifts happening in Canada.

The Elmwood — Transcona seat has been vacant since the NDP’s Daniel Blaikie left federal politics.

The New Democrats are hoping to hold onto the riding and polls suggest the Conservatives are in the running.

LaSalle—Émard—Verdun opened up when former justice minister David Lametti left politics.

Polls suggested the race was tight between the Liberal candidate and the Bloc Québécois, but the NDP were hopeful it could win.

Palestini thanked her volunteers as the results rolled in Monday night.

“Thanks to your efforts, our message resonated,” she said in French at a Liberal gathering in Dilallo Burger, a Ville-Émard institution dating back to 1929.

“Perhaps tomorrow morning, early, we will hear what the people of LaSalle—Émard—Verdun want as their member of parliament.”

She departed shortly after.

Meanwhile at the NDP headquarters, cries of joy erupted as the first poll results were showed.

Montrealer Graham Juneau said that despite all the campaigning, he and many of his friends are “relatively disengaged.”

He opted to vote for no one, to make a point about “a lack of confidence in the political establishment in Canada.”

“At least amongst my peers, there hasn’t been a groundswell of enthusiasm for any of the particular parties,” he said.

Liberal ministers have visited the area several times as the party worked hard to keep the riding it has held for decades.

Ahead of the results, Liam Olsen, a volunteer with the Young Liberals of Canada, said he was feeling optimistic.

He had travelled to Montreal from Ottawa to knock on doors on byelection day.

“It’s going to be a close one,” he said.

“Unpredictable things can happen. But definitely good vibes at the doors today.”

Outside the headquarters of the Bloc Québécois in Verdun, volunteer Sarah Plante, 21, said she was feeling similarly confident.

A Bloc victory in Montreal would prove that the Bloc has a place in Montreal and would send a “strong message” to the federal government that the party represents the interests of all Quebecers, she said.

The stakes are particularly high for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who faced calls for his resignation last June when the Conservatives took over a Liberal stronghold seat in a Toronto byelection.

The loss sent shock waves through the governing party, as the Liberals were faced with the stark reality of their plummeting poll numbers.

C.B. Singh, an 85-year-old Montrealer who has been volunteering for the Liberals since Pierre Elliott Trudeau was prime minister, said he still supports Justin Trudeau.

“I know his father, so I’m for him,” he said. “He is still popular among the immigrants.”

Some strategists have suggested that Jagmeet Singh’s leadership could come under similar scrutiny if the NDP fails to hold onto the Winnipeg seat.

As early results rolled in there were cheers from supporters in the NDP camp in Winnipeg.

Singh took a political gamble on signing a pact with Trudeau in 2022 to prevent an early election in exchange for progress on NDP priorities.

While that deal has yielded a national dental care program, legislation to ban replacement workers and a bill that would underpin a future pharmacare program, the results haven’t translated to gains in the polls.

Singh pulled out of that deal just weeks ago in a bid to distance his party from the Liberals and try to make the next election a two-way race between himself and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre.

The Conservatives have made an aggressive play for the riding by appealing to traditional NDP voters on issues related to labour and affordability.

“Jagmeet Singh and Justin Trudeau are the same person,” Poilievre said in a social media video posted Sunday ahead of Monday’s vote.

A vote for the Conservative candidate in Elmwood — Transcona is a vote to “fire Justin Trudeau and axe the tax,” he said.

Elections Canada warned on social media Monday evening that the results in the Montreal riding could take longer than usual to be counted because of the record number of candidates.

There are 91 names on the ballot, making it the longest list in the history of federal elections. Most are affiliated with a group protesting Canada’s first-past-the-post voting system.

“Results will be available tonight or early tomorrow. Thank you for your patience,” Elections Canada said on X Monday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.

WINNIPEG – A backbencher with Manitoba’s NDP government has been removed from caucus over his link to convicted sex offender Peter Nygard.

Caucus chair Mike Moyes says it learned early Monday that a business partner of Mark Wasyliw is acting as Nygard’s criminal defence lawyer.

Moyes says Wasyliw was notified of the decision.

“Wasyliw’s failure to demonstrate good judgment does not align with our caucus principles of mutual respect and trust,” Moyes said in a statement.

“As such MLA Wasyliw can no longer continue his role in our caucus.”

Nygard, who founded a fashion empire in Winnipeg, was sentenced earlier this month to 11 years in prison for sexually assaulting four women at his company’s headquarters in Toronto.

The 83-year-old continues to face charges in Manitoba, Quebec and the United States.

Moyes declined to say whether Wasyliw would be sitting as an Independent.

The legislature member for Fort Garry was first elected in 2019. Before the NDP formed government in 2023, Wasyliw served as the party’s finance critic.

He previously came under fire from the Opposition Progressive Conservatives for continuing to work as a lawyer while serving in the legislature.

