Frank Baylis is the first Black leadership candidate in the federal Liberal party’s history — here’s why that matters
You’ve got 10 seconds: how many Black politicians can you name? Barack Obama? Kamala Harris? Maybe Michaëlle Jean?
What about Frank Baylis?
Baylis is one of five candidates running in the federal Liberal leadership race. He is an entrepreneur from Montreal, the son of an English father and Barbadian mother. He was elected to the House of Commons in 2015, handily winning his seat. Citing the lack of respect and civility in politics, and a desire to spend more time on his business and with his family, he opted not to run in the 2019 election.
Now Baylis is back. His journey into and out of politics is one that reflects the experiences of many Black Canadians. But it’s also part of a history that has received very little attention. Until now.
Since 2022, we have been gathering archival materials, surveying Black Canadian candidates and officeholders from across the country, and conducting in-depth interviews to understand why Black Canadians run for office, what challenges they face, and what advice they would give to those considering electoral politics. We’ve just published our findings in a new report, called Black on the Ballot. Here’s what we found.
At least 380 Black Canadians have run for office in Canada’s history, from the school board level all the way up to the House of Commons. Undoubtedly, this number is higher, but holes in the historical record leave us with an incomplete picture. Most Black Canadians who run for office are, like Baylis, first- or second-generation Canadians. They come from careers in business, law, or government and politics. Unlike Baylis, they tend to run first for school board or municipal council, but like Baylis, most who are successful — 69 per cent — are elected the first time they run for office.
Even so, Black candidates point to challenges raising money, finding volunteers and being covered fairly in the media. A majority, 71 per cent, say they have encountered racial discrimination in politics, including from the public, colleagues and legislative and municipal staff. But even so, when asked whether they would run again, 87 per cent of Black former politicians say yes, just as Baylis did when he threw his hat into the leadership ring.
Nonetheless, as the first Black Canadian to seek the leadership of the federal Liberal party, Baylis also stands out. Baylis is the first Black leadership candidate in the Liberal party’s history; all of the other major federal parties have already achieved this milestone.
Rosemary Brown, a Black woman and British Columbia MLA ran for the leadership of the federal NDP way back in 1975. In 2011, the Bloc Quebecois selected Vivian Barbot as the party’s interim leader. Leslyn Lewis has run for the Conservative leadership twice, in 2020 and 2022. And from 2020 to 2022, Annamie Paul led the Green Party of Canada.
Unlike Baylis, these leadership candidates are all women, a pattern that departs from our data: while 29 per cent of Black men said they aspire to positions as party leaders, just 11 per cent of Black women said the same. Brown, Barbot, Lewis and Paul are trailblazers and role models, but they are also cautionary tales of the difficult terrain one can encounter when you reach for the top. Brown and Lewis’ leadership aspirations ended in defeat, while Barbot and Paul enjoyed only brief tenures before their eventual departures from politics.
The absence of Black Canadians from the upper echelons of the political arena is a missed opportunity: it deprives us of perspectives and experiences that could help solve the country’s pressing problems.
Baylis’ story is still being written. Even if there isn’t a fairy tale ending, his presence in the race is really a story of possibility. It’s a story that shows us politics is a worthy pursuit. That “firsts” open doors for those who come behind them. That political exits aren’t necessarily forever. And that we just might need a new template of who can and should be a political leader in Canada.
Photo courtesy of Timbit-Wolverine, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
