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CorroboratedVerifiedChanged party affiliationIndividual

Belinda Stronach joins the Liberal Party and Cabinet (2005)

May 17, 2005

CanadaFederalHouse of Commons

What the record says

House roles record a Conservative-to-Liberal affiliation change and ministerial service beginning May 17, 2005. The Prime Minister’s statement explicitly linked the announced switch and Cabinet appointment; the archive does not infer an illegal exchange.

Participants

1 participants named in the record

Belinda Stronach
CTF-EP-000072-01
Conservative Party of CanadaToLiberal Party of CanadaTo another partyWhere the seat went: The seat was carried to another partyBoth sides of the change are parties, and they are different parties. The member sat with one caucus and then sat with another, without the seat being returned to voters in between.What you may rely onThat a party gained a seat it did not win. It says nothing about why: the record separates where a member went from whether they chose to go.How it countsThe direction the floor-crossing total is drawn from, but not the total itself. A small number of legs whose labels read party-to-a-different-party are ruled election-time relabelling, and count toward nothing.
Riding
not recorded
Effective
May 17, 2005
Kind of transition
Changed party affiliation
Voluntary
Not recorded
Direction
Not recorded
Appointment
Not recorded
What happened afterwards
Recorded outcomes only. An absence here means nothing has been recorded, not that nothing happened, and no causal link to the affiliation change is asserted unless a source establishes one.
- cabinet appointment — Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development
  May 17, 2005 · result: yes · causation: not established · influence access, office
  Belinda Stronach became Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development on the same day as the Liberal affiliation began. The Prime Minister’s statement documents the linked offer and appointment; the record does not establish an illegal quid pro quo.
- reelected
  January 23, 2006 · result: yes · causation: not established · election validation
  Belinda Stronach was re-elected in Newmarket—Aurora as a Liberal on January 23, 2006, with 27,176 votes (46.2%). This voter validation is distinct from the earlier Cabinet appointment.

How rare is this?

6 recorded transitions match leaving Conservative Party of Canada, joining Liberal Party of Canada and at the federal level, across 6 events and 6 named people (Crossing the Floor Database, release 2026-08-01.1, consulted September 2, 2026). The most recent is Marilyn Gladu, April 8, 2026 — the 6th on record. The earliest on record is Garth Turner, 2007.

5 of the 6 are recorded to the day; the other 1 are recorded to the year only, so no exact interval can be quoted.
4 of the 6 meet the database's publication standard; the other 2 are unreviewed leads.
1 of the 6 carry a recorded outcome after the transition; any share must be taken over those 1 and published beside that number.
Withdrawn records are excluded from this set.
No senator appears in this count: we hold Senate events, but none has passed the publication gate.

How the comparable set is defined

Claims and the sources cited for them

Every statement this record makes is stored as a separate claim with its own review state and its own citations. A claim with no citation is shown as such rather than omitted.

