Trinity—Spadina

For the provincial electoral district, see Trinity—Spadina (provincial electoral district).

Trinity—Spadina is a federal electoral district in Ontario, Canada, that has been represented in the Canadian House of Commons since 1988.

It generally encompasses the western portion of Downtown Toronto. In the 2001 Canadian census, the riding had 106,094 people, of whom 74,409 were eligible to vote.

Its federal Member of Parliament (MP) is Olivia Chow of the New Democratic Party. She defeated Tony Ianno of the Liberal Party of Canada in the January 23, 2006 election. The riding has long been a battle ground between the NDP and the Liberals, with the NDP recently winning both provincially and federally.

Major landmarks within the riding include the western portion of the University of Toronto, the CN Tower, Rogers Centre (formerly Skydome), Air Canada Centre, the Canadian Broadcasting Centre, the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, Toronto City Hall, Kensington Market, Chinatown, Christie Pits, Trinity Bellwoods Park, the southern portion of Bay Street and Palmerston Boulevard.

The riding is one of the most ethnically diverse in Canada containing the heart of Toronto's Chinatown, Koreatown, Little Italy, and Little Portugal. The northern section of the riding is the trendy Annex district, while the eastern edge contains part of the University of Toronto and thousands of students.

Demographics

Average family income: $81,415 [1] (2001)
Median family income: $50,047 [2]
Unemployment: 6.7%
Language, mother tongue: English 52%, French 2%, Other 46%
Religion: Catholic 32%, Protestant 15%, Buddhist 5%, Jewish 4%, Muslim 3%, No religious affiliation 33%, Other 7% [3]
Visible Minority: Chinese 18%, Black 4% South Asian 3%, Filipino 2%, Southeast Asian 2%, Korean 2%, Others 6%

Geography

It consists of the Toronto Islands and the part of the City of Toronto bounded on the south by Toronto Harbour, and on the west, north and east by a line drawn from the harbour north on Spencer Avenue, east along the Gardiner Expressway, north on Dufferin, east on Queen Street West, southeast along the Canadian Pacific Railway line, north along Dovercourt Road, east along Dundas Street West, north along Ossington Avenue, east along the Canadian Pacific Railway situated north of Dupont Street, south along Avenue Road and Queens Park Crescent West, east along College Street and south along Yonge Street to the Harbour.

These borders were somewhat changed in the 2004 redistribution. The northwestern corner, a somewhat pro-NDP area was lost to Davenport. A large, but mostly business area of Toronto Centre—Rosedale between University Avenue and Yonge St. was given to the riding. This region tends to support the Liberals. The Toronto Islands were also added to the riding from Toronto Centre—Rosedale. This area is very strongly NDP and while it has a small population it is a highly activist one that provides many campaign workers for the New Democrats.

History

The riding was created in 1987 from Trinity and Spadina, and smaller parts of Toronto Centre—Rosedale and Parkdale—High Park.

It consisted initially of the part of the City of Toronto bounded on the south by Toronto Harbour, on the east by Avenue Road, Queen's Park Crescent West, University Avenue and York Street, and on the west and north by a line drawn from the harbour north along Spencer Avenue, east along the Gardiner Expressway, north along Atlantic Avenue, southeast along the Canadian National Railway line, north along Dovercourt Road, east along Bloor Street West, north along Ossington Avenue, and east along the Canadian Pacific Railway line to Avenue Road.

In 2003, it was given its current boundaries as described above.

Members of Parliament

This riding has elected the following members of the Canadian House of Commons:

Election results

2011 election

The 2011 election was not the expected close race between the incumbent NDP MP Olivia Chow and Liberal candidate, Toronto lawyer Christine Innes (wife of former MP Tony Ianno), that some observers predicted. The Liberals did not make gains here, which were anticipated by those who believed that the number of condominiums along the Toronto waterfront would bring in more centrist and right leaning voters.

2008 election

2006 election

A third battle between NDP challenger Olivia Chow and longtime Liberal incumbent Tony Ianno took place in the 2006 election. Ianno's narrow victory over Chow in 2004 had surprised most observers. Immediately after the writ was dropped for the federal election, Chow resigned her City Hall seat and vowed not to return to her previous job as municipal councillor. Chow ran a more disciplined campaign than in 2004, focusing on winning her own seat rather than lending her support to the national campaign of her husband, NDP leader Jack Layton. Ianno suffered from the broader decline in Liberal fortunes across Canada, ultimately losing to Chow by nearly six percentage points, the largest margin of victory in any of their three electoral encounters.

The strongest areas for the NDP were the Annex, Seaton Village, the University of Toronto area, Sussex-Ulster and Kensington Market. The Liberals narrowly carried Little Italy, and won the waterfront condo belt by a very wide margin.

2004 election

In the 2004 election, New Democrat city councillor Olivia Chow took on Tony Ianno again in what was expected to be a very competitive election. Additionally, Conservative David Watters, Green Anna Costa, Progressive Canadian Party Asif Hossain, Canadian Action Party Tristan Downe-Dewdney and Daniel Knezetic for the Popular Democratic Party contested the election.

The Popular Democratic Party was a social democratic and populist political party formed in 2003. It did not register as a political party with Elections Canada, and closed down after the 2004 election. The PDP proposed decentralization and community involvement in the political process through the creation of community councils to which any elected PDP representative would relinquish all decision making power. The party was anti-war, opposed globalization, was environmentalist, and supported full employment. Its only electoral activity was to run Daniel Knezetic, a University of Toronto student, in this election.

Unlike the 1997 battle between Chow and Ianno, this campaign largely remained civil. Chow was outside of the riding much of the time, campaigning in other ridings due to her national prestige. Many had pegged her to win because of her high profile as the wife of NDP leader Jack Layton. On election night, most were expecting Chow to win, but Ianno won a close but certain victory.

The results surprised many. Chow captured Little Italy, long Ianno's main bedrock of support and an area that polling and sign numbers showed as going strongly for Ianno. The reverse was true of the Annex which was expected to solidly vote for Chow but did so by a fairly small margin.

Ianno won on strong turnout from the waterfront condominiums that voted overwhelmingly in favour of him.

Note: Conservative vote is compared to the total of the Canadian Alliance vote and Progressive Conservative vote in 2000 election.

Prior elections

Note: Canadian Alliance vote is compared to the Reform vote in 1997 election.

See also

• List of Canadian federal electoral districts
• Past Canadian electoral districts

External links

• Riding history from the Library of Parliament
• 2008 results from Elections Canada
• 2011 results from Elections Canada
• Campaign expense data from Elections Canada