The federal riding of Charlottetown has been reliably won by Liberals since the Mulroney era.
But some believe the Liberals may be vulnerable in the riding. The federal Greens in particular have poured considerable resources into the campaign of local candidate Darcie Lanthier.
The party is hoping the electoral success of the provincial Greens will translate to a breakthrough at the federal level.
Meanwhile, some polls have suggested Conservative candidate Robert Campbell may be the most realistic challenger to the Liberal stronghold.
For incumbent Liberal candidate Sean Casey, this race has simply felt like a repeat of the 2015 campaign. In that race, the NDP were the main challengers. Casey believes the NDP and Greens usually share the same collection of voters.
"This actually feels an awful lot like the last campaign, except you can trade orange for green,” Casey said.
Casey won handily in 2015, capturing 56 per cent of the vote.
This time around, Casey believes Liberal policies are having an impact on the housing shortage and on addressing social inequality. Several federally-financed affordable housing projects, including the 60-unit Martha Place on Acadian Drive, are under construction.
Many Islanders have benefitted from the Canada Child Benefit, Casey says. Experts credit the national program with pulling 278,000 children above the poverty line since 2016.
However, the federal Greens have invested heavily in the Charlottetown race. While specific spending figures have not been released, the party has spent heavily on ad-buys in traditional media.
The party’s leader, Elizabeth May, has also visited the riding twice over the course of the campaign. Along with three ridings in Vancouver Island, the federal party considers Charlottetown and Fredericton to be key battlegrounds.
"It feels like the Greens are making more noise than the blue,” Casey said.
“But will that translate to the ballot box? I'll leave that up to the voters."
Lanthier believes frustrations over issues like affordable housing or runaway climate change could shift Charlottetown’s traditionally cagey voters.
“This is one of those change elections,” Lanthier said.
Lanthier believes the Charlottetown election is a “two-way” election, between her and Casey. She believes Green MPs could be influential in a minority government scenario.
"After 31 years of Liberal MPs, we're in a housing crisis. We're in the bottom 15 per cent of federal ridings for average household income. We're doing very poorly," Lanthier said.
Conservative candidate Robert Campbell believes he is getting strong reception from voters. He said the Conservative platform, with its anti-carbon tax message and its emphasis on income tax cuts, has resonated.
Campbell’s campaign recently erected several signs near those of Casey. The signs bore the words “we trusted you” and listed several outstanding issues in Charlottetown, including
Employment Insurance reform, housing and taxes.
"The whole idea is, if he's running on his record, he's got to run on it all, not [just] a portion of it," Campbell said.
"He's touting his good stuff, I'm showing him the things that he's failed to do."
Byrne said many voters have been responding positively to both leader Jagmeet Singh and NDP policies, such as a proposed one per cent tax on fortunes worth more than $20 million. The federal leader is seeing a surge nationally in recent polling.
"Jagmeet has done such a wonderful job of just saying 'are we going to do this for everybody, or are we going to do this for a few?' Byrne said.
“People understand there's one class of rules for the super wealthy in this country and there's one class of rules for others.”
But in the midst of a race populated by candidates from more well-known parties, Christian Heritage Party candidate Fred MacLeod says his party is offering voters a more socially conservative option.
The party describes itself as pro-life and opposes legal cannabis, doctor-assisted suicide, same-sex marriage, and abortions in almost all circumstances.
“We stand for the innocent and the ones who can’t stand for themselves,” MacLeod said.
For Stu Neatby's closer look at what issues P.E.I. voters will be focusing on while they head to the ballot box, click here
Twitter.com/stu_neatby
