Thanks. Well said.
Author: Laurel L. Russwurm
Laurel L Russwurm 2025-05-08 15:27:07
Election Night in Canada
I am posting this final "Preliminary Election Result" table posted on the Elections Canada website on Election Night (April 28th, 2025) because they always remove the easily understandable table at some point after the election. The numbers will change/have changed as some polls are challenged and/or recounted, but this is what the data looked like at that point in time.
https://whoacanada.wordpress.com/2025/05/08/election-night-in-canada/
Election Night in Canada
I am posting this final “Preliminary Election Result” table posted on the Elections Canada website on Election Night (April 28th, 2025) because they always remove the easily understandable table at some point after the election. The numbers will change/have changed as some polls are challenged and/or recounted, but this is what the data looked like at that point in time.
Registered Political…

Election Night in Canada
I am posting this final “Preliminary Election Result” table posted on the Elections Canada website on Election Night (April 28th, 2025) because they always remove the easily understandable table at some point after the election. The numbers will change/have changed as some polls are challenged and/or recounted, but this is what the data looked like at that point in time.
Registered Political Party | Seats | % | Votes | % | |
Animal Protection Party | 0 | 0.0 % | 1,299 | 0.0 % | |
Bloc Québécois | 22 | 6.4 % | 1,232,853 | 6.3 % | |
Centrist | 0 | 0.0 % | 4,147 | 0.0 % | |
Canada First Party | 0 | 0.0 % | 3,198 | 0.0 % | |
Christian Heritage Party | 0 | 0.0 % | 10,165 | 0.0 % | |
Communist | 0 | 0.0 % | 5,462 | 0.0 % | |
Conservative | 144 | 42.0 % | 8,086,051 | 41.3 % | |
Green Party | 1 | 0.3 % | 244,952 | 1.2 % | |
Independent | 0 | 0.0 % | 36,166 | 0.2 % | |
Liberal | 169 | 49.3 % | 8,564,200 | 43.7 % | |
Libertarian | 0 | 0.0 % | 6,001 | 0.0 % | |
Marijuana Party | 0 | 0.0 % | 133 | 0.0 % | |
Marxist-Leninist | 0 | 0.0 % | 5,648 | 0.0 % | |
NDP (New Democratic Party) | 7 | 2.0 % | 1,237,263 | 6.3 % | |
No Affiliation | 0 | 0.0 % | 5,225 | 0.0 % | |
Rhinocéros | 0 | 0.0 % | 7,457 | 0.0 % | |
People’s Party | 0 | 0.0 % | 141,212 | 0.7 % | |
United Party of Canada (UP) | 0 | 0.0 % | 6,242 | 0.0 % | |
Total | 343 | 19,597,674 | |||
Polls Reporting: | 75,425 of 75,479 | 99.93 % | |||
Voter Turnout: | 19,597,674 of 28,525,638 registered electors | 68.7 % |
What’s good about it?
Canadians are lucky that all the frenzied strategic voting didn’t crush us under a majority government. This is always the best outcome, because no minority government has a blank cheque to do whatever they want.
And not so good?
For more than a century, despite the powerful disincentives of our First-Past-the-Post voting system, Canadians have worked very hard to make sure we retained our multi-party democracy.
Just watching what’s been going on south of the border should have driven home exactly why it is so important to keep it.
What’s bad?
But yet again, far too many Canadians were frightened into voting “strategically” for what we don’t want. And the result has been the decimation of our smaller parties. The NDP plummeted from 24 seats to 7, and the Greens lost 2 of their 3 seats. Even the Bloc Québécois lost ten— a third— of their seats, despite the party’s regional advantage. And Maxime Bernier’s People’s Party of Canada plummeted from an 840,993 vote high in the last election to a mere 141,212 votes in this.

