2018 London, Ontario, municipal election

The 2018 London municipal election was a municipal election that occurred on October 22, 2018, to elect the Mayor of London, London City Council and the Thames Valley District School Board, London District Catholic School Board, Conseil scolaire catholique Providence and Conseil scolaire Viamonde. The election was held on the same day as elections in every other municipality in Ontario.

As per the Ontario Municipal Elections Act, 1996, nomination papers for candidates for municipal and school board elections could be filed from May 1, 2018, at which time the campaign period began.

This election was notable as London became the first city in Canada since Calgary in 1971 to use preferential voting to elect city councillors and the mayor. It was also the only city in Ontario to use ranked balloting after the Wynne government allowed municipalities to do so in 2016 and before the Ford government reversed the decision in 2020, forcing London to return to first-past-the-post for the 2022 election.

The major issues facing candidates in this election included Bus Rapid Transit, safe injection sites, affordable rent and social housing stock as well as city unemployment rates.

Former Conservative MP for London West Ed Holder defeated Paul Paolatto, Tanya Park, Paul Cheng, and several minor candidates in the thirteenth round of instant-runoff voting to become the 64th mayor of London.

The use of instant-runoff voting meant (theoretically) that to be elected, a candidate for Council needed a majority of the ward vote. In the mayor's case, the successful candidate needed to have a majority of the city vote. Where no candidate had a majority in first preferences, vote transfers were used to assemble a majority behind one of them. London's rule that only two back-up preferences could be marked (and some voters' not even marking the three choices allowed) meant that in a few of the contests many votes had to be set aside as they had been transferred twice and still had not gone to a candidate with a chance to be elected. Although a majority is required to be elected, that could be a majority of votes still in play. Due to the number of votes being deemed invalid or becoming exhausted, in a few cases the majority accumulated by the winning candidate was less than a majority of valid votes or less than a majority of votes cast.

Holder, the winning mayoral candidate, was elected in the end with 44,373 votes when 48,320 was a majority of valid votes that were cast.

In Ward 5, Cassidy won with 3,922 votes, 44 percent of votes cast.

In Ward 8, Lehman won with 3,058 votes, 39 percent of votes cast.

In Ward 12, Peloza won with 3,139 votes, 48 percent of votes cast.

In Ward 13, Kayabaga won with 2,325 votes, 41 percent of votes cast.

In Ward 14, Hillier won with 2,522 votes, 48 percent of votes cast.

The amount of support recorded for the winning candidate is more than shown in those vote totals. Unusually, in the vote count for the 2018 London election, transfers of votes between candidates continued even after a candidate had accumulated a majority of votes still in play and had been declared the winner. In the mayoral contest for example, the winner (Holder) was determined in the 13th round so there was no need for a 14th round where Holder apparently is recorded as accumulating 100 percent of the votes.

That the winner in nine out of 15 of the contests held in London in 2018 was elected with a majority of votes cast is noteworthy though. In other municipal elections where first past the post is used, more than half the winners are elected with just a minority of votes cast. (The 2017 Edmonton municipal election is an example where this happened.)

Perhaps in part due to the large number of "exhausted" votes, the leader in the first count won in the end in all the contests in this election. There were no "turn-overs" caused by the front-runner not having the most overall support.

Although ranked ballots were expected to increase the civility of the election, it failed to prevent the creation of two negative websites targeting former city councillor, Virginia Ridley (ward 10), and city councillor, Maureen Cassidy (ward 5). The controversy has since triggered an OPP investigation into the behaviour of several organizations and candidates in the 2018 municipal election.

The mayoralty was an open seat, as incumbent mayor Matt Brown was not running for re-election.

*Withdrew in September 2018

TVDSB Wards 7, 8, 9, 10, 13

Elected: Jake Skinner, Joyce Bennett

TVDSB Wards 1, 11, 12, 14

Elected: Lori-Ann Pizzolato, Sherry Polhill

TVDSB Wards 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Elected: Peter Cuddy, Corrine Rahman

LDCSB Wards 5, 6, 7

Elected: Gabe Pizzuti

LDCSB Wards 11, 12, 13

Elected: John Jevnikar

LDCSB Wards 1, 14

Elected: Pedro Almeida

LDCSB Wards 2, 3, 4

Elected: Sandra Cruz

LDCSB Wards 8, 9, 10

Elected: Linda Steel