Federal Byelection 2026: Tanveer Shahnawaz wins Beaches-East York seat for Liberals

By MATTHEW STEPHENS

Tanveer Shahnawaz has secured the federal Liberals another seat in Ottawa as he was elected the new Member of Parliament (MP) in the Beaches-East York riding following a solid victory in Monday night’s byelection in the riding.

“It is going to now be the honour of a lifetime to represent the only home I’ve ever known as your next Member of Parliament,” Shahnawaz told a room full of excited supporters at the Stone Lion Pub on Queen Street East in the Beach on the evening of Monday, Aug. 31.

“I think it’s very fitting that we had our Prime Minister Mark Carney right here at Stone Lion a few weeks ago, where we’re steps away from Lake Ontario,” he said to cheers from supporters.

Securing a total of 55.3 per cent of the total votes, the Crescent Town native said his longtime connection to the community helped him to secure the victory.

“My mom, my dad and my brother, they immigrated to this country from Bangladesh the year that I was born. I was born in East General, what is now Michael Garron; I’ve never left this riding,” said Shahnawaz.

“It is going to be the honour of a lifetime – with community, experience, and hard work, and representation – that we continue building Canada strong, that we continue building Beaches-East York stronger.”

Finishing second to Shahnawaz in the six-candidate race in Beaches-East York was NDP candidate Shannon Devine with 26.2 per cent of the total vote.

Third place went to Conservative Party candidate Jim Syrbos with 15.6 per cent of the vote. The Green Party’s Bruce Livesey was fourth with 1.7 per cent of the vote; People’s Party of Canada candidate Michel Lachance was fifth with 0.8 per cent of the vote; and the Canadian Future Party’s Cameron Thomas was sixth with 0.5 per cent of the vote.

Voter turnout for this byelection was reported by Elections Canada as 34.37 per cent. Voter turnout in the April 2025 federal election in Beaches-East York was 71.942 per cent.

Advance polls in this Beaches-East York byelection saw 11,800 residents show up to cast their votes out of a total 28,060 valid votes.

The Liberals took an early lead as results started becoming available shortly after polls closed at 9:30 p.m., with nearly half of the total voters in favour of Shahnawaz.

The electoral history of Beaches-East York has seen the riding vote in favour of the Liberals since 2015.

Shahnawaz recently won the federal Liberal Electoral District Association nomination back in July, where he went up against formidable candidates such as environmental lawyer and former chief of staff Claire Seaborn, as well as former Beaches-East York MPP Arthur Potts.

The work of being a Beaches-East York MP is not unfamiliar to Shahnawaz, as he formerly served as a key staffer with the office of former Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, in addition to working as a MP constituency office manager and co-chair of the Taylor-Massey & Oakridge Community Response Team. Erskine-Smith had been the Beaches-East York Liberal MP from 2015 until he stepped down from the seat in July of this year.

“Here’s a guy who put in the hard work into going from volunteering, to then running our youth campaign,” said Erskine-Smith prior to Shahnawaz’s victory speech.

“You could immediately see other young people gravitate to him because of his charisma, his thoughtfulness, his kindness, his hard work. He was already showing leadership then, and he grew into running our constituency office.”

In his closing remarks, Shahnawaz expressed his appreciation to all the constituents who supported him throughout his campaign.

“It’s the thousands of conversations that we’ve had in these last few weeks, it’s making sure that we are community building, that we are supporting Mark Carney’s Liberal government, and the much-needed nation building,” he said.

Despite finishing second, NDP candidate Devine celebrated with members of the community at the Budapest Hungarian Restaurant on Danforth Avenue. She spoke to those who came out about the issues she and her team will continue to advocate for, and thanked her campaign team, members of the NDP and her family for their support in the campaign

“We ran an excellent campaign in a very short period of time. The Liberal government and Mark Carney in particular did everything that they possibly could to make this harder for us,” she said. “We had hundreds of volunteers come through our office and we identified thousands of new NDP supporters.”

The federal government called the federal byelection on July 26, setting voting day as Aug. 31.

“From the beginning, the Liberal government and the mainstream media have underestimated us,” said Devine of the NDP. “They underestimated our organizing abilities and they underestimated our desire to push for something better. Because we know that our community deserves better.”

When speaking to Beach Metro Community News, Devine said she believes that the way the byelections were called, severely impacted voter turnout and the results.

“We had the minimum amount of time to run the campaign, and that was very intentional. In the last week of summer. It didn’t need to be called for this period of time, and that was a choice, and I think it was to ensure that people didn’t get out to vote as much as we would’ve wanted them to.”

In the 2025 federal election, the NDP hit a historical low in election results, only winning seven seats, and six per cent of the popular vote, resulting in the loss of official party status for the first time since 1993. While noting the struggle of the party, Devine believes that people respond to the ideas put forward by the NDP, and she said that despite the circumstances of the byelection, this was their most energetic campaign.

“When we were out knocking on the doors, the ideas that we were putting forward were resonating with people,” she said. “People like the idea of a national plan of rent control and building more affordable housing, and public grocers. And they feel really disappointed with how the government hasn’t dealt with the affordability crisis and is also back pedaling on the environment. People are frustrated with that.”

“I think the last election for the NDP was a really difficult one and there were a lot of reasons for that. But I think that the ideas are really good, and they meet the needs of Canadians,” added Devine.

