Crombie says she won’t ask any Ontario Liberals to step aside so she can have a seat

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Ontario Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie said Wednesday she intends to try again to win a seat in the legislature, but will be leading the party from outside the chamber for the foreseeable future.

Crombie is trying to brand the third-place party as “the people’s opposition,” as it won a much higher percentage of the popular vote than the NDP, which will form official Opposition because it won more seats.

In last week’s election, the Liberals increased their number of seats to 14, above the threshold needed for official party status in the legislature for the first time since 2018, but the party also ended up in third place again and Crombie didn’t win a seat.

She hasn’t given up seeking one, but it may be a while before she gets another shot at running.

“I will not ask any of my incredible caucus members to step down,” she said Wednesday. “I will, at the right time, find a seat.”

Crombie, who was mayor of Mississauga for three terms before becoming provincial Liberal leader in 2023, ran in Mississauga East-Cooksville, where the Progressive Conservative candidate won by 1,210 votes.

The Liberals had been hoping that Crombie’s mayoral record and name recognition in Mississauga could help them flip all six Mississauga ridings, but they did not win any. Mississauga-Erin Mills, however, was so close between the Liberals and Progressive Conservatives that it is going to a recount.

Crombie said she would like the party to conduct a postelection analysis of the results to see what it could have done differently and what it should do better next time.

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There will be a leadership review at some point, but for now the party’s executive council and the 14-member caucus voted to support her continuing on as leader, Crombie noted, framing the Liberals’ election result as positive.

“We are the people’s opposition,” she said. “We are the ones who gained support right across Ontario with 30 per cent of the vote. We brought in five new members. We’re the only party to have gained strength.”

The NDP lost seats and strength in the popular vote, but with 27 seats it will remain the official Opposition.

NDP Leader Marit Stiles noted Tuesday that the Progressive Conservatives spent a lot of time and energy targeting NDP ridings such as Windsor West, Niagara Falls and Oshawa and the New Democrats held them all.

“We fought back hard and we used every resource we had to hold on to those communities,” she said. “At the end of the day, I’m proud of the campaign we put on.”

Premier Doug Ford has said the legislature cannot resume until at least the week of March 17 because that is the earliest that members of provincial parliament can be sworn in, but he has not indicated how quickly he intends to get the house back in session after that.