A few observations from yesterday’s election results. Among the five polling houses that produced late polls, three (Ipsos, SES and Decima) had a 1% error or less in their calculation of the Liberal- Conservative differential. Two(Strategic Counsel and Angus-Reid) had a 4% error.

The seat projection model of 68-29-10  had an average 2 seat per party error level in contrast with the actual result of 71-26-10. This error level is identical to its application in the previous four Ontario elections as presented in the “track record”.

The results of the various categories in the constituency projection map were as follows:

Gold - 8/8 NDP. 

Red- 58/60 Liberal, 1 Conservative (Sarnia-Lambton), 1 NDP (Hamilton East). 

Pink (Lib Leaners)- 6/6 Liberal. 

Grey(too close to call) Lib/Con   Liberal-4, Conservative- 3. Lib/NDP   Liberal-1,NDP- 1.

Pale Blue -4/7 Conservative. 3 Liberal (Brampton West, Mississauga South, Kitch.-Conestoga).

Blue- 21/22 Conservative, 1 Liberal (Barrie).    BK

(This column appeared in The Record and Guelph Mercury on Oct. 11)

They say lightening never strikes twice in the same place. Last night, John Tory and his inner circle of number crunchers were praying that the old adage was wrong.

Lightening had already struck the Progressive Conservative campaign once – in the form of a bolt that knocked a gaping hole in the party’s support. That bolt was, of course, the policy on public funding for faith-based schools. What the Tories needed last night was another lighting bolt – even better, a miracle – to put their staggering campaign back into contention.

As they poked and prodded at the numbers from their internal polls as well as the published ones, the Tory crunchers thought they saw hope – hope that their damage control had worked, hope that the  anticipated Liberal rout would not materialize, hope that Ontario would wake up this morning with a minority government. A Liberal minority, to be sure, but after a campaign like this one, holding the Grits to a minority would be a victory indeed.

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(This column appeared in The Record and Guelph Mercury on Oct. 9)

Ontario NDP leader Howard Hampton lost his cool the other day, lashing out at the news media and the other political parties for ignoring the important issues in this provincial election.

It’s a shame he didn’t lose his cool earlier. Hampton was right. It is too easy – and wrong – to dismiss his outburst as the whining of a third-party leader who has been unsuccessful in pushing his priorities to the front of the public agenda.

The 2007 election will be remembered as a campaign that was hijacked by a red herring – the herring in question being the issue of public funding for Muslim, Jewish, fundamentalist Christian and other faith-based schools.

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(This column appeared in The Record and Guelph Mercury on October 4)

This Ontario election campaign is winding down as we head into the Thanksgiving weekend. The parties have emptied their cupboard of policies. The leaders have exhausted their store of promises. The candidates are nearing the end of their marathon of door-knocking, coffee parties and all-candidate debates – one of the last of which took place last night in the Preston end of Cambridge.

In Ontario electoral history, 2007 seems destined to go into the books as an exercise in preserving the status quo. Twenty or 30 years from now, people may say nothing much happened in the 2007 election, nothing really changed.

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(This column appeared in The Record and Guelph Mercury on Oct. 1, 2007)

Did John Tory lose the Ontario election away back in June when he announced that a Progressive Conservative government would extend to all religious schools the same public funding that Catholic schools have long enjoyed?

Looking back, I think he did.

Tory had his reasons, back then. He had made a commitment during the 2004 Conservative leadership campaign to extend funding to non-Catholic religious schools. He felt bound to honour that commitment. How could he attack Premier Dalton McGuinty’s record of broken promises if he did not keep his own word?

He undoubtedly felt, as he has said many times, that fairness and equity demanded that other faith-based schools receive equal financial treatment with Ontario’s constitutionally-protected Catholic schools.

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