KITCHENER – The Green Party has reason to celebrate the day after the election.
Despite only nabbing three seats in the election, the party made inroads across the country in votes.
Two local ridings were especially strong for the Greens: Kitchener Centre and Guelph.
Mike Morrice in Kitchener Centre came in second with 26 per cent of the vote, only 10 per cent less than winner Liberal Raj Saini.
By comparison, the Greens only earned three per cent in Kitchener Centre in the last election.
Morrice noted a couple of things about his campaign. For one, he says the strong showing is thanks in part to a team of more than 350 volunteers.
He also believes that the desire of voters to avoid the mudslinging that filled the other federal parties played a part.
Morrice says that the message about the climate crisis is now an everyday issue that resonates with people of all ages.
"I'd go to a retirement home and a number of people there were saying, yeah, we're all voting Green because we care about action on climate change," Morrice told CTV on Monday night.
"It didn't matter which community, which neighborhood I was in. Climate change was at the top of the list because we're all collectively realizing, the science is pretty clear. This is the last moment we've got to turn the corner."
Guelph also saw a remarkable result for the Greens.
The candidate there was Steve Dyck. He captured 25 per cent of the vote—that was second to the 40 per cent that Liberal winner Lloyd Longfield got.
The Green vote this year nearly doubled the party's results from the last election.
Dyck told CTV on Tuesday morning that he's disappointed with the result because he feels they could have won in Guelph.
Nonetheless, he says he got a great response from voters in the riding when he was campaigning door-to-door.
He says a lot of people like the Green message, and that he hopes people were voting for something and not out of fear.
