Summary: Long-time Liberal MP John McCallum has held this riding since 2004, but he’s decided to run in a different riding after significant boundary redistribution. That will leave the Liberals in a tough fight here. The transposed votes show that in 2011, the Conservatives had more support than the Liberals under these new boundaries. The Conservative candidate in 2011, who finished a close second, is running again.
Boundaries: While this riding has the same name as 2011, its boundaries are drastically different. The southern portion of Markham has shifted to a new riding, and this riding gains a large area to the north that was formerly part of Oak Ridges-Markham.
Last Election: In this riding in 2011, Liberal John McCallum defeated Conservative Bob Saroya by 1,695 votes. However, if these new boundaries had been in effect in 2011, it would have been a Conservative victory, and by a wide margin, with 45.8 per cent of the vote, compared to 33.7 per cent for the Liberals.
History: While Markham-Unionville has been Liberal since it was created in 2004, Oak Ridges-Markham, which contributes a large part of the newly defined riding, elected a Conservative, Paul Calandra, in both 2008 and 2011.
Demographics: 56.9 per cent of Markham-Unionville residents identified as Chinese in the 2011 National Household Survey, the highest number for any riding in Canada.
Candidates
Conservative: Bob Saroya, businessman
NDP: Colleen Zimmerman
Liberal: Bang-Gu Jiang, lawyer
Green: Elvin Kao, data analyst