Former Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson announces run for federal election

Gregor Robertson can be seen speaking during a federal announcement during his tenure as Vancouver's mayor.

Former Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson is running in the federal election, saying he was invited to do so by Liberal Leader Mark Carney.

Robertson will be running in the Vancouver Fraserview-South Burnaby riding where there was a vacancy on the Liberal slate following Harjit Sajjan’s announcement that he would not be seeking re-election.

“We’re facing unprecedented, urgent, complex challenges—and there’s no one better prepared to lead us through them than Prime Minister Mark Carney. His depth of experience, steady hand, and bold vision are exactly what this country needs right now,” Robertson said in a statement Sunday, hours after the election was called.

“So, when the prime minister asked me to run, the choice was clear.”

The run will mark a return to politics for Robertson, who served as mayor from 2008 to 2018. Prior to that, he spent three years as an MLA with the B.C. NDP.

The Conservatives, according to their website, have yet to declare a candidate in the riding ahead of what is widely predicted to be a tight, two-way race between the Tories and the Liberals.

The riding is one of the hundreds across the country that saw its boundaries redrawn ahead of the election, meaning there’s no record of how it has swung in the past.

However, the new riding has subsumed Vancouver South which Sajjan won for Trudeau’s Liberals in 2015. That riding has flipped back and forth between Liberals and Conservatives since it was created in 2003. The NDP has never taken the riding.

The NDP’s candidate in Vancouver Fraserview-South Burnaby is Manoj Bhangu, who has not held office but who describes himself as a “small-business owner and an engaged community advocate.”

The election is set for Monday, April 28.