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National Post’s Chris Selley and National Post contributor Anthony Furey discuss the latest in the 2025 Ontario election. Watch the video or read the transcript.
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Anthony Furey: Hi, I’m Anthony Furey here with National Post columnist Chris Selley. And Chris, as I was looking around for matters to discuss related to the Ontario election, as we do here, I found myself hard pressed to find any news coverage the past couple days in major news outlets across the province. And I found that kind of curious. I was trying to remember when the last time that happened, that we were in the middle of an election, a week before the big day, and yet no news outlet is really talking about it. And then I cross-referenced that with electoral turnout rates, found how 2022 was historically the lowest Ontario voter turnout rate in recorded history — 44 per cent. And it had me wondering, what are we going to see on February 27th? What sort of turnout will we see? What sort of voter interest? And what will this even mean for Doug Ford’s mandate, assuming he’s re-elected?
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Selley: I mean, it’s a great question. It seems entirely possible to me that the turnout could be lower. You know, the NDP and Liberals have so far, it seems, completely failed to make this in any significant way a judgment on Ford’s record. They keep telling us that this election shouldn’t be happening, which isn’t exactly a get-out-the-vote kind of message. So yeah, I think it could be for sure, and what does that mean in terms of Doug Ford’s mandate? Well, it would be kind of odd if he gained more seats with fewer votes because that doesn’t scream strong mandate, but then of course he had a mandate to do everything he wanted to do beforehand. So, it’s not going to really make a difference if he runs the table and has a huge mega super ultra majority as opposed to just a comfortable majority. I think historians might kind of look back on this as a very damp squib of an election.
Furey: And yet what’s so interesting is we’re not lacking for news right now in so many respects, whether it’s about provincial issues, challenges with health care, the fact that major cities across the province are trying to dig themselves out of this record snowfall, which creates questions about managing infrastructure. And then there’s obviously the Trump tariff angle, which has been dominating the election discussion. And the fact that there is a prime ministerial selection underway, not to be mistaken with a federal election, but all of these things you would think would add to the excitement of an Ontario election, but instead the one thing where we’re all going to the ballot box on, the one thing that all sort of provokes the participation of the regular citizen, that’s the thing that’s a dud in all of this.
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Selley: Yeah, I mean, media outlets like this sort of day-to-day campaign trail dramatics, right? There just haven’t been very many of those. I mean, Doug Ford isn’t really even talking to reporters anymore. So, yeah, and on those substantive issues like health-care, again, and I’ve said this before, you know, they don’t really disagree on all that much. They’re yelling at Doug Ford for private healthcare, but he’s not, he doesn’t have, you know, privatizing health-care as one of his major planks for anything. They all seem to agree on the idea of family health teams, primary care teams, as opposed to just having one: your own GP. So there’s just not that much. It’s just a question of follow through. Really, any of their plans on paper would make health-care better in Ontario. But do people really expect that? Do people really believe that? But, know, on two, or I guess it was, yeah, it was yesterday, on Tuesday. The NDP unveiled what they called their plan for Toronto. Now it wasn’t much of a plan. Uploading 50 per cent of TTCs operating costs. I mean, that would be significant, you know, rent control, including vacancy control, which is just a bad idea, but you know, that’s the sort of thing that, their core voters tend to support. And at this point, the NDP really needs to try to save the furniture in Toronto. So, it wasn’t much of a plan, but then I was looking just two minutes ago, the Toronto Star’s Ontario election homepage, and there’s no mention of it. This is the city paper, and this is the NDP’s plan for the city. It’s a weird, weird dynamic. People just seem to have, yeah, checked out. Maybe the coverage is there, but it’s not making the front pages. It’s not driving the numbers, it would seem.
Furey: Yeah, it’s like if an election was called and nobody showed up, what would we do? It’s sort of this curious philosophical discussion coming out in real time right now. As I guess to maybe Doug Ford’s advantage and perhaps to their original strategy, this is how they wanted things to unfold. Because I think we’re in a situation now where we are probably going to see the historically lowest turnout rate ever for an Ontario election. And I don’t think we’re healthier off for all of that. Well, let’s leave it at that. I’m Anthony Furey with Chris Selley. Thanks everyone.
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