There isn’t a single NDP seat in Ontario, for the first time in I don’t know how many elections. In recent months I’ve heard folks on both sides of the spectrum complain about the NDP for one reason or another.
Yet we have Mr Singh to thank for the fledgling National Universal Pharmacare and the Canadian Dental Care Plan. This was a gift of epic proportions, much like the gift of Universal Healthcare— for which we can thank an earlier NDP led by Tommy Douglas.
That same Universal Healthcare may be the only thing Canadians agree on across the political spectrum, and we’ve all grumbled as we watched it erode, thanks to successive Liberal and Conservative funding cuts and privatization. But just think; if instead of voting “lesser evil,” we had just voted for what we want, like, say, for Green or NDP candidates, by now we could have had a world class Universal Healthcare system to rival those in countries advanced enough to elect their governments with Proportional Representation.
I was very happy to learn Heather McPherson had retained her seat in Alberta, but sad that the riding off Hamilton Centre lost Matthew Green’s strong voice.
But for me, personally, the biggest loss in this election was that of Ontario’s only Green Party MP, Mike Morrice, in Kitchener Centre.

I can’t imagine any MP working harder than Mike Morrice has. He led the fight for the Canadian Disability Benefit, as well as being a strong advocate for needed improvements to our Universal Health Care system, access to affordable housing, giving voice to marginalized communities, standing up for Indigenous rights, reminding the Canadian government of its legal obligations not to be complicit in genocide and Israel’s other war crimes, working for Electoral Reform, and of course meaningful climate action. I certainly hope Mike will win back his seat in the next election.
Thank you, Mike.
Image Credits:
2025 Canadian Federal Election Map By Eric0892 – Own work, CC BY 4.0, Link
Screencap: Mike Morrice delivering petition e-4082 in Parliament [fair dealing – ParlVU ]
Instagram post excerpt by Mike Morrice
CKMS Meet The Candidate
Cambridge Greens: Vote Lux Burgess
“I’m running because my family’s future—and the future of all families—means everything to me. I want my loved ones to grow up in a world that’s safe, healthy, and full of opportunity. But with rising costs, and growing inequality, that future is at risk.

“I can’t just sit back and hope things get better—I want to be part of the solution. That’s why I’m fighting for real climate action, a fair economy, and stronger support for families.
“This isn’t just politics — it’s personal. It’s about protecting the people and places we love for generations to come.”
— Lux Burgess, 2025 Cambridge Green Party candidate
Even though time constraints prevented Lux from making it onto CKMS this time around, you can still catch his appearance in the Cambridge Chamber of Commerce Debate below. I especially like the fact that we’re *still* talking about #Electoral Reform. And that the lack of it inspires excellent candidates like Lux Burgess to seriously challenge complacent incumbents like MP Bryan May. https://luxburgess.ca/campaign/index.php/blog/
Hey Kitchener Centre: don’t forget to ReElect Mike Morrice!
If you haven’t already voted at one of the Advance Polls, do not forget Monday, April 28th, 2025 is ELECTION DAY 2025. Just because you know Mike Morrice is the best Member of Parliament Kitchener Centre has ever had, it is no reason to be complacent.

Not so long ago, an incumbent city councillor in this very community lost an election by a single vote. It wasn’t even that people felt it was tie for a change. It was that everyone expected her to be re-elected by a landslide, that her voters felt no real sense of urgency to get out and vote.
One vote is really the difference between winning and losing representation in countries still using terrible winner-take-all voting systems like ours. Don’t let your opportunity to vote slip away!
It took a very long time to get a local Green MP elected locally. Help make sure he is re-elected!
Like any Green MP, Mike doesn’t just represent the constituents in his own riding, he provides a vouce to otherwise disfranchised Greens across the country. I’m in Kitchener—Conestoga, yet he supported and presented my Petition e-4802 in Parliament. So even if you’re not exactly in Mike’e riding, there is still time to help out by volunteering or donating. Mike’s team will keep working as hard to re-elect Mike as Mike works for us in Ottawa until the very last minute. If getting to the polling station is a problem, you can even call the office and they’ll arrange transportation for you… no matter who you ‘re planning on voting for. And if you haven’t already, you can listen to Mike on CKMS radio:
Kitchener—Conestoga Greens
Unfortunately there was a hitch in our candidate’s registration, so we were unable to secure a Green candidate in Kitchener—Conestoga for this 2025 election.

Kitchener South—Hespeler: Vote Ethan Russell

Kitchener South—Hespeler candidate Ethan Russell will make another excellent Green MP for Waterloo Region. The photo above was taken just after Ethan’s CKMS “Meet The Candidate” spot, with show producer (and former Green Party candidate) Bob Jonkman. The air time time was made available to all Waterloo Region candidates, and it is interesting to see which did (or didn’t) show up.
Check out Ethan’s Green Party Page and, of course, listen to his CKMS broadcast here:
Waterloo Greens: Vote Simon Guthrie
We have yet another great Green Party candidate running in Waterloo.

