Memories of Spadina By-Elections Past

Watching the results come in from the Trinity-Spadina federal by-election on June 30th (one of four federal by-elections held that day) brought back memories of another summer federal by-election in the old Spadina riding thirty-three years ago in August 1981.
In an attempt to get his principal secretary, Jim Coutts, into the House of Commons then Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau had appointed the sitting Liberal member, Peter Stollery to the Senate. The Progressive Conservative candidate was noted journalist, Laura Sabia. The NDP candidate was municipal councillor, Dan Heap. There were also a scattering of minor party and independent candidates.
Although Statistics Canada had not yet confirmed it , the country had just entered the severe recession of 1981-82 which would ultimately bring down the Liberals and pave the way for the Mulroney PC sweep of 1984. I was then working in the federal Progressive Conservative caucus research office and was not directly involved in the campaign, but was kept apprised of developments by several friends who were.
With a strong candidate in Laura Sabia, it became clear early in the campaign that for the first time in several years the PCs were competitive in the riding and that, contrary to all expectations, the election would not be a coronation for Jim Coutts. So, on election night my friends hopefully gathered at Laura’s election headquarters to await the results. They were initially thrilled to find that the race indeed was a three-way nail biter. However, as the evening wore on, it became apparent that a PC victory was not going to happen and that Jim Coutts was the probable winner. A pall of disappointment fell over the headquarters. Then word arrived that Dan Heap had been elected on the strength of late-reporting polls south of Bloor Street. The PC headquarters erupted with cheering and campaign workers embraced each other as moral victory was snatched from the jaws of defeat. As a friend who was there told me on his return to Ottawa, uninformed observers would have assumed they were in NDP, not PC headquarters.
It would be hard to imagine a similar response in Conservative headquarters on June 30th had Joe Cressy defeated Adam Vaughan, the candidate of the son of Prime Minister Trudeau, and held on to the successor constituency of Trinity-Spadina for the NDP. It was the same place, but another time and a very different and non-Progressive Conservative party.