It's the riding to watch: Burnaby North-Seymour, and on Election Night, Conservative candidate Mike Little is still waiting to see the final results come in, flanked by friends, family and supporters.
While the Conservatives may have lost their hold on the House of Commons to a Liberal majority, Little still has a decent shot at the riding, if polls leading up to Oct. 19 carry any weight.
"I'm doing well. I think we put forward a good option for the people of Burnaby North-Seymour," he told the NOW, over the pub clamour and cheers for the Blue Jays. As for the final results, "We'll have to wait and see," he said.
Little is expecting the riding to be close.
"I think there's going to be little difference between the top three parties in terms of votes," he said.
As for the Tories' campaign, Little said the party struggled part way through and saw numbers drop, but the Conservatives brought forward new ideas and those numbers picked up again. He also tipped his hat to the Liberals, which he said ran a strong campaign by catching the energy and putting the Tories on the defensive.
"When you are defending, you are losing," he said.
Little also said the extra-long election period got members of the public engaged, and he hopes whoever forms government sticks with fixed elections dates.
Initial numbers for Burnaby North-Seymour showed Liberal Terry Beech in the lead with 2,300 votes, and Little in second with 1,909 and NDP's Carol Baird Ellan in third with 1,908 with 316, but that was with 25 out of 193 polls reporting, and it's still very early in the game.
Meanwhile, at Joey's on Lougheed Highway, Beech was ebullient but not counting on a victory yet, pointing out that there were still many polls to come in.
"I feel cautiously optimistic," he said laughing and knocking the wooden table. "There's lots of polls in there. Mike Little, Lynne Quarmby, Carol Baird Ellan – they all ran really strong campaigns."
The Liberals now clearly hold a majority, with 188 seats nationally, and the momentum that's swept the country is benefitting local Liberals like Beech.
"There's no doubt that a strong federal campaign is benefitting Liberal campaigns across the country. Here in Burnaby North-Seymour, it's a tight race, and we're not taking anything for granted," Beech said. "Whatever happens tonight, win or lose, it's not because of me, it's because of all of the volunteers who've worked hard for a year-and-a-half."'
Regardless of the results tonight, first thing tomorrow morning, Beech plans on calling and thanking all the volunteers and donors who helped his campaign.
See more stories from Burnaby Now at burnabynow.com.
