Federal byelection in Scarborough Southwest to take place on April 13

By MATTHEW STEPHENS

The federal byelection in Scarborough Southwest will take place on Monday, April 13.

Prime Minister Mark Carney announced yesterday (Sunday, March 8) that he had called a byelection in the Quebec riding of Terrebonne and the Toronto ridings of University-Rosedale and Scarborough Southwest.

The upcoming Scarborough Southwest federal byelection will fill the vacant seat left after a chain reaction of political moves led by the riding’s former Liberal MP Bill Blair, who announced his resignation from the position on Feb 2 after being appointed as Canada’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom.

This sparked a number of moves in the riding’s political landscape, with former Ontario NDP Deputy Leader Scarborough Southwest MPP Doly Begum announcing the next day that she would be leaving the NDP and running for the Liberals to fill Blair’s position.

In this April byelection, the federal NDP candidate taking on Begum for the Scarborough Southwest seat will be Fatima Shaban who also ran against Blair in the April 2025 federal election.

The Green Party of Canada candidate in the byelection will be Pooja Malhotra, and Lyall Sanders has been announced by the Centrist Party as its federal candidate in Scarborough Southwest. It is not yet known who the Conservative Party candidate will be.

Since the byelection was only called yesterday, the deadline for candidates to register has not yet been announced. Nominations for candidates will close on Wednesday, March 23, at 2 p.m., according to Elections Canada.

With Blair’s appointment as High Commissioner and  Begum seeking a position at the federal level, her open seat caught the attention of Beaches-East York MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith who announced in early February that he would be seeking the Liberal nomination to run in an upcoming provincial byelection for Scarborough Southwest MPP.

Premier Doug Ford has yet to set the date for that byelection, but according to Elections Ontario it must happen no later than Sept. 3.

According to Elections Canada, voters in the Scarbrough Southwest federal byelection can cast their ballots on election day and vote in advance polls from April 3 to April 6 at their assigned local polling station. Those who wish to cast their vote by mail must apply to do so by April 7.

For more information on voting in the Scarborough Southwest federal byelection, please visit the Elections Canada website at https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=med&dir=pre&document=mar0826&lang=e