1999 Ontario Provincial Election
Riding-by-Riding Prediction
Eglinton-Lawrence

Current Prediction:
Riding Profile:

Candidates:
Liberal Party:
Mike Colle MPP
Progressive Conservative Party:
John Parker MPP
New Democratic Party:
Jay Waterman
Green Party:
Shelly Lipsey
Natural Law Party:
Neil Dickie
Family Coalition Party:
Frank D'Angelo

Incumbent (old riding composition):
Eglinton (34%):
William Saunderson
Lawrence (52%):
Joe Cordiano
Oakwood (38%):
Mike Colle
St. Andrew-St. Patrick (6%):
Hon. Isabe Bassett
Wilson Heights (12.8?%):
Monte Kwinter
York Mills (8%):
Hon. David Turnbull

Member of Parliament:
Joseph Volpe

Surrounding Ridings:
Davenport
Don Valley West
St. Paul's
Willowdale
York Centre
York South-Weston

Misc:
Population: 103 242
Avg Household Income 61 724
Language (Home)
English 78 495
Italian 6 895
Portuguese 2 075
Submitted Information
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03/08/99 D Cavaco Email:
Mike Colle will win without a doubt. He has the best profile of the current Liberal Caucus with his visible and strong stances on CVA, redlight cameras, the Megacity, and hospital closings. Mike Colle will attract volunteers from both insied the new riding as well as admirers from other parts of the west-end. On an organzitaional side, Colle has one of the best Liberal organizers as a campiagn manager. No doubt the areas different ethnic communties will know of Mike Colle and come out to support him on Election Day. Colle is a shrewd pol and he will not take any of his opponets lightly.
03/10/99 I.MacFarlane Email:
Mike Colle is well known and well liked in Toronto. He has a high profile from his time in city politics and from taking on issues such as red light cameras for high accident area in toronto. The riding has a strong liberal base, most of the riding is current held by liberal MPP's.
03/11/99 A.S. Email: adma@interlog.com
It might not have been predicted in 1995, but incredibly, Mike Colle appears to have found his true calling as an MPP--I'd reckon he's not just headed for reelection, but a possible landslide, bolstered by the support of erstwhile Tories and NDPers. And unlike many of Toronto's Italian Liberals, Colle has successfully deflected the offputting whiff of ethnicized "machine politics"--he's on another planet from McGuinty's potentially lethal "Cordiano Crisis".
03/15/99 Email:
Mike's got it made, so despite his temporary flight to the arms of that amalgamation wonderboy that took over our fair city, we can presume no contest even this early, and look forward to seeing him back on a much firmer footing in the new leg. And he is even a hero to a lot of NDP people.
04/08/99 NOW Email:
Cooking up a Tory defeat By Enzo di Matteo
Incumbent Bill Saunderson is another Tory saying bye-bye to provincial politics in this north Toronto enclave that, under riding redistribution, is now made up of parts of the old Eglinton, Lawrence, Oakwood, St. Andrew-St. Patrick, Wilson Heights and York Mills ridings.
Tory MPP John L. Parker, who's seeking to replace Saunderson, hails from East York and will be out of his element against Grit MPP Mike Colle, who has his Oakwood base going for him.
When you add up the 1995 election numbers, it spells bad news for the Tories.
Italian and Jewish residents, typically strong Grit supporters, make up 33 per cent of voters. It gets worse for the Tories where health care and rental policy are concerned. Half the riding's residents are tenants and 16 per cent seniors.
05/04/99 Robert Dunn Email:
Mike Colle is in the news all the time. He was the leader in the anti-megacity fight and is now taking on the Oil companies who rip us off at the gas pumps every weekend. The people in this neighborhood like fighters and Mike Colle will fight for each one of us. That is why I will vote for him and why he will win the election when everyone goes to cast their ballot.
05/10/99 Toronto Star
NDP is dark horse in Tory, Liberal slugfest By Joel Baglole
05/13/99 Mara Thompson Email:
MPP John Parker is a strong and hard working candidate. He has proved to be a hard and determined worker in working in the attourney Generals office and travelling to many aboriginal towns. The riding will be a tough one to win, BUT it is deffinatley posssible with all the help from the many volunteers and supporters. The conservative's have a strong plattform and strong leadership by Mike Harris and the cacus. John Parker is a prime canidate and could deffinatly beat Mike Colle!
05/20/99 Pat Bradley Email:
Mike Colle used to be my Metro Councillor, and he's a dream politician - remembers everyone, pays attention, is a great riding politician. John Parker is my current MPP, and where is he? Not in my neighbourhood. Not only does Colle deserve to win, he will win.
05/25/99 S. Yodan Email:
John Parker has been the MPP for the former riding of York East since he was elected four years ago riding the Tory wave into office. Since then he has not been very active in the riding and to my knowledge does nothing but send calenders to residents once a year. In any case, John Parker chose not to run in one of the ridings which were once part of his old riding including Broadview-Greenwood and Beaches-East York as he knows he has no chance against the strong incumbents, both of whom are strong NDP star candidates. Thus he was forced to run to a riding which he thought would be a safe seat. This just may have been his undoing as Mike Colle has been acclaimed as the Liberal Candidate. Mike COlle is both popular and a supporter of Toronto (being a Metro Coucilor). John Parker being a PC, suported the unloading of user fees onto Toronto residents.
05/26/99 Paul E. Email:
Early on, most people thought Colle would win easily. Now, the local consensus is that it's a horse race. John Parker has run a surprisingly strong campaign. The signs tell the story: Parker is winning in the east, while Colle (as expected) leads in the west. The problem for Colle is a resurgent NDP that's eating away at his west end base. Some prominent Colle supporters can barely conceal their feelings about their leader, whom they feel has helped turn a sure thing into a horse race. If the NDP keeps moving up and Tory support holds, Colle will be in trouble.
05/28/99 Susumu Yoshioka Email: manabiya@hotmail.com
John Parker has been my MPP in the former York East riding for the past four years and the general consensus here is that the residents are not aware of anything this man has done while in government. Once a year he has sent us a handy little calender with useful phone numbers, but that's about it. The residents in York East are upset about the shafting of Metro Toronto by the Harris Tories over the last four years... Another concern here is the amalgamation of East York into a huge megacity. Not only has the government tried to destroy a sense of community amongst East Yorkers, John Parker and the Mike Harris government have cut billions of dollars in transfer fees for municipal services. In essence he has just said, hey deal with it yourself, we don't care (we need the cash to find the tax cuts!) Despite the "generous" billion dollar loan to"tide us over", we will really start to feel the effects next year when the loan period runs out. How can a government leave the nation's biggest city saddled with unpayable debt and not enough funding to maintain basic services?...If I lived in Eglinton-Lawrence, I wouldn't vote for him. But at the same time I wouldn't vote for Mike Colle either because of disturbing rumours I've heard about his campaign. Apparently, Colle is running a dirty campaign (I emphasize that this is just a rumour I've heard) I've heard that many of the all-candidates meetings have been stage-run by the Mike Colle campaign refusing to allow John Parker to express his views. This is contrary to democracy and should (if true) not be done, obviously. This one reason that I'm already starting to feel disillusioned by politics (and it's my first election), because it's just so dirty. I've seen signs being stolen and slashed, I've heard the slander and mud-slinging during this campaign. To me it is clearly unacceptable. It's time for politicians to think of us the people first!
05/29/99 A.S. Email: adma@interlog.com
Final-stretch wrapup: I did *not* know in my earlier (over two months ago!) post that John Parker was going to be running here. Big deal; he needn't have bothered. If Parker appears to have more signs in the upscale east, that's to be expected--it's *always* been Tory-friendly east of Bathurst. But from what I've seen, Colle's no slouch there, either--and lots of signs in the east (and a few PC polls as well) didn't help ex-MPP David Rotenberg come close to Joe Volpe in '97. Perhaps Joltin' Jay Waterman will skim a bit off the bottom and even get his deposit back, but Colle so transcends his leader's personal travails that only wild-eyed PC delirium can project John Parker as the giant-killer...

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Last Updated 30th May 1999

© 1999 Milton Chan, University of Waterloo
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