By Pepper Parr
March 17th, 2025
BURLINGTON, ON
Are they electable?
In 2015 Karina Gould showed that Burlington can elect a Liberal.
She became the Member of Parliament for the city and went on to become a Cabinet Minister and then took a shot at becoming the Prime Minister.
The number of votes she got from Burlington was less than 200; Gould received just under 4,800 votes nationally – the number of votes from Burlington had to have stunned Gould.
Gould was elected in the riding of Burlington on Sept. 20, 2019, and won 45.7 percent of 69,208 votes cast.
In the federal election that is expected to be announced before the 27th of this month the certainty that was there for Gould in the past isn’t as solid now.
No one knows why Mark Carney did not put her in the Cabinet he named last Friday. One nationally known pundit said he thought it was petty on the part of Carney.
Andrea Grebenc (straw hat with black trip) campaigning with Karina Gould.
Andrea Grebenc was beside Gould during many of the door-to-door campaigns.
Grebenc had been a very successful school board trustee and served exceptionally well when she was chair.
When there was an opportunity to run as a candidate for the Burlington seat in the Legislature – she got tied up in the rules that kept her away from putting together a solid campaign. She lost the nomination. The woman who won Mariam Manaa lost the election.
Grebenc thought she saw an opportunity at the municipal level and ran against Gary Carr for Regional Chair. Grebenc ran into some of the hard realities for women who choose public service to run for public office. She pulled a respectable 20,276 votes (19%)at the Regional level.
No one expected Doug Ford to call the snap election – he did and Grebenc campaigned for the nomination – won that and was thought to be a sure winner. It was described by many as “hers to lose” – and she did just that.
She did say that she would be running again whenever the next election is held.
This leads to the question: Is Andrea Grebenc electable? And can Gould hold her seat?
Gould wants to keep the Carbon Tax.Carney said he would scrap it and he did on day one.
The trend with Carney is to the right.Gould fits more like the NDP.