Liberals lose closely contested seat to Bloc Québécois after vote validation

Darren Major · CBC News

· Posted: May 01, 2025 3:40 PM EDT | Last Updated: 7 minutes ago

The Liberals person dropped 1 spot aft Elections Canada's validation process determined they mislaid a tightly contested Quebec riding.

Terrebonne, conscionable northbound of Montreal, was 1 of the past ridings to beryllium called connected Tuesday afternoon. The last ballot number had the Liberals flip the spot from the Bloc Québécois by 35 votes.

But CBC News has learned that aft Elections Canada double-checked the numbers during its validation process, the Bloc successful information held the riding by a borderline of 44 votes.

The flip pulls the Liberals — who fell conscionable a fewer seats abbreviated of a bulk authorities — down to 168 seats and the Bloc jumps to 23 seats.

The validation process — which is antithetic from an authoritative recount — is simply a mode for Elections Canada to verify the unofficial results that are reported connected predetermination night. Each section returning serviceman goes done the results reported by each polling presumption to weed retired immoderate imaginable errors.

"When you're talking astir hundreds of oregon thousands of polling locations and tons of results coming in, errors tin happen. Whether it's thing gets misheard connected the telephone oregon idiosyncratic accidentally types successful the incorrect fig connected the keyboard," Matthew McKenna, a spokesperson for Elections Canada, told CBC News earlier predetermination day.

"The returning serviceman for each riding goes done the statements of the ballot from each canvass and makes definite that that's checked against the records truthful that we tin set for immoderate small errors oregon mistakes."

Even aft the validation process, the contention was truthful adjacent that it volition trigger an authoritative recount. Such a recount is overseen by a justice and is automatically triggered if a campaigner wins by little than 0.1 per cent of the wide vote.

Official recounts person flipped ridings successful the past. In 2021, the Bloc campaigner was declared the victor of the then-named riding of Châteauguay-Lacolle. But an authoritative recount 2 weeks aboriginal gave the triumph to the Liberals.

An authoritative recount volition besides beryllium triggered successful the N.L. riding of Terra Nova-The Peninsulas, wherever the Liberal campaigner edged retired the Conservative by 12 votes.