An Early Look into the Ontario Liberal Party’s Campaign Prospects

4 min readFeb 6, 2025

A Note on Polling Data

For the sake of simplicity, I’m only going to refer to polls from one polling firm, Mainstreet Research, in the following analysis. Since I don’t have access to OLP’s internal polls in this election, I have subscribed to Mainstreet’s daily updates to get a better sense of how the election is playing out at the riding level. Those numbers are reserved for Mainstreet’s paid subscribers and I will respect that by not sharing those numbers here. What I will do in this post is cover in general who is up and down and which seats are in play for the Liberals.

Growth Elections

The last time the Ontario Liberal Party experienced a “growth” election was in 2014. That’s when, against all odds and a three-term record in office, Kathleen Wynne won a surprise majority for her party. To do that, she had to flip a number of seats across the province:

Beaches-East York
Davenport
Trinity-Spadina
Barrie
Burlington
Cambridge
Durham
Halton
Newmarket-Aurora
Northumberland — Quinte West

The question for the Liberals in this election is how to repeat that success, either in those ridings or others around the province.

What the Polls Are Saying

It stands to reason that if the Liberals want to take back power, or at least restore their party status and become the Official Opposition, they will need to win back at least some of the seats that were a part of their 2014 surge.

Liberal Incumbents

Of all of those 2014 surge seats, they only retain one going into this campaign: Beaches-East York, a seat they lost in 2018 but won back in 2022. This time out, this seat is a battle between the Liberals and the PCs with the NDP trailing in third. Liberal incumbent Mary-Margaret McMahon is 10 points up over her PC challenger.

The rest of the small group of Liberal incumbents are all currently expected to retain their seats which is not surprising given the party is currently polling higher than it has in recent elections. This means that voters who want to avoid vote-splitting, and who have a Liberal incumbent in their riding already, should stick with the Liberals this time out (pending any future polling swings).

Potential Pick-Ups from the 2014 Red Wave

According to Mainstreet’s data as of February 6, 2025, the Liberals may potentially pick up the following from the 2014 crop of seats:

Spadina-Fort York: Liberals +2 over the NDP
Burlington: Liberals -1 versus the PCs
Newmarket-Aurora: Liberals -1 versus the PCs

None of the other communities from that 2014 breakthrough are particularly close for the Liberals at this stage in the race. However, as always, that could change if the party continues to move up in the polls.

Potential 2024 Red “Surge”

That doesn’t however mean the party is only looking at these three ridings. Several communities that previously formed the bedrock of Liberal majorities are now back in play, according to Mainstreet’s data.

Toronto

Toronto Centre: Liberals +13 over the NDP
Toronto-St. Paul’s: Liberals +9 over the PCs
University-Rosedale: Liberals +8 over the PCs
Eglinton-Lawrence: Liberals +4 over the PCs
Etobicoke-Lakeshore: Liberals -3 versus the PCs

GTA

Mississauga East-Cooksville: Liberals +22 over the PCs
Mississauga-Lakeshore: Liberals +16 over the PCs
Mississauga-Erin Mills: Liberals +10 over the PCs
Ajax: Liberals +7 over the PCs
Oakville: Liberals +7 over the PCs
Mississauga Centre: Liberals +6 over the PCs
Mississauga-Streetsville: Liberals +3 over the PCs
Oakville-North Burlington: Liberals +3 over the PCs
Markham-Stouffville: PCs +1 over the Liberals
Markham-Thornhill: Liberals +0.5 over the PCs
Mississauga-Malton: Liberals -2 versus the PCs
Milton: Liberals -3 versus the PCs
Pickering-Uxbridge: Liberals -5 versus the PCs

Ottawa

Nepean: Liberals +7 over the PCs
Ottawa West-Nepean: Liberals +4 over the PCs
Glengarry-Prescott-Russell: Liberals -5 versus the PCs

North

Thunder Bay-Superior North: Liberals -3 versus the PCs

The Race is Blue versus Red in Many Key Ridings

The most striking thing about these numbers is that, with the exception of Toronto Centre, the NDP is not currently in the conversation in any of these ridings. Thunder Bay-Superior North, University-Rosedale and Toronto-St. Paul’s are all currently represented by NDP MPPs who are running for re-election and yet the party does not seem to be in the mix in current polling.

This might mean that the Liberals have simply won over voters in these communities. Or it could mean that progressive voters are already backing the party that they think has the best chance of stopping Ford in these specific ridings.

The rest of the races I’ve listed are already very clearly between the Liberals and the PCs. Again, voters trying to avoid electing PC MPPs a result of vote-splitting between progressive parties should likely vote Liberal in these communities. But it may also just be too early to tell whether these numbers will stick.

These numbers matter as voters are already able to cast their ballots at their local returning offices. Those who wish to vote during advance polls will have to wait until after February 14 to find out where they will be located. Of course, most voters wait until Election Day itself to make their decision. With three weeks left in the campaign, a lot can still change before then.

To view Mainstreet Research’s data yourself, visit their election dashboard here: https://www.mainstreetresearch.ca/dashboard/ontario

Theresa has served as the Communications Coordinator for the Ontario Liberal Party, the Director of Communications to Ontario Deputy Premier Deb Matthews, and an election speechwriter for former Premier Kathleen Wynne. She owns a communications company operating out of Toronto.