The writ has been dropped in Ontario as Premier Doug Ford seeks a stronger majority government, saying he wants a renewed mandate in the face of potential American tariffs on Canadian goods.
But snap elections always come with a risk.
A snap election is an election called earlier than the originally planned date. Snap elections can be called to resolve a political impasse, to avoid a non-confidence vote, or when the incumbent prime minister is defeated in a motion of no confidence.
But they can also be called when a leader wants to achieve or strengthen a majority mandate.
“That type of snap election is always a gamble, but is often a gamble where the odds are in your favour,” University of Toronto professor emeritus of political science Nelson Wiseman told The Epoch Times.
“The premier or the prime minister looks at the polls, … and they make a calculation: Is it worth going now? Am I going to pay a penalty?”
With the snap election call, Ontarians will now be headed to the polls on Feb. 27, some 16 months earlier than the fixed election date of June 2026.
As Ontario’s political parties embark on their election campaigns, here’s a look at some notable snap elections in Canada, from the successful to the downright disastrous.
Ontario Snap Elections
One of the most significant snap elections in Ontario dates back to 1990, when Liberal Premier David Peterson called an election ahead of the looming recession amid internal strife within the opposing parties.Some within the party opposed the election call less than three years into their mandate because the Liberals were already enjoying a large majority in the provincial legislature. Peterson pushed ahead, citing the party’s substantial lead in the polls, with voter intentions hitting above the 50 percent mark.
What should have been an easy victory never materialized, as the Liberals were overwhelmed by controversy after the start of the campaign, with protesters following the premier to various public events.
Unions and interest groups also spoke out against Peterson to express their opposition to the hastily called election.
The NDP, led by Bob Rae, pulled off a major electoral upset, winning enough seats to form a majority government. Peterson lost his own seat and stepped down from his position as party leader.
The main reason Peterson’s gamble backfired was that his election call was largely seen as unnecessary, Wiseman said.
“One of the big issues in that election for a lot of people was, why are we having an unnecessary election?” he said. “And that’s a danger that could hurt Ford, … because snap elections don’t always work.”
Like Peterson, Ford’s election call is a calculated risk based on his strong polling numbers, Wiseman said, noting that the end result will ultimately come down to how his campaign unfolds.
While Peterson’s call is an example of a snap election gone horribly wrong in Ontario, Liberal Premier Kathleen Wynne’s early election call worked out in her favour.
Wynne was forced to call a snap election in 2014 when the NDP announced it would not support her minority government’s budget.
2024 Nova Scotia Election
The most recent example of a gamble that paid off for a governing provincial party was the 2024 snap election called by Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston.It came at a time when Houston’s Progressive Conservative (PC) party was doing well in the polls, holding a more than 20-point lead over the Liberals and NDP.
Like Ford, Houston didn’t need to call an election. He cited two reasons for his decision: the high cost of living and ensuring the provincial vote wouldn’t conflict with the federal election set for the fall of 2025. Nova Scotia’s fixed election date was July 15, 2025.
2020 New Brunswick Election
New Brunswick Progressive Conservative Premier Blaine Higgs also decided to roll the political dice by calling an early election in 2020.Higgs had a minority government when he called the election in August that year, the first Canadian election while grappling with a pandemic. He said a stronger mandate would give the province the stability it needed to navigate the next phase of the COVID-19 pandemic and facilitate economic recovery.
The September election came just six months after the province declared a state of emergency due to the pandemic.
2008 Federal Election
In 2008, Prime Minister Stephen Harper asked the Governor General to dissolve Parliament a year early in a bid to win a stronger mandate for his minority Conservative government.The move was a gamble by Harper, Wiseman pointed out, because Parliament had just passed a law in 2007 fixing federal election dates for every four years. The next election date would have occurred on Oct. 19, 2009, if Harper hadn’t called the snap election.
“Harper was looking at the polls, and they showed that if an election were held, the Conservatives would win a majority,” Wiseman said. “He didn’t want to rule with the minority because that tied his hands on a lot of things.”
While Harper was victorious, his move paid little dividends. The party again failed to achieve a majority mandate although the election did result in more seats for the Conservatives.
While the Tories were a dozen seats away from the hoped-for majority, the election was successful in that the official Opposition, the Liberal Party led by Stéphane Dion, lost 18 seats.
A coalition attempt between the Liberal Party and the New Democratic Party was initiated in the aftermath of the election, but it was ultimately unsuccessful in ousting the Conservatives.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also called a snap election in 2021, two years after his majority government was reduced to a minority in the 2019 election. The election was held during the pandemic. The average life of minority governments in Canada is also typically less than two years.
1984 Federal Election
John Turner called a snap election in 1984 just four days after being sworn in as the Liberal Party’s new leader following the resignation of Pierre Trudeau.Internal polls at the time predicted the party was ahead of the opposition and Turner wanted to showcase a revamped Liberal party that differed greatly from the Trudeau era. However, a weak campaign and some gaffes along with losing popularity in the Liberal stronghold of Quebec ultimately brought a defeat for his Liberal Party in that election.
