OTTAWA –Two high-profile Independents will venture out on separate paths, with only one heading back to Ottawa as an MP in a few weeks when the 44th Parliament is formed.
Jody Wilson-Raybould, the representative for Vancouver Granville, won her riding Monday night with 32 per cent of the vote, surpassing her Liberal rival Noormohamed Taleeb who earned 27 per cent.
Her fellow Independent and former Liberal colleague, Jane Philpott, meanwhile, was a distant third in her riding – with 21 per cent of the vote. It wasn’t enough to surpass Conservative Theodore Antony with 31 per cent and winner Liberal Helena Jaczek with 39 per cent.
It was far from the 2015 results when Philpott, as a Liberal, earned almost 50 per cent of support from her Markham-Stouffville community.
Both politicians resigned from the Liberal cabinet and were subsequently booted from caucus during the unraveling of the SNC-Lavalin affair in early 2019. Wilson-Raybould sat as both attorney general and minister of veterans affairs, while Philpott held the positions of minister of health, minister of Indigenous services, and president of the Treasury Board.
Wilson-Raybould is the only Independent to make it through to the House of Commons. She joins three Greens, 24 NDP, 32 Bloq Quebecois, 122 Tories, and 156 Liberals, including a re-elected Justin Trudeau.
