For agriculture minister Andy Mitchell, election night came down to 21 votes.
Through most of the evening Jan. 23, the Parry Sound-Muskoka Ontario MP held a small lead over Conservative challenger and former provincial health minister Tony Clement. The last few rural polls put Clement over the top by 21 votes in the unofficial tally. There will be an automatic recount under Elections Canada rules.
It marks the second time in consecutive elections that the Liberal agriculture minister has been defeated in an Ontario riding. In 2004, Bob Speller lost after just seven months on the job and this election, Conservative Diane Finley defeated him in a re-election bid.
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Even if Mitchell had won or wins on a recount, the former rural banker will no longer be agriculture minister, because the Liberals lost government.
Since 1993, Mitchell had represented a riding that had previously elected Conservative MPs for decades. Only the split between the Progressive Conservatives and the Reform Party helped him retain the seat in 1997 and 2000.
The 2004 election against a weak Conservative candidate was a close call.
Mitchell, 52, presided over a record use of public dollars to support farm incomes that were at their lowest point in decades. Federal programs sent $5 billion to producers in 2004 and in 2005 even more money is expected to be transferred.
He also promised “transformative change” and in the face of the BSE crisis, announced programs that would support development of locally owned packing plants.
Mitchell planted the seeds for policy revisions by commissioning a farm income report from Liberal MP Wayne Easter, his parliamentary secretary, that challenged economists’ views on the causes of low farm incomes and argued that the real issue is the power of corporations in the marketplace and the market weakness of farmers rather than farmer efficiency.
Mitchell and the Liberal Party campaigned on a promise to implement the Easter report by helping increase farmer power.
As minister, Mitchell also raised expectations for changes in federal agricultural science and research policy by launching a review of existing policies and promising to change them if found wanting.
Winnipeg-based pollster Curtis Johnson, vice-president of Ipsos-Reid, said in a Jan. 23 interview that Mitchell had good instincts about the need to support the industry and for policy change, but he lacked a direct connection.
