January 21, 2025
Ontario Premier Doug Ford has been dropping hints for some time about the possibility of a provincial election in the spring of this year, if not sooner. Those hints are being reinforced by the pending arrival of $200 ‘rebate’ cheques to Ontarians from the province at a cost of nearly $3 billion.
Ford claims that he needs a 'clear mandate’ to deal with the incoming Trump administration in the US, specifically its threats to impose 25 per cent tariffs on all Canadian imports. But Ford’s Progressive Conservatives already hold a strong majority in the provincial legislature as a result of the June 2022 election. The legislative opposition parties have made it clear that they are prepared to cooperate on any reasonable measures needed to respond to whatever Trump actually does.
Timing is a key issue in this situation. The province would not normally be due another election for nearly a year and a half – four years from the June 2022 election. Constitutionally an election is not actually required for another year after that.
Ford has been musing about the possibility of an early election call since last spring. In theory, an early election call might help Ford capitalize in his current lead in public opinion polls, and his new profile as a leading spokesperson for Canada in the emerging tariff dispute with the US.
An early election could put him ahead of further fallout from the Greenbelt land removal scandal flowing from Freedom of Information requests and the RCMP investigation. An early election could also pre-empt the impacts of a variety of earlier decisions that are coming home to roost, ranging from the emerging financial crisis in the post-secondary education sector, ongoing wider crises in health care, education, affordable (especially rental) housing and rising electricity costs.
Perhaps most importantly, it was been thought that the Ford government wants to go to the polls before a federal election – one, which it has been widely expected the federal Conservatives will win. Ontario voters do have a record of voting for different parties at the federal and provincial levels.
Beyond the issues of the expense of a premature and unnecessary election, it is difficult to imagine a worse time to call a provincial vote. The Ford government would almost certainly want to hold an election before a federal campaign begins.
The current prorogation of the federal Parliament is scheduled to end March 24th. A confidence vote, which the current Liberal government is almost certainly to lose regardless of who its leader is, will follow shortly, likely over the Speech from the Throne or a Budget. That will trigger a federal election, which, based on the minimum requirement for a 36-day campaign, will occur somewhere in early to mid-May.
This would mean a provincial election would have to occur before the end of March. Given the minimum 28-day provincial election period, an election call could be no later than the end of February. The campaign would then need to run mostly in March.
The problem with this timing is that the Trump administration is signaling (as far as anyone can tell) its intent to do whatever it is going to do on tariffs on Canadian exports, somewhere between the beginning of February and early April of this year. This would mean that an Ontario election campaign, with all its distractions of political, media and public energy and attention, would be taking place at precisely the most crucial moments in dealing the Trump administration’s actions on Canada-US trade.
In that situation, the province’s government will need to focus all of its energy and attention on working with the federal government to deal with the Canada-US dynamics. The province cannot afford to have its leaders’ focus diverted into trying to win an unnecessary election at that point.
There is no shortage of decisions and actions taken by the Ford government that require a serious evaluation by the electorate. But without a pressing constitutional or political rationale, the next few months may be precisely the wrong time to trigger that process.
Finally, the Ford government may want to reflect on the fate of the last majority provincial government to pursue what seemed a good opportunity for early election call. Former Premier David Peterson could have some good advice for Mr. Ford on that question.