Belinda Stronach changed from Conservative to Liberal on May 17, 2005.
Supported
Field:
affiliation_change
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Wikipedia: Belinda Stronach
  UND
  Legacy record-level citation; claim-level locator pending review.
  Archived copy — September 1, 2026
  CTF-S-000073 · Reliability tier: tertiary · Rights: link only
- Statement by Prime Minister Paul Martin
  Government of Canada · May 17, 2005 · record Statement; Belinda Stronach will cross the floor and join the government and Cabinet; 2005-05-17 · EN
  The Prime Minister’s statement announces both the change and Cabinet appointment.
  Archived copy — December 7, 2025
  CTF-S-PMO-STRONACH-2005 · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
- Roles — Belinda Stronach — Current and Past
  House of Commons of Canada · section Political Affiliation; Ministries; 2005-05-16 to 2005-05-17 · EN
  House roles give the party and ministry boundary dates.
  Archived copy — September 1, 2026
  CTF-S-HOC-STRONACH-ROLES · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
Belinda Stronach became Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development on the same day as the Liberal affiliation began. The Prime Minister’s statement documents the linked offer and appointment; the record does not establish an illegal quid pro quo.
Supported
Field:
cabinet_appointment
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Roles — Belinda Stronach — Current and Past
  House of Commons of Canada · section Political Affiliation; Ministries; 2005-05-16 to 2005-05-17 · EN
  House roles confirm both effective dates.
  Archived copy — September 1, 2026
  CTF-S-HOC-STRONACH-ROLES · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
The Prime Minister’s official statement said Belinda Stronach would cross the floor, join the government, and enter Cabinet. This documents a linked offer and appointment without establishing an illegal exchange.
Supported
Field:
documented_link
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Statement by Prime Minister Paul Martin
  Government of Canada · May 17, 2005 · record Statement; Belinda Stronach will cross the floor and join the government and Cabinet; 2005-05-17 · EN
  The official statement explicitly links the announced change and Cabinet entry.
  Archived copy — December 7, 2025
  CTF-S-PMO-STRONACH-2005 · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
Belinda Stronach was re-elected in Newmarket—Aurora as a Liberal on January 23, 2006, with 27,176 votes (46.2%). This voter validation is distinct from the earlier Cabinet appointment.
Supported
Field:
reelected
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Résultats antérieurs — Newmarket—Aurora
  Élections Canada · January 23, 2006 · record Résultats officiels — Élection générale du 23 janvier 2006 · FR
  The official French result independently records the same final totals.
  Archived copy — March 18, 2025
  CTF-S-EC-STRONACH-2006-FR · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
- Past results — Newmarket—Aurora
  Elections Canada · January 23, 2006 · record Official Voting Results — General Election (January 23, 2006) · EN
  The official English result records the candidate, party, vote total, share, and election date.
  Archived copy — May 16, 2018
  CTF-S-EC-STRONACH-2006-EN · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026

Corrections to this record

Permanent citation address did not resolve
The permanent URI published for this record was https://crossingthefloor.ca/en/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005. This site has never served a language-prefixed route and has no /id/ route, so that address returned HTTP 404: any citation made against it did not resolve to the record. The permanent URI is now https://crossingthefloor.ca/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005, the canonical record address. The record's facts, dates, parties, participants, sources and public identifier (CTF-E-000072) are unchanged; only the stored address was corrected.
September 1, 2026 · material correction · CTF-COR-URI-000072

Machine-assisted proposals awaiting a human

A proposal listed here has changed nothing. It names exactly which steps a machine performed and waits for a person to accept or reject it.

outcome research approved
Machine assistance: research entity matching and translation draft
AI-assisted source discovery, entity matching, and French drafting produced this private outcome candidate. A human editor must open every source and verify each date, office, election result, exact locator, and translation before promotion. Promotion still does not publish an outcome.

Editorial review passes

Which checks have been run against this record, and what each one concluded. A review that has not happened is shown as pending, never as passed.

fact checkapproved · August 1, 2026

Revision history

Every change to this record is appended here. Nothing is edited away.

r3 corrected
Corrected the stored permanent URI. It pointed at /en/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005, a path this site has never served, so the citation target returned HTTP 404. It now points at /crossings/belinda-stronach-2005, the canonical record address. No fact, date, party, participant or source in this record was changed.
September 1, 2026
r2 expanded
Added exact chronology, cabinet outcome, source-bound linkage, and explicit causation limits.
August 1, 2026 · Official-source deterministic verifier
r1 created
Imported from the legacy archive as an unpublished research lead. Historical narrative, motive labels, and benefit scores were not treated as verified claims.
July 31, 2026 · Crossing the Floor project maintainer

Jurisdiction

Jurisdiction: Canada
Level: Federal
Legislature: Parliament of Canada
Chamber: House of Commons

Place and party names on this page come from the institutional tables, never from free text on the record.

Record identifier

Record identifier: CTF-E-000072
Revision: 3
Published: August 1, 2026
Last verified: August 1, 2026
Record last changed: September 1, 2026
Evidence on this record: 1 claims, 3 citations
Session: not recordedNo parliamentary session is recorded on this event. The session is never inferred from the date.

Cite this record

Crossing the Floor. “Belinda Stronach joins the Liberal Party and Cabinet (2005)” (CTF-E-000072). The Crossing the Floor Database, release 2026-08-01.1. https://crossingthefloor.ca/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005 (consulted —).

Permanent address: https://crossingthefloor