Union leaders give thumbs up to New Democrat wins in Windsor-Essex
CBC News | Posted: October 20, 2015 8:16 PM | Last Updated: October 20, 2015
Local union leaders say they are pleased with Monday's election results, even though Windsor-Essex won't have a single representative who is part of either the governing party or the Official Opposition.
The voters in all three Windsor-Essex ridings ended up electing New Democrat members to Parliament. Brian Masse was re-elected in the riding of Windsor West, while Cheryl Hardcastle won a seat in Windsor-Tecumseh and Tracey Ramsey won a seat in Essex.
The New Democrats' success in the region came as Canadians across the country elected 184 Liberals to Parliament, meaning that party will form the next government.
The Conservatives won 99 seats, sending them back into Opposition after nine years in government.
The New Democrats fell to third-party status in Monday's election, winning just 44 seats.
Chris Taylor, the president of Unifor Local 200, said the scenario that has emerged in Windsor-Essex is win-win — the New Democrat candidates can bring the region's concerns forward in Ottawa and they will likely be able to work with the Liberals in a way they couldn't with the Conservatives.
"I don't see anything but good out of this," he told CBC News in an interview on election night.
Furthermore, Taylor said he had personally met with Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, who is now the prime minister-designate, earlier this year and believes he has a grasp of the issues facing the auto industry.
'We bashed the Conservatives'
But Taylor warned that his union would remain engaged in a fight against the Pacific Rim trade deal known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) that Canada agreed to, in principle, in the final days of the election.
The deal must still be ratified by Parliament. Taylor said his union feels it something that must be stopped.
"We bashed the Conservatives heavily during this campaign on the TPP. We're not going to let that go," he said. "This agreement is still bad for Canada, still extremely bad for the automotive industry and we're going to make sure that the Liberals and our new candidates in the NDP understand our concerns and bring that voice [to Ottawa]."
Dino Chiodo, the president of Unifor Local 444, said that his union had sought to see an end to a Conservative government in Ottawa and it had also supported the NDP candidates in Windsor-Essex.
"We're happy to see the results that we saw," he said in an interview Tuesday.
Like Taylor, he said he believes a Liberal government would be more receptive to issues affecting Canadians than the prior government was.
"We know that there is more of an open door with the Liberals than there ever would be with Conservatives," Chiodo said.
'We don't have those champions'
Lydia Miljan, an associate professor of political science at the University of Windsor, said it was doubtful that the local New Democrat candidates would be able to exercise much influence in Ottawa under a Liberal government.
She said that the region benefited from having Liberal members who were part of Liberal governments in the past. But that's not the case with the results from Monday's election.
"We don't have those champions at the caucus, or in cabinet and I think that's where we're going to see the real effects," she told CBC News in an interview on Tuesday.
Miljan said the unions' support of the New Democrats would have seemed like the strategic choice at the start of the election campaign when the party seemed well-positioned in the polls.
When things changed during the campaign, Miljan said there wasn't much the unions could do about their approach.
"They sort of had to stick with their game plan, but as a result, they ended up winning seats in Windsor to the exclusion of the Liberals and that could be problematic for the region," she said.
Matt Farrell, a political science professor at London's Fanshawe College, said members from outside of the governing party simply have a greater distance from the people who wield political power.
"It really does help to have an MP from your region who can kind of, I guess, whisper in the ear of the prime minister, if you will," he told CBC Radio's Afternoon Drive on Tuesday.
"The thinking is that, you know, if your riding is important or there are seats to defend there, then the government will look to shore up that support. Maybe they will do that with spending projects or just attention to the riding in general. Without that representation, there is that fear that you're going to get left out."