Mark Carney’s Liberals finally secured a majority government Monday night for the first time in six years after winning all three by-elections in Toronto and Montreal.Polls closed at 8:30 p.m. eastern time in the University–Rosedale and Scarborough–Southwest ridings, with Western Standard projecting Liberal victories in both ridings shortly after.The wins bring the Liberal seat count from 171 to 173, with a potential 174th seat still in play, cementing control of the House of Commons after securing five floor crossers. In Terrebonne,Que., Liberal candidate Tatiana Auguste bested Bloc Québécois candidate Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné in a tight race. .In University–Rosedale, Danielle Martin captured the seat left by former deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland. Freeland stepped down in January to take on a role as an economic adviser to Ukraine after nearly 13 years as a member of Parliament.She spent nearly four months abroad in Ukraine while as an MP before eventually resigning.In Scarborough–Southwest, Doly Begum won the riding left vacant by former public safety minister Bill Blair, now Canada’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom with5,470 votes. Begum resigned as Ontario NDP deputy leader earlier this year to run federally for the Liberals.Her win comes despite a series of past social media posts in which she sharply criticized the Liberal Party prior to securing the nomination.In a 2018 post, Begum accused the Liberals of stealing NDP ideas “in a desperate bid to get votes.” In 2019, she urged voters not to forget what she described as “years of Liberal deception and carelessness.” In 2020, she questioned why the Trudeau government was “silent on the gross human rights violations and abuses happening in China,” including concerns over forced labour involving Uyghur Muslims..At another point, she described the Liberals as “untrustworthy,” “conniving,” and “the surest path to greater evil.”Monday’s results formalize a shift that had already been underway in recent weeks. The Liberals entered the by-elections after five MPs crossed the floor to join the party — four from the Conservatives and one from the NDP — moves that had already begun to alter the balance of power in the House.The Toronto wins now confirm a Liberal majority government for the first time in more than six years.Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet spent the final hours of the campaign urging voters in Terrebonne to withhold further support from the Liberals.“They have the majority they wanted,” Blanchet said Monday, arguing that the riding should instead elect a representative focused solely on Quebec’s interests. “No one can come here and say, ‘You should give us a majority.’ They have it already.”Blanchet also criticized Liberal campaign efforts, suggesting they were focused more on promoting Prime Minister Mark Carney than on policy, and pointed to recent floor crossings as evidence of narrowing differences between federal parties..In Terrebonne, Tatiana Auguste held on for the Liberals, winning the riding for the second time in a year and bringing the Liberal seat count to 174. Sinclair-Desgagné, whose legal challenge had forced the by-election, was unable to reclaim the seat the Bloc had held for a decade since its reformation. The Bloc had held the riding for a decade prior to the 2025 result. This by-election ballot includes 48 candidates, 42 of them independents organized by the Longest Ballot Committee.With 173 seats secured, the Carney government no longer requires opposition support to pass confidence votes, making an early election unlikely and setting the stage for a mandate that could extend to October 2029.
