Cities and provinces across Canada have seen political change in recent months as frustrations over affordability and quality of life has meant incumbents being shown the door.
Multiple Ontario cities said goodbye to short and long-time mayors and councillors on Monday. A few days earlier, British Columbia ousted its NDP government and premier David Eby, following the trend of incumbent losses after several B.C. mayors were voted out of office. Those changes all came in a month that started with Quebec’s CAQ government losing every seat in the provincial election.
The back-to-back changes were a result of Canadians facing continued strain over tariffs from the U.S. administration, wavering inflation and uncertainty when affordability will get better, political experts said.
“If we think about the national mood right now in Canada … I think a lot of Canadians don’t feel like they’re getting ahead,” said Lewis Krashinsky, a political scientist and William Lyon Mackenzie King postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University. “Voters can be fickle.”
He said that when voters don’t feel like they’re getting ahead, they look for people they believe can bring new ideas.
Richard Johnston, professor emeritus of political science at the University of British Columbia, said the power of incumbency has decreased over decades. Previously, some provincial governments have served for decades such as the Progressive Conservatives in New Brunswick for 17 years, or the Alberta PCs for 43. The average length of a government now sits at about 10 years.
Incumbents have also faced multiple issues in recent months, with Johnston saying the handling of COVID-19, supply chain and inflation, and President Donald Trump’s tariffs have meant Canadians are feeling worse off.
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As a result, people are pointing the finger at politicians in city hall or the provincial legislatures and punishing them for it.
“In general, this has been a decade of sort of institutional failure, I think that’s actually unfair, but that’s how voters perceive it,” Johnston said. “There’s a sense in which governments of almost any stripe seem to have dropped the ball or they’re overwhelmed by forces beyond their control.”
But Krashinsky, originally from Toronto, added that voters can choose someone new for a number of reasons including anger.
“Perhaps that’s out of a sense of anger, resentment towards a political candidate who’s been in there for so many years; perhaps it’s a sense of optimism with what the new candidate could bring in,” said Krashinsky. “Perhaps it is a sense of just needing a better option; it’s a sense of almost desperation that we’ve tried this path over and over again, and we haven’t gotten ahead.”
Long-time incumbency ended for several mayors in Ontario Oct. 26.
Gord Krantz, Canada’s longest-serving, lost his first election since becoming mayor of Milton in 1980. Further south, Sarnia’s Mike Bradley ended his 38-year run in the mayor’s seat defeated by newcomer Carrie McEachran.
It wasn’t long-time incumbents who lost either. One-term mayors in B.C. including Port Moody’s Meghan Lahti and New Westminster’s Patrick Johnstone, and Mississauga’s Carolyn Parrish and Hamilton’s Andrea Horwath in Ontario also lost.
Hamish Telford, associate political science professor at the University of the Fraser Valley in B.C., said those short-term mayors were the victims of the public disappointed in their own choices within the previous four years.
“It’s frustration with lack of progress on core issues as a generality,” he said. “People look over the past four years and say, ‘my life or my city hasn’t improved like you promised it would,’ and obviously, they come to the conclusion that the direction that the mayor set was not the right one.”
Not all incumbents are losing though, with Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow, Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown and several B.C. mayors still keeping their jobs.
Krashinsky said the reasons can range from a mixture of relatability to there not being a strong enough opposition candidate to give voters another strong choice.
“Affinity for a candidate that you know and recognize and trust someone perhaps that you’ve met,” he said. “Being able to have that personal touch that you can be established really over time I think can really help these incumbents.”
Yet Telford added even likeability won’t help if voters are losing respect for the judgment of longer-serving incumbents creating that need for change.
“The winds of change of change blow every decade in Canada and that’s what we’re seeing lately,” Telford said.
—with files from Global News’ Aaron D’Andrea and Amy Judd
Every politician left or right is a waste of skin, if you can’t see that you are beyond help
Hopefully Danielle Smith, Doug Ford, Pierre Poilievre, and other dumba$$ Conservative politicians will be shown the door soon. BC just made a colossal mistake electing the Conservative because they are really just Liberals and OneBC is the only true Conservative Party.
