Harper calls four byelections for late November

Fierce fights expected in Toronto, Montreal ridings

Four federal byelections in Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec will be held on Nov. 25, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced Sunday.

The ridings have been gearing up for elections since the summer, and much attention has been focused on Toronto Centre and Montreal’s Bourassa riding, where fierce fights are expected between the Liberal and NDP candidates. Both ridings have been held by Liberals for years but saw strong showings by the NDP in 2011.

The byelections will be the first time the parties have faced off under new leaders Justin Trudeau and Tom Mulcair, who both hope to gain political ground in the 2015 election.

“There’s a battle right now for the political left in the country between the Liberal party and the New Democrats,” political scientist Chris Cochrane told Postmedia News this summer. “Any signals that the Liberals send out at this point of losing ground to the New Democrats or not making ground up would be a very negative one.”

Toronto Centre, previously held by former interim Liberal leader Bob Rae, will see two journalists vying for votes. Liberal candidate Chrystia Freeland, a former deputy editor at the Globe and Mail and cochair of the Liberals’ new economic advisory board, is seeking election against NDP candidate Linda McQuaig, a former Toronto Star columnist.

In Montreal- Bourassa, where former Liberal MP Denis Coderre stepped down in June to run for mayor of Montreal, the competition is between Liberal candidate Emmanuel Dubourg, who used to be a Quebec MNA, and NDP candidate Stéphane Moraille, an entertainment lawyer. Former NHL player and Green Party deputy leader Georges Laraque dropped out of the race last week to fight fraud charges.

Manitoba ridings Provencher and Brandon-Souris are expected to remain Tory.