Canada’s Conservatives Are Down, but Far from Out

Canada’s Liberals have, once again, risen from the dead. Their re-election with Mark Carney at the helm is a remarkable development in Canadian federal politics — the party not only managed to reverse the dire predictions of its demise but also, despite voters expressing a desire for change, retained its control of government for a rare fourth consecutive term.

This is a crushing disappointment for the Conservative Party of Canada. Although they have so far held the Liberals to a minority government — votes are still being counted in some ridings — their continuing role as the lead Opposition, albeit a bigger one, pales in comparison to the large majority government they’d been projected to form.

Leader Pierre Poilievre even lost his own Ottawa-area seat.

But for all this dejection, Conservatives still had a solid and promising performance. Rather than constituting a total failure, their standing is better regarded as an inability to fully close the deal.

The Trump factor

Conservatives won the greatest share of the vote by any federal centre-right party since 1988, and the popular vote remains close to a virtual tie.

The narrow margins of many Liberal gains also suggest that a Conservative minority was within the realm of possibility. For all his success, a politically inexperienced Carney so far appears to have failed to win a majority government and may have inherited yet another fractious and unstable minority that will probably not last long.

While it’s still too early to get a full grasp of how voters made their decisions, it appears that the nearly 25-point swing in the polls was largely due to U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs and threats against Canada.

From the moment he came to office for a second term, Trump’s constant threats transformed the election from a fairly routine matter of anti-incumbent backlash to one focused on leadership, national unity and crisis management. Overnight, Canadian sovereignty became the top issue, and the NDP vote collapsed as most voters decided that their choice was really between two leaders.

A divided electorate

Carney was able to leverage his background as governor of both the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, and his short initial tenure as prime minister, to not only depict a steady hand, but generate a rally-around-the-flag effect.

Poilievre, in contrast, was unable to continue with the disruptive, anti-establishment tone of much of his previous rhetoric.

But even while Carney, from the moment the campaign started, performed better on the Trump issue than Poilievre, it was far from the only issue that mattered to voters.

What ultimately drove voters back to the Liberals seems to be confined to largely one aspect of the population — older and more economically established Canadians.

Many voters still prioritized domestic issues — such as the cost of living crisis, housing affordability and economic stagnation — that had once characterized the campaign. Conservatives seemed to gain support throughout the campaign from young adults, newer Canadians, blue-collar workers and some NDP defectors.

Rather than providing Carney with a clear mandate, the results suggest Canada continues to grow increasingly divided along the lines of age, class and region. The Liberals have been able to hold on to power with the support of Canadians wanting to defend what they have, but Conservatives are gaining ground among voters who feel increasingly disenchanted with and locked out of the Canadian project they’re now being told to embrace.

Poilievre’s future

Poilievre has signalled his intention to stay on as Conservative leader. In the months ahead, he’ll not only need to find a way to return to Parliament via a byelection — he’ll also need to convince his party and caucus he should remain leader.

While the party doesn’t have an automatic leadership review following elections, there are several mechanisms to challenge Poilievre’s leadership.

There are certainly several areas where Poilievre and his team can be faulted by Conservative party members. A loss is a loss, and there have been well-publicized reports of internal discord and frustration about his campaign strategy.

Ultimately, however, a sustained movement to push out Poilievre seems unlikely. For all his drawbacks, Poilievre has not only brought the party its greatest electoral performance in decades, but generated a unique degree of energy and enthusiasm among supporters that no obvious successor seems capable of maintaining.

The challenge now is about determining what the Conservative party, having received just above 41 per cent of the vote, needs to do in order to gain a few more percentage points.