And of course, check out Simon’s CKMS spot!
Find out more about Simon at https://www.simonguthrie.ca/

REMEMBER: Monday April 28th, 2025 is Election Day in Canada
While I would obviously like to see you cast your ballot for the Green Candidate in your riding, I sincerely hope you choose to vote for the candidate who will best represent you. Since my own riding is without a Green Candidate, after checking out the available candidates, I have decided my vote will go to for Bozorgzad, the excellent NDP candidate running in Kitchener—Conestoga.
Overall the opinion polls seem to indicate the Liberals are on track for another majority government. As far as I’m concerned, that would be an most unfortunate outcome. One of the many things wrong with what we call “strategic voting” these days (ie voting for a candidate you don’t want instead of the one you do), is that it helps prop up the First Past The Post two party Liberal/Conservative status quo.
We’re at a point where neither Liberal or Conservative governments can win a faux First Past The Post Majority Governments without all the vote suppression inspired by our Single Member Plurality voting system (which means a party doesn’t need to win a simple majority of the vote to win 100% of the power) and now also propped up by the pressure we unrepresented voters feel to vote “Strategically” for the least worst candidate. That’s not how representative democracy is supposed to work.
But it is the system Justin Trudeau chose over his own ERRE Committee’s recommendation to adopt a solidly Proportional Representation voting system. Because “fear voting” has made it possible for Liberal Governments to dominate our politics for so much of Canada’s history.
Strategic voting doesn’t do what they advertise. If it did, we only would have had to do it once. Giving one party a mandate it can’t earn from a majority of voters a majority of the power doesn’t result in a strong democratic government, the “strength” it produces is autocratic rule that polarizes us all. Even with our inadequate unrepresentative First Past The Post voting system, Canadians can get a lot closer to a representative Representative Democracy by voting for the independent candidates and small parties we actually want to vote for.
If we vote for what we want— regardless of the Opinion Polls, Op Eds and big money with which which defenders of the status quo successfully dominate our political discourse— the diverse Canadian electorate actually has the power to elect nothing but minority governments.
That means electing governments that will actually represent a majority of the voters. It will make governing a lot harder for our elected politicians because they will have to learn to work together instead of painting each other as the boogeyman, but it is the only way (short of Proportional Representation) we can achieve truly strong government supported by most Canadians.
I truly believe in democracy. I trust Canadians to do the right thing. And that starts with voting. And even better, voting for what we want.
Regards,
Laurel Russwurm
Kitchener—Conestoga Greens
Laurel L Russwurm 2025-04-03 01:07:14
Josie tdiscusses US military reliance on recruiting people in poverty.
I know this isn't new from "An Officer and a Gentleman" was the fact local girls depended on hooking up with young officers as a ticket out of poverty.
I've long thought an important aspect of the American military-industrial complex is providing good paying jobs & university educations in a world where most good paying factory jobs have been shipped overseas.
#UBI would be so much better.
Laurel L Russwurm 2025-04-02 17:40:10
Palestine Talks: In Conversation with Josie Guilbeau
Wow. Very interesting TRT interview with an amazing American with a background in the military, first as a combat medic, then in intelligence. She talks about her political awakening and her trip to Palestine.
Sad fact: 22 daily suicides in American military personnel
phrase of the day: the economic draft
Laurel L Russwurm 2025-03-29 16:37:00
Tufts University PhD student Rumeysa Öztürk was targeted by the Trump Administration even though she was legally there on a student visa.
Ms Öztürk was picked up by masked men in what looked like a kidnapping, but turned out to be an ICE apprehension.
(I guess even ICE is embarrassed by what they are doing.)
The former Fulbright scholar is being deported for co-writing a school paper Op-ed in the country formerly known as "the land of the free."
Laurel L Russwurm 2025-03-29 15:15:29
Seems President Trump sees the whole world as his to command.
Laurel L Russwurm 2025-02-26 15:14:03
After posting a bunch of comments on this, I am furious about the supposed "Green Party" candidate in my riding (Kitchener—Conestoga) who has not campaigned at all — except for showing up at this debate to endorse the NDP candidate.
Can you say "ringer"?