Ontario Liberal leadership front-runner Steven Del Duca is well ahead in race for would-be delegates

Thestar.com
January 24, 2020
Robert Benzie

More than half the Ontario Liberal members running for delegate positions so they can vote for the party’s next leader are committed to front-runner Steven Del Duca.

Del Duca, a former cabinet minister, has 2,684 supporters running to be his delegates at the Liberal leadership convention in Mississauga on March 7.

That’s 52 per cent of the 5,153 people vying for the prestigious spots in delegate selection meetings being held across the province on Feb. 8-9.

Some 1,984 delegates -- 16 from each of Ontario’s 124 ridings -- and about 400 ex officio members, including current and former Liberal MPPs, sitting federal Liberal MPs, riding association presidents, and other insiders, will be eligible to cast ballots for the leader.

MPP Michael Coteau (Don Valley East), also a former minister, has 1,234 would-be delegates affiliated with his campaign -- or 24 per cent of those seeking leadership-voting privileges.

Kate Graham, who finished third in the 2018 election in London North Centre, has 623 or 12 per cent.

MPP Mitzie Hunter (Scarborough-Guildwood), another former minister, has 409 or 8 per cent.

Alvin Tedjo, who finished third in 2018 in Oakville North-Burlington, has 137 or 2.7 per cent.

Ottawa lawyer Brenda Hollingsworth has 66 or 1.3 per cent.

The unofficial tally obtained by the Star does not include a small number of Liberals who are running as independent, or unaffiliated, delegates in meetings being held across the province in two weeks’ time.

But it does underscore that Del Duca appears well ahead of his rivals.

The former Vaughan MPP, who lost his seat to Progressive Conservative MPP Michael Tibollo in Premier Doug Ford’s June 2018 landslide, sold 14,173 party memberships.

Coteau sold 8,500 memberships while Hunter sold 2,000, Graham about 1,500, and Tedjo 1,000. Hollingsworth entered the race at the deadline for membership sales and did not report any.