VOTE 2022: MARKHAMUNIONVILLE PROVINCIAL RIDING

THE RIDING:

The Markham—unionville riding extends to the Markham/whitchurchstouffville boundary to the north, Highway 48 and Mccowan Road to the east, Highway 407 to south and Highway 404 to the west.

Markham—unionville spans 84 square kilometres in York. It includes the community of Unionville. It has 128,308 residents, according to the 2021 census, up 4.04 per cent from 2015.

Immigrants make up almost 61 per cent of this riding's population, with Cantonese and Mandarin being the most popular non-official languages, superseding French and English, according to the 2016 census.

The member of provincial parliament representing Markham— Unionville at dissolution was Billy Pang of the Progressive Conservative Party

of Ontario. Pang is seeking re-election. Pang first won election in 2018 and won the 2018 election with 61.77 per cent of the vote.

THE RACE:

Progressive Conservative party: Billy Pang Liberal party: Emily Li NDP: Senthil Mahalingam

Green party: Shanta Sundarason

New Blue party: Trina Kollis

THE ISSUES:

Residents and business owners remain concerned

about the ongoing impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Affordable housing is a growing concern, especially as the pandemic pushed already high housing prices and rents even higher.

Many residents are also concerned about climate change, health care and taxes.

BACKGROUND::

Markham-unionville riding was created in 2003 from Markham. In the 2018 election, Liberal incumbent Michael Chan (2007-2018) did not run for re-election. Billy Pang from PC party won 29,305 votes (62 per cent) in the race and Pang is seeking re-election.