Last night I was lucky to join the Energy Mix's election-watch party with environmental and energy leaders from across the country. The dialogue was rich and diverse and I'm really grateful to the team for letting me join in.

As we wait for the final results to be tabulated, and consider Pierre Pollievre's loss of his own seat, the remarkableness of the whole event only grows.

Elaborating a little on what I said for the Energy Mix, here are some of my current thoughts and musings as we await the final results from the election:

One – Echoing something Chantal Hébert said on CBC last night: the Liberals (and to some extent Conservatives) should remember that they are "renting" and did not "buy" NDP and Bloc voters who moved to them. I am not at all convinced Canada is about to become a two-party system. If I were a party strategist, I'd be calling the British Labour Party and learning do's and don'ts after their 2024 win.

Two – In what should not even bear mentioning, Pollievre conceded gracefully last night and, despite losing his own seat, did not platform any wild fraud conspiracy theories. I think voters will reward him yet. Danielle Smith should take note.

Three – Canadians elected a Prime Minister who has said publicly, repeatedly, that both climate change and inequality are grave crises to be confronted directly. Remember that Carney called Occupy Wall Street "entirely constructive." His political room to maneuver is limited on both of these fronts, but I would suggest to him and his team that now is not the time for small thinking.

Four – As much as "anti-woke" rhetoric swirled in the election, Abacus Data's final poll of the election showed that nothing resembling that entered voters' top issues of the election. Anti/progressive language is a sheen that politicians can add to anything to signal to their supporters where they stand, but it's not clear that that's the primary driver of anyone's voting behaviour to me.

Five – Canadians are, in my view, increasingly sophisticated in how they navigate our outdated first-past-the-post electoral system. Strategic voting for both progressive and, to a lesser extent, hard-right PPC voters is the rule, not the norm. I'm proud of my country for making the best of a bad system, with I think is quite high literacy, but it's beyond obvious that this system is past its expiration date.

What did you think?

The link has been copied!