Liberal party gaining momentum in the polls and to form government every seat will make the difference.
The CBC has reported the Liberals and the Conservatives are in a heated race in this federal election.
The Liberal Party will need to snatch as many seats as possible from the Tories if they want to be the next government in Ottawa.
The Liberals are even trying to break through in the Tory heartland of Alberta. Liberals candidates have built a strong presence in six ridings in the wildrose province according to the poll tracking website Three Hundred Eight.There are three Liberal candidates with a chance to win in Calgary.
In Calgary Confederation, Liberal candidate Matt Grant is ahead by a razor thin margin of 2.4 per cent over Conservative candidate Len Webber according to a ThreeHundredEight poll released Oct. 7.
Despite the Liberal momentum, Lori Williams, a political scientist from Mount Royal University, said there are “real possibilities that the Conservative candidate [Len Webber] could win” in the riding.
Even with a well-organized strategic vote, the Conservatives could win thanks to vote splitting. “There are people who truly support the NDP federally and provincially, and will vote for them no matter what,” said Williams.
Vote splitting and strategic voting could play a key role in the riding Williams predicted.
Grant said “We don’t campaign on fear, we campaign on optimism.”
Matt Grant greets morning commuters with coffee on their way to work at the Hillhurst-Sunnyside LRT station. The Liberal candidate hopes to build a sense of community and support from all political stripes in Calgary Confederation to send him to Ottawa as their MP. October 7th 2015, Calgary. Photo by Daniel Rodriguez
The Grit candidate said he is trying to earn the vote of people and create a consensus among the progressive voters in the riding to elect him and avoid vote splitting.
NDP candidate Kirk Heuser said that for those thinking about strategic voting, the Liberals aren’t the best choice.
“If you’re going to vote strategically you have to look all across the country,” Heuser argued. “We [NDP] only need 35 seats to form government, and the Liberals need over 100.”
Calgary Confederation is a new riding that is proving a tight race this election between the Liberals and the Conservatives. Created in 2012, the riding consists of the following electoral districts: Calgary Centre-North, Calgary West and Calgary – Nose Hill. These previous ridings were all Conservative strongholds over the past three elections, according to Elections Canada. Learn more about the riding and the candidates here. Map courtesy of Elections Canada. Icon courtesy of Adiante/App finder under creative commons licence
The editor responsible for this article is Zarif Alibhai, Zalibhai@cjournal.ca