St. Paul's

St. Paul's covers the affluent midtown core of Toronto, stretching from the Canadian Pacific Railway corridor in the south to Eglinton Avenue in the north. The riding is bounded roughly by Ossington Avenue and Winona Drive to the west and Bayview Avenue to the east. It encompasses established neighbourhoods including Forest Hill, Deer Park, Chaplin Estates, Davisville Village, Humewood-Cedarvale, South Hill, and the northern portion of Summerhill.

Candidates

Carolyn Bennett (Liberal) — Bennett was the incumbent, first elected in 1997 and returned in every subsequent election. A physician by training, she graduated from the University of Toronto's Faculty of Medicine in 1974 and received her certification in family medicine in 1976. She practised as a family doctor for 20 years at Wellesley Hospital and Women's College Hospital, and was a founding partner of Bedford Medical Associates. She served as president of the medical staff association at Women's College Hospital and held a clinical adjunct appointment as an assistant professor in the University of Toronto's department of family and community medicine. In Paul Martin's government, she served as Minister of State for Public Health from 2003 to 2006.

Maureen Harquail (Conservative) — Harquail was a lawyer who had served as general counsel and chief administrative officer at the Ontario Racing Commission for a decade. She held a Bachelor of Arts in political science from the University of Toronto and an Honours Bachelor of Laws from the University of Wales, Cardiff. Before joining the Racing Commission, she worked as a federal environmental and regulatory prosecutor with the Department of Justice. She also served two years as a Naval Reservist in communications and harbour control.

William Molls (NDP) — Molls stood as the NDP candidate in the riding.

Jim McGarva (Green Party) — McGarva ran as the Green Party candidate for St. Paul's.

John Kittredge also stood for the Libertarian Party.

About the Riding

St. Paul's is one of Toronto's wealthiest and most established residential areas. Forest Hill, a former independent village amalgamated into Toronto in 1967, is among the city's most affluent neighbourhoods. The Yonge-Eglinton intersection at the riding's northeastern corner is a major commercial and transit hub, while Davisville Village and the streets along Mount Pleasant Road retain a village-like character. The riding's housing stock ranges from century-old mansions and Tudor-style homes in Forest Hill to mid-rise apartment buildings along the Eglinton and St. Clair corridors.

The riding's economy is driven by professional services, health care, education, and retail. Several hospitals and medical facilities are located in or near the riding, and the concentration of professionals in law, finance, and medicine contributes to one of the highest average household incomes in the country. The riding is home to a significant Jewish community centred on the Forest Hill and Cedarvale neighbourhoods, along with notable Korean, Chinese, and Spanish-speaking populations. English is the mother tongue for roughly two-thirds of residents.

Key federal issues heading into 2011 included health care policy and public health infrastructure, transit investment in midtown Toronto, arts and culture funding, urban housing affordability, and Canada's engagement with Indigenous communities — an issue on which Bennett had been a prominent voice in Parliament.