January 24, 2006
The Day After the Election
Garth Turner CON 30578 44.18%
Gary Carr LIB 28498 41.17%
Anwar Naqvi NDP 6110 8.83%
Kyle Grice GRN 4026 5.82%
There are the results for Halton taken from the CBC website. Pretty much what we expected except for our own party. We had hoped to reach that elusive 10% mark this time around and we had hoped to do it on the coat tails of a strong national campaign and with the slimmest possible local campaign. I'll explain why later but first lets take a look at the history and numbers.
Halton:
1891-1930 inclusive - CON
1935-49 inclusive - LIB
1953, 1957, 1958 - PC
1962, 1963, 1965, 1968 - LIB
1972 - PC
1974 - LIB
1979, 1980, 1984; PC
Halton-Peel: 1988; PC, 1993; LIB
Halton: 1997, 2000, 2004; LIB
1984: NDP @ 14.6%, Kevin Flynn, riding includes Oakville
1988: NDP @ 13%, Fern Wolf, riding includes part of Burlington, all
of Halton Hills and part of Peel
1993: NDP @ 2.4%, Norma Peterson, riding includes part of Burlington,
all of Halton Hills and part of Peel
1997: NDP @ 4.5%, Jay Jackson, riding looks like present plus towns
of Halton Hills
2000: NDP @ 4.4%, Brenda Dolling, riding looks like present plus
towns of Halton Hills
2004: NDP @ 8.2%, Anwar Naqvi, present day riding
This gives us our first graph.
NOTE: Whenever the riding is more rural the NDP vote drops,
whenever it is more urban the NDP vote increases. Is our slow growth
coupled to the urbanization of the riding?
2006: Average family income is $103,617 (highest in Canada) and
unemployment is a low 3.5 per cent. Total Votes cast = 69212, better
than 2004. Halton riding seems to have 50-60,000 votes cast each
election. Anyway the first number of interest is 1246. That number
represents 1.8% of the votes cast and it represents the extra number
of votes we would need to reach the 10% mark. This is where I start
wondering what we could have done, in Halton, to get that many more
votes. What will we do next time to get that many more votes? 1246.
Its a big number. Currently we have a contact database that is aging
and contains 350 records. The riding has around 120 members. The
campaign team consisted of just a handfull of people working out of
their own houses or out of Anwar's house since we did not have an
office. Next election we will need more volunteers and at least 1
other person besides the candidate working full time to run things
out of an office. Running a simple campaign in Halton still managed
to increase the vote take so does running a fully staffed and
capitalized campaign mean more votes? Clearly, as always, the central
campaign has more to do with our results then action on our part. But
I can't help thinking that if we can break that 10% barrier we'll
have more money to build membership and contacts between
elections.
OK. So what about this 10% figure? It's just something I heard so lets see what elections Canada has to say.
Under Political Financing of Candidates New Rules on January 1, 2004
Immediately after the return of the writ in an election, a candidate who receives 10 percent or more of the valid votes cast is eligible for the first instalment of a reimbursement payment from public funds for his or her election expenses and personal expenses. Previously the candidate had to receive 15 percent of the votes to be eligible.
The candidate is eligible for payment of the final instalment after the official agent gives the Chief Electoral Officer the candidate's electoral campaign return and associated documents. That instalment is the lesser of:
Previously the portion was 50 percent.
So there it is - that magical 10% number. The number that means you have arrived, you are there, playing marbles with the big boys, spending large and getting 60% of it back. Nice!
The following excerpts are also interesting and need more
discussion later.
Under Financing of Registered Political Parties New Rules on
January 1,2004 it says:
All qualifying registered parties now receive quarterly allowances from public funds. To be eligible, a party must have received in the general election preceding the quarter:
The size of the fund from which the allowances are paid is determined by multiplying:
The Act provides the formula for calculating
the inflation adjustment factor, which is based on the annual average
consumer price index published by Statistics Canada.
Each party's share of the quarterly allowance fund is its percentage
of the valid votes cast in the general election preceding the
quarter.
Reimbursement of election expenses
A political party that meets the requirements set out in the Act is entitled to a reimbursement from public funds of a portion of its election expenses. Previously the portion was 22.5 percent; it is now 50 percent.
For the first general election held after January 1, 2004, the portion will be 60 percent.
NOTE: So the party got nearly 4 million dollars in 2005. Theyll get $2673.13 for the votes they picked up in Halton this time.
Now this I did not know:
Limits on contributions by corporations and
trade unions
A corporation or trade union may contribute:
I did not know this either! Limits on
contributions by corporations and trade unions
From Registration and Political Financing of Electoral District
Associations New Rules on January 1, 2004
A corporation or trade union may contribute up to $1,000* in total in any calendar year to the registered associations, nomination contestants and candidates of a particular registered party.
So why was our campaign so slim? Well the party has limited resources too and so the decision was made early on to put all their resources into ridings they could win. A sensible stratagy except it doesn't help make the unsupported ridings feel very enthusiastic. Our own riding executive is a small and dedicated group but many work full time and so for many of us the campaign became an evening thing. There was no way we could staff an office and the local real estate agents are just plain unhelpful. We had a winter campaign, people working or on holidays, everyone thinking about Christmas what could we do? And really the question is what are we going to do? How do we proceed from here to that 10%?
.... more to follow