Davenport (electoral district)

Demographics

The Davenport riding has the highest percentage of ethnic Portuguese of all Canadian federal ridings (27.4%), and the highest percentage of European immigrants (28.5%, of whom 25.0% are from Southern Europe, and 19.2% from Southern European countries other than Italy), in all of Canada. It also has the highest percentage of native speakers of Portuguese (20.7%) and of Romance languages other than the French language of Canada (32.0%, with many Italian and Spanish). The same holds true for home language (Portuguese: 14.0%; non-French Romance languages: 21.2%, both Canadian riding records)

Geography

The district includes parts of west-end Toronto, and includes the neighbourhoods of Fairbank, Oakwood-Vaughan, St. Clair Gardens, Corso Italia, Dovercourt Village, Bloordale Village, Bloorcourt Village, Brockton Village, the Junction Triangle and the western part of Rua Acores.

History

The federal electoral district was created in 1933 from parts of Parkdale and Toronto Northwest ridings.

The federal riding of Davenport has been one of the most consistently Liberal ridings in Canada over the last century; Until 2011 the last non-Liberal to be elected for the constituency was Progressive Conservative Member of Parliament Douglas Morton in 1958. Since then, Liberals Walter Gordon and Charles Caccia (who himself held the seat for nearly 40 years) won the seat by increasing margins, finally culminating in a 17,500-vote majority in 1993. Meanwhile, the opposition parties in the constituency were shifting, and the New Democratic Party candidate beat the Progressive Conservative or Conservative candidate in every election since 1979.

After the election of Paul Martin to the Liberal leadership in late 2003, Charles Caccia lost the nomination for the seat to local city councillor Mario Silva, who had signed up sufficient new members to oust the incumbent; this was an unpopular situation and was deeply resented by many in the local Liberal party, which, combined with redistricting, led to an overnight tripling of the NDP vote in the 2004 federal election.

In 2011 Andrew Cash of the New Democratic Party won the seat by a significant margin, becoming the first non-Liberal in over 50 years to represent the riding.

This riding lost a fraction of territory to Toronto—St. Paul's during the 2012 electoral redistribution.

Members of Parliament

This riding has elected the following Members of Parliament:

Election results

Note: Canadian Alliance vote is compared to the Reform vote in 1997 election.

Note: NDP vote is compared to CCF vote in 1958 election.

Note: Progressive Conservative vote is compared to "National Government" vote in 1940 election.

Note: "National Government" vote is compared to Conservative vote in 1935 election.