The mainstream media would be shedding jobs too, as a consequence of lying so much, were it not for all the state funding they receive. But hopefully with time….
Surprise Del Doucha won in Vaughn.
I would have voted NDP had they repealed DRIPA. Them failing to do that meant voting Conservative. And I did that. Had the NDP promised to repeal DRIPA. I would have voted Conservative because EBY lied about the 1000 grocery benefit in 2024. He blew the trust up.
Pipeline welfare? Someone is an indigenous arsonist.
Someone didn’t get beaten when they deserved it.
On The Side Lines
October 27, 2026 at 8:07 pm
You are not the decider of speech @7:50pm.
“You sound like an idiot”
You are not the decider of speech @7:50pm.
“You sound like an idiot”
I’ll give you this….the CONS are really Conning on this one. They’ve got everyone believing this os the way to paradise. Nit knowing soon they’ll be asked to drink the purple koolaid. ! Which is great.
Time to remind people communists are death knells for their opinions.
If it wasn’t for pity, kindness and sympathy you guys would all be collecting REAL welfare not just pipeline welfare.
Try This – your conundrum can be answered easily by assuming liberals are scandalous and contemptuous fraudsters that think we’re stupid, and the people too stupid to acknowledge they were the ones being called stupid.
It’s a stupid is a people that think universal languages like math, are tough.
You guys complain like women.! If it wasn’t for Justin and now maybe Carney you guys are the biggest welfare province in Canada with your ” Make a wish” pipelines. Talk about doing nothing but stand there and get a paycheck. DF central!
GREAT NEWS, BYE BYE ! TIME TO FIND A REAL JOB, AND ACTUALLY WORK FOR YOUR MONEY !!! BYE BYE GRAVY TRAIN
It’s the result of Carney and his Liberal fraudsters and, I mean, if the Supreme Court doesn’t acknowledge improper use of the EA, inanimate objects.
Interesting opinion. But wrong. BC ousted it’s NDP because they were giving land and money to the natives without consultation or referendum. The mayors can do nothing about tariffs, so that is not the reason. Ripping out driving lanes for all vehicles to put in bike lanes caused several to lose.
Many mayors lost because of Carney’s infilling provincial go around. We do not like our single family home neighbourhoods getting apartments built in them. We do not like increased property taxes with no increase in service, Instead we get increased user fees. If the city expands, then the tax base expands. If the cost of living goes up, the value of our property, and thus taxes naturally rises. So why any increase in rates?
Remember, remember 1066 when the vikings decided they were done with you.
King Harold. The dead Saxon (German invader) King.
If you are in government now, you need to go, even if you just won.
I don’t care. Democracy is what you thought was malleable. No one else thought that.
Nothing is better under Carney and now Trudeau before. The Liberals have sunken Canada economic future under green fantasies. Where are all the green jobs.
Honestly, look at the sorry ass acolytes getting their photos behind Chow?
Do you think they are more useful than card board cutouts? I sure don’t.
Hopefully Carney Libs are shown the door next
Let me guess, you think your insolvent owners own this business and have a right to censor political debate.
Like I said, it’s cute, to those that marvel at weak creatures.
Thanks Capt. Obvious
Imagine calling voters fickle for firing people who suck at their jobs.
Canada is cooked. No change in a mayor or premier will change that.
Anyone inheriting the mess will 100% be guaranteed to fail now.
Toronto people are just plain stupid!!
hahahaahahahah!!!!!
Like I said, try to avoid insolvency.
No, there is no world where you survive.
Based on provincial votes so far, I’m gonna say the only people that support Liberals live in the GTA and Ottawa valley.
Don’t worry, the dumbass Federal government will allow Ottawa to drown in its flood zone to gain support for higher taxes that don’t result in flood zone mitigation.
Let me clarify what I know about corporations.
You are vulnerable to financial burdens I know how to generate. Kinda like how indigenous Canadians keep starting forest fires.
Based on provincial votes so far, I’m gonna say the only people that support Liberals live in the GTA and Ottawa valley.
Don’t worry, the dumbass Federal government will allow Ottawa to drown in its flood zone to gain support for higher taxes that don’t result in flood zone mitigation.