“We’re going to continue campaigning between elections. I absolutely believe we can win here. We had four weeks to run this campaign, from beginning to end, and that was challenging, and I think given that we had four weeks, it was an excellent campaign,” she said. “The numbers on the screen there don’t tell the picture of our campaign, the story of our campaign.”

Devine said she knocked on thousands of doors and heard from thousands of people during the campaign. She said she has come to understand what voters are most concerned about, and what she believes the current government should be focusing on. 

“People overwhelmingly told me that they’re concerned about the cost of housing, and the scarcity of affordable housing, and the cost of groceries and our healthcare system which is crumbling here in Ontario under this governments watch,” she said. “And then the climate. We had days this summer where it was not safe to breathe the air in Toronto, and we are hearing about the federal government buying a pipeline and laying off climate scientists and people who coordinate the wildfire efforts.”

While the results did not fall in the NDP’s favour, Devine said the conversations she had with residents throughout the byelection have reinforced why she believes the party’s work must continue.

“As Canadians, we want a future, where we actually take care of each other. Where we value our shared goals as much as our differences, and where we raise our expectations of what we can accomplish together, if we have the courage and audacity to try. And we will keep building, and I will be here with you, and we will keep going until we win, because I know we will,” said Devine.

Conservative candidate Syrbos spoke with Beach Metro Community News on Monday night during his campaign team party at The Hide Out on The Beach on Queen Street East.

Syrbos grew up in the neighbourhood and runs a pair of local businesses, a restaurant with a long history in the community and a coffee shop. He said he was excited to run, but admitted the experience at the start of the campaign was not a positive one as he and his businesses came under attack on social media from opponents of the Conservatives and the party’s leader Pierre Poilievre.

“The experience was initially not really an enjoyable one. There were a lot of negative things being said about me online that was completely untrue and I was getting threatening phone calls at my place of business. So it wasn’t enjoyable in that sense, but after that subsided I was able to meet a lot of really nice people who were very supportive,” he said.

Syrbos said the anger directed towards him and his businesses surprised him and he did find it “disheartening” given his deep roots in the Beaches-East York community.

However, he said as the campaign went on he was able to find “common ground” with residents by putting the focus on making life in the riding and Canada better.

“That was something I set out to do and that was critical moment for me,” said Syrbos.

“I’ve spent pretty much my entire life in Beaches-East York and I was surprised about the anger. I really wanted to make myself available to all voters and try and begin to understand why they were so upset,” he said.

Anger and grievance seem to be a big part of politics today, but Syrbos said he was surprised by the intensity of the backlash that was directed towards himself and the Conservative Party. “I do feel the other candidates did not get it as badly as I did.”

“But if we weed out the bad apples, the majority of people were very respectful. It was good to talk to people and see the other side,” he added.

In the 2025 federal election, the Conservative candidate finished in second place ahead of the NDP but in this byelection the Conservatives were third and the NDP second.

Syrbos said the short summer campaign made it a challenge to connect with all voters. “It was a lot of things in a short campaign. If it was a longer one maybe I would have had a better opportunity. I would have been able to bring people together.”

He said the experience had not “soured” him on perhaps running again. “If anything, it motivates me. It makes me want to bridge that gap. I don’t think living in a world of anger is the way to be, especially in such a beautiful community such as ours. If anything, I’d like people to view not just Conservatives but everybody else as human beings not just representatives for a party or organization”

As has been the case for a number of past federal Conservative and provincial Progressive Conservative campaigns, the candidates don’t take part in debates with other candidates but instead focus on knocking on doors and talking to voters, which was the approach the Syrbos campaign also took.

“We chose door knocking over the community events, and we wanted to meet the people,” he said.

At the doors he heard anger, concern and fear from residents about the future. “People seem to be angry and frustrated that so many important things are being done very slowly. They want some resolution on these issues both with the United States and in Canada.”

Syrbos also congratulated Shahnawaz and Devine on their campaigns, and he thanked the voters he met at the doors while canvassing for their kindness and willingness to listen to one-on-one conversations.

The Beaches-East York byelection was sparked by a domino-effect of political moves led by the resignation of former Scarborough Southwest MP Bill Blair, who stepped away from the seat to become Canada’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom earlier this year.

Shortly after Blair’s move, the now Liberal MP Doly Begum, who had previously served as Scarborough Southwest MPP for the New Democratic Party (NDP), announced that she would be transitioning parties and seeking nomination as the Liberal Candidate to fill the vacant seat of MP in the riding.

Begum’s move to federal politics caught the attention of Erskine-Smith, who unsuccessfully sought the Liberal nomination in the provincial riding of Scarborough Southwest but was defeated in that attempt.

The provincial byelection is slated for Thursday, Sept. 3. Ahsanul Hafiz was elected as the candidate to run for the Liberals in the upcoming by election for Scarborough Southwest.

RESULTS ACCORDING TO ELECTIONS CANADA

197 OF 200 POLLS

Tanveer Shahnawaz (Liberal) – 17,251 (55.3 per cent)

Shannon Devine (NDP) – 8,159 (26.2 per cent)

Jim Syrbos (Conservative) 4,857 (15.6 per cent)

Bruce Livesey (Green Party) 531 (1.7 per cent)

Michel Lachance (People’s Party of Canada) 240 (0.8 per cent)

Cameron Thomas (Canadian Future Party) 157 (0.5 per cent)

Voter turnout of 38.21 per cent. The voter turnout in the April 2025 federal election in Beaches-East York was 71.942 per cent.