At the time, Wasyliw told the Winnipeg Free Press that he was disappointed he wasn’t named to cabinet and planned to continue working as a defence lawyer.

Premier Wab Kinew objected to Wasyliw’s decision, saying elected officials should focus on serving the public.

There were possible signs of tension between Wasyliw and Kinew last fall. Wasyliw didn’t shake hands with the new premier after being sworn into office. Other caucus members shook Kinew’s hand, hugged or offered a fist bump.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.

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OTTAWA – Liberal House leader Karina Gould lambasted Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre as a “fraudster” Monday morning after he said the federal carbon price is going to cause a “nuclear winter.”

Gould was speaking just before the House of Commons is set to reopen following the summer break. Monday is the first sitting since the end of an agreement that had the NDP insulate the Liberals from the possibility of a snap election, one the Conservatives are eager to trigger.

With the prospect of a confidence vote that could send Canadians to the polls, Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet cast doubt on how long MPs will be sitting in the House of Commons.

“We are playing chicken with four cars. Eventually, one will eat another one, and there will be a wreckage. So, I’m not certain that this session will last a very long time,” Blanchet told reporters on Monday.

On Sunday Poilievre said increasing the carbon price will cause a “nuclear winter,” painting a dystopian picture of people starving and freezing because they can’t afford food or heat due the carbon price.

He said the Liberals’ obsession with carbon pricing is “an existential threat to our economy and our way of life.”

The carbon price currently adds about 17.6 cents to every litre of gasoline, but that cost is offset by carbon rebates mailed to Canadians every three months.

The Parliamentary Budget Office provided analysis that showed eight in 10 households receive more from the rebates than they pay in carbon pricing, though the office also warned that long-term economic effects could harm jobs and wage growth.

Gould accused Poilievre of ignoring the rebates, and refusing to tell Canadians how he would make life more affordable while battling climate change.

“What I heard yesterday from Mr. Poilievre was so over the top, so irresponsible, so immature, and something that only a fraudster would do,” Gould said from Parliament Hill.

The Liberals have also accused the Conservatives of dismissing the expertise of more than 200 economists who wrote a letter earlier this year describing the carbon price as the least expensive, most efficient way to lower emissions.

Poilievre is pushing for the other opposition parties to vote the government down and trigger what he calls a “carbon tax election.”

Despite previously supporting the consumer carbon price, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has been distancing himself from the policy.

Singh wouldn’t say last week whether an NDP government would keep the consumer carbon price. On Monday, he told reporters Canadians were already “doing their part” to fight climate change, but that big polluters are getting a “free ride.”

He said the New Democrats will focus this fall on affordability issues like housing and grocery costs, arguing the Liberals and Conservatives are beholden to big business.

“Their governments have been in it for CEOs and big corporations,” he told reporters Monday on Parliament Hill.

Poilievre intends to bring a non-confidence motion against the government as early as this week but would likely need both the Bloc and NDP to support it. Neither have indicated an appetite for triggering an election.

Gould said she has no “crystal ball” over when or how often Poilievre might try to bring down the government.

“I know that the end of the supply and confidence agreement makes things a bit different, but really all it does is returns us to a normal minority parliament,” she said.

“That means that we will work case-by-case, legislation-by-legislation with whichever party wants to work with us,” she said, adding she’s already been in touch with colleagues in other parties to “make Parliament work for Canadians.”

The Liberals said at their caucus retreat last week that they would be sharpening their attacks on Poilievre this fall, seeking to reverse his months-long rise in the polls.

Freeland suggested she had no qualms with criticizing Poilievre’s rhetoric while having a colleague call him a fraudster.

She said Monday that the Liberals must “be really clear with Canadians about what the Conservative Party is saying, about what it is standing for — and about the veracity, or not, of the statements of the Conservative leader.”

Meanwhile, Gould insisted the government has listened to the concerns raised by Canadians, and received the message when the Liberals were defeated in a Toronto byelection in June, losing a seat the party had held since 1997.

“We certainly got the message from Toronto-St. Paul’s and have spent the summer reflecting on what that means and are coming back to Parliament, I think, very clearly focused on ensuring that Canadians are at the centre of everything that we do moving forward,” she said.

The Liberals are bracing, however, for the possibility of another blow Monday night, in a tight race to hold a Montreal seat in a byelection there. Voters in LaSalle—Émard—Verdun are casting ballots today to replace former justice minister David Lametti, who was removed from cabinet in 2023 and resigned as an MP in January.

The Conservatives and NDP are also in a tight race in Elmwood-Transcona, a Winnipeg seat that has mostly been held by the NDP over the last several decades.

There are several key bills making their way through the legislative process, including the online harms act and the NDP-endorsed pharmacare bill, which is currently in the Senate.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.