A historic snap federal election was called in mid-August leaving candidates across the Cowichan-Malahat-Langford riding — and clear across the country as well — just 36 days to mobilize their campaigns and start knocking on doors.
Five candidates chose to run in the Cowichan-Malahat-Langford riding. They included incumbent Alistair MacGregor, NDP, Alana DeLong, Conservative, Blair Herbert, Liberal, Lia Versaevel, Green Party and Mark Hecht, People’s Party of Canada.
Voting day was Sept. 20 and when the dust settled, the incumbent MacGregor retained his seat, as did the Liberal Party and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau with a minority government.
MacGregor received 26,968 votes, good for 42.8 per cent of the overall total.
It was MacGregor’s most convincing victory. He won with 35.94 per cent of the vote in 2015, and 36.06 per cent in 2019.
The next closest wasn’t that close at all. The Conservative DeLong earned 17,870 votes, or 28.4 per cent of the 63,032 valid ballots. Herbert’s Liberal supporters gave him 10,320 votes, or 16.4 per cent of the Cowichan-Malahat-Langford riding’s votes while the People’s Party candidate Mark Hecht and Green Party’s Lia Versaevel got 3,952 and 3,922 votes respectively, both good for just over six per cent of the vote each.
“I’m very thankful to the people of this riding for putting that kind of trust on my shoulders again,” MacGregor said on Sept. 20, after it was clear he was going to keep his job. “I think they’ve reviewed my last six years in office and decided that I am the right person for this riding. I will go into the 44th Parliament trying to live up to their expectations.
“It doesn’t look like the result will be all that different from what we just had, which begs the question of why this election was necessary in the first place,” MacGregor said. “The Liberals were seeing a majority and they were denied that because Canadians don’t feel comfortable giving them 100 per cent of the power in the House of Commons.”