CANADA: Tories Win Majority; NDP Clear 2nd

The table below is courtesy Professor Andrew Heard of Simon Fraser University and illustrates the election results of the 2011 Canada federal elections, compared to the 2006 and 2006 elections.

						OTHER
2011 Seats % Votes	4 6.0	167 39.6	1 3.7	34 18.9	102 30.6	0 0.9
2008 Seats % Votes	49 10.0	143 37.6	- 6.8	77 26.2	37 18.2	2 1.2
2006 Seats % Votes	51 10.5	124 36.3	- 4.5	103 30.2	29 17.5	1 1.0

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party won a huge victory last night, outpolling several published pre-election surveys handily to get 39.6% of the vote with the perennial thirds nearly doubling their previous best results to get 30.6% of the vote. Then official Opposition Party, the Liberals, received the lowest vote percentage in their long history, 18.9%, falling below 20% for the first time ever.

With a comfortable margin of a dozen over the required 155-seat total for a majority in the Canadian Parliament, Harper can be assured of being Prime Minister for at least 5 years before he needs to call another election.

Although that's disappointing, real progressives will be having a say in running the Canadian government, although in a parliamentary system, if you have the votes there are very little checks and balances for a majority government to enact its will.