Orange continues to be crushed in federal by-elections

I was happy to help the Freeland campaign in Toronto Centre over the last couple of months, and I'm glad to have her as my MP. I was a poll captain, and Freeland pulled 62% of the vote in my home poll, woot.

With the results spinning game already going on, here is my contribution, taking a look at some of the data from by-election results since the last election:

• The NDP did get its best ever result in Toronto Centre with 36%, but despite Mulcair running a star candidate with a hard negative campaign, the actual margin between the Liberals and NDP increased from 2011 from 11% to 13%, with Liberal support increasing by 8%
• Of the nine by-elections held since the last election, Toronto Centre marked only the second time that the NDP actually increased its percentage of the vote. The NDP saw a 5% increase in Durham, when the Liberals were shorthanded because of the provincial Liberal leadership race
• The NDP also ran a star candidate and ran a hard negative campaign in Bourassa...and were rewarded with a lower share of the vote than 2011 and a Liberal margin of victory almost double over 2011
• In by-elections since Mulcair has become NDP leader, NDP support has declined by 9% on average, with three seats (Brandon-Souris, Calgary Centre, Provencher and Victoria) seeing double digit declines in support
• While the NDP vote has only gone up in two by-elections, the Liberal vote has only gone down in two races, (Victoria and Durham) which were held when the Liberals were without a permanent leader (and as mentioned when Liberal energies in Ontario were elsewhere) and the decline in both seats was less than 1%
• While the NDP was running from Mulcair's record on resource development in Toronto Centre, in Western Canada the NDP vote declined by 11% in Calgary Centre, 14% in Victoria, 10% in Provencher and 18% in Brandon-Souris. In all but Victoria, which was a held NDP seat and was retained, the NDP candidate finished with under 10% of the vote
• The Manitoba NDP holds a seat in Brandon, making the 18% drop they experienced more troubling, as they hardly lack a ground game. 
• While the Liberals took Labrador from the Conservatives and came within 4% and 1% of winning Calgary Centre and Labrador respectively, the 13% gap in Toronto Centre represents the closest the the NDP has come to actually winning (and again, this is actually a widening of the gap for the NDP from 2011) and the NDP only retained Victoria by less than 3% after a 14% drop