Update:
2:23 AM 19/01/2006

Prediction Changed
1:42 AM 22/01/2006
Election Prediction Project
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Vancouver Island North
Federal Election - 2006



Constituency Profile

Candidates:
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NDP/NPD
Catherine Bell
Conservatives/Conservateurs
John Duncan
Green Party/Parti Vert
Michael Mascall
Liberal/libéral
Jim Mitchell

Incumbent:
John Duncan

2004 Result:
John Duncan
18733
Catherine Bell
18250
Noor Ahmed
11352
Pam Munroe
4456
Jack East
111

For historical result, please see
2004 Prediction page




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16 01 06 Ben
The Liberals may lose a few votes in this riding due to falling numbers, but not many - they have a more solid candidate this time around. Most votes that they lose will be strategic votes from those who know that the race was extremely tight last election - about 2000 in all. Given BC voters' strange political tendencies it is difficult to predict where the majority of those votes will go, but, given provincial trends, this riding is leaning towards the NDP, or at least teh NDP has greater momentum than the provincial Liberals or federal Conservatives. While the NDP has lost their 30% support in BC since the start of the campaign, they are certainly on an upswing and are polling higher than last election. Bell will take maybe 1500 of the 2000 Liberal strategic votes and win very narrowly.
13 01 06 Morton
This riding is too close to call. Mitchell will pull more votes from Duncan than he will from Bell. The real question is where will the strategic Liberal votes go as it is pretty obvious that this is strictly a Duncan/Bell race.
When weighing the significance of the provincial election here, two things need to be considered:
1. A Liberal cabinet minister barely beat out a first time NDP challenger in Comox Valley, and 2) the North Island candidate was arguably one of the greenest candidates ever to run for the NDP in this relatively brown area, and a first timer with little profile in the region, and still won. Had someone like the previous NDP MLA run here the BC Liberals (same pool as federal Conservatives) would have lost by a significantly greater margin.
It should also be noted that the Bell family has a generations long working class history in the region and connections in many of the villages.
30 12 05 love, sydney
Bell and Duncan in a tough rematch. The blue collar, working class ruralesque riding certainly reads like an NDP fit, and I'm not discounting Bell's chances of taking it. But just as there are more retirees in the Nanaimo-Parksville region, they've also started to park their RVs a little further north, where land isn't so expensive. They tend to be more conservative, fiscally, and may not be buying as much of Layton's urban soap as in the past. Plus, the Lib candidate is solid enough, and the economy is glowing a little, tho not nearly as much as in the Lower Mainland, to stop a sharp crumble of Grit votes. Some will slide left, but an equal amount, in my estimate, are heading right so its a trade-off. People wanting change in Ottawa may be more motivated to dust the snow off the car and get to the polls, giving this to the Tories again.
18 12 05 M. Lunn
Actually the BC Liberals would have won this riding by 102 votes had it existed, go to www.elections.bc.ca and check the results for yourself. The results were BC Liberals 24,876 - 44.3%, BC NDP 24,774 - 44.1%. The BC Liberals narrowly won Comox Valley by 807 votes while the BC NDP took North Island by 660 votes, while on the mainland section, only 77 votes were cast since the area is sparsely populated although 49 were for the BC NDP and 4 for the BC Liberals. That being said, with the current polling numbers I do agree John Duncan is in trouble and will probably lose his seat. Lets remember that even though some provincial NDP votes will go Liberal federally, not all BC Liberal votes will either go Conservative federally, some will go Liberal. Generally speaking the federal Liberal vote tends to split 50/50 provincially, but right now it is probably closer to 60/40 for the BC Liberals as some moderate Conservatives have since gone over to the Liberals. I suspect if Peter MacKay or Bernard Lord were the Conservative leader it would probably be 60-70% of the federal liberal vote going NDP provincially as many current liberal voters are really Conservative but cannot stomach Stephen Harper's hardline conservatism.
16 12 05 BC Voter
"The provincial results were inconclusive, and the demographic trends are a little bit against the NDP." - wow, been huffing a bit too much BC bud there? The NDP solidly won this riding provincially.
15 12 05 James
I'm going to go off on a limb and say that there is an outside chance of a liberal upset here! Paul Martin's tough talk with the Americans on softwood lumber here is going down very well among both the business community and in the labour community who depend on the health of the lumber industry - people who usually vote CPC or NDP. Otherwise, watch this seat go to the NDP and NOT the CPC . . . being too closely associated with U.S. policies does not go down well here after the softwood lumber war and the CPC in its policies is perceived (rightly or wrongly) as too close to the hated George Bush. At one time that might have worked but not now after the Americans decided to bully the Canadian lumber industry - American style political parties are NOT popular here. Ambassador Wilkins' comments to Canadians telling Martin to shut up likely won't help the CPC either.
27 11 05 Bear and Ape
Very true that this riding is not only the northern part of Vancouver Island but also contains a chunk of the mainland, problem is that the mainland part of this riding is sparsly populated, thus the riding will swing in the direction the town centers in the south of the riding go. Never the less, with the NDP ahead as they are in BC, and the CPC down, it seems unlikely that the CPC will hold this riding. NDP pick up.
07 06 05 Mike D
I agree it is too soon to call this one. The provincial results were inconclusive, and the demographic trends are a little bit against the NDP. But the Conservatives have a lot to be worried about as they lose populist votes thanks to rigid right-wing economic policies and the staunchly pro-American stance of Harper. Meanwhile, Jack Layton has been widely praised for providing a bit of stability in a wild situation in Ottawa.
07 06 05 Christian Socialism
Note that this seat isn't just the northern half of the Island; it also includes a large slice of the B.C mainland which, IIRC, has *traditionally* been decent territory for the NDP and I'll hazard a guess that this riding may have voted narrowly for the BC Dippers in the provincial election, although it was pretty close either way.
It's likely to be pretty close either way *federally* as well; both parties have some decent strongholds up this way, the Dippers have the resource communities while the Tories have the various oldies settlements further south. In other words this'll be a turnout battle... and while I tend to think that Duncan will lose I don't think it's a good idea to call this one until the campaign is well under way.
06 06 05 hatman
Vancouver Island North very nearly went NDP last time. Somehow though, it stuck with the tories. This will not happen again. Vancouver Island is NDP territory, except for a few areas- this not being one of them. The NDP won here easily provincially and I expect them to do it here federally. There's just too many of those 11,000 Liberal and 4,000 green votes that will go to the NDP this time for the Conservatives to hang on.
01 06 05 M. Lunn
Actually Stan Hagen won by 800 votes, while Claire Trevana in North Island only won by 600 votes so the BC Liberals would have taken this riding had it existed at a provincial level. Likewise, last federal election, the NDP would have narrowly won North Island, while the Conservatives would have narrowly won Comox Valley. The Conservatives will certainly not do as well as the BC Liberals did provincially percentage wise, but the NDP won't do as well either, so this is really a toss-up between the NDP and Conservatives.
01 06 05
The thumping the Gordon Campbell quasi-cons got in the provincial North Island district along with Stan Hagen's skin-of-teeth escape in the Comox Valley suggests the NDP are on the rebound north of Union Bay.
One can only wonder what the national Liberal powers-that-be have in mind as far as twisting the resource taps is concerned... for ridings like this one, I know what I'd do if I was David Herle.
11 05 05 Bear and Ape
Conservative MP owing a debt to Paul Martin #2
One of several Conservatives who won over the NDP last year because of Paul Martin's last minute "Harper is evil and scary" speach. Now that voters who would have voted NDP last year realize that they actually helped Harper by voting Liberal, they should return to the NDP. Expect Martin trying to make Harper out to be some sort of vampire or other scary thing, to woo back NDP voters.
04 05 05 BLJ
This seat was held by the CPC by the barest of margins in 2004 as much of the previous Reform protest vote has moved to the NDP. This is not a centre-right riding and a good possibility exists that the NDP will win the seat next time.
03 05 05 M. Lunn
This will be a close one again. A lot will depend on how much the liberals drop in BC and which party they go to. The NDP is strong in the Northern party of the riding up around Port Hardy and Port McNeil, which is heavily unionized, but the Conservatives are stronger in the Comox Valley where there is a large senior population who tend to vote conservative. I wouldn't mind seeing John Duncan defeated, but I am not keen on seeing the NDP win more seats either and the liberals really have no chance here.
02 05 05 JC
Duncan is gone, the NDP barely lost and they will take it this time.



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