Papineau

One of the smallest federal ridings in Canada by area at roughly nine square kilometres, Papineau sits in the geographic heart of Montreal's island, bounded by Autoroute 40 to the north, Boulevard de l'Acadie to the west, Rue Jean-Talon to the south, and 24th Avenue to the east. The riding takes in the neighbourhoods of Villeray and Park Extension, along with the southern portion of Saint-Michel, all within the borough of Villeray—Saint-Michel—Parc-Extension. Justin Trudeau had held the seat since 2008, when he defeated the Bloc Québécois incumbent by roughly 1,200 votes.

Candidates

Justin Trudeau (Liberal) — The leader of the Liberal Party of Canada since April 2013, Trudeau had worked as a teacher of mathematics, French, drama, and social studies at schools in Vancouver before entering politics. He was first elected in Papineau in the 2008 federal election, unseating the sitting Bloc Québécois member. Heading into the 2015 campaign, he had spent two years criss-crossing the country building the Liberal platform and rebuilding a party that had been reduced to third-party status in the House of Commons after the 2011 election.

Anne Lagacé Dowson (NDP) — A veteran broadcast journalist, Lagacé Dowson had spent years as a host and reporter at CBC Radio in Montreal, including stints on Radio Noon and Home Run, and had guest-hosted national programs such as Cross Country Checkup and As It Happens. She had previously run for the NDP in the 2008 election in the riding of Westmount—Ville-Marie.

Maxime Claveau (Bloc Québécois) — A music teacher and composer who had studied at the Conservatoire de musique de Montréal, Claveau was a longtime sovereignty activist who had lived in the Papineau riding for nearly a decade. He composed music for film and television.

Yvon Vadnais (Conservative) — Vadnais carried the Conservative banner in a riding where the party had limited support in the heavily francophone and immigrant-rich neighbourhoods of central Montreal.

About the Riding

Papineau is one of Montreal's most linguistically and culturally diverse ridings. More than a third of residents are immigrants, with particularly large communities from Algeria, Haiti, and Greece. French is the mother tongue of roughly forty-seven percent of the population, but Arabic, Spanish, and Greek are widely spoken. Park Extension, a dense neighbourhood of about 34,000, has historically served as a landing point for new arrivals to Montreal, while Villeray is a francophone residential district that was experiencing growing gentrification by 2015. Saint-Michel, an industrial and working-class area, rounds out the riding's varied character. Affordable housing, immigrant settlement and integration, and public transit access were key local issues. As the riding of the Liberal leader, Papineau attracted national media scrutiny, with opposition parties fielding high-profile candidates in an effort to unseat Trudeau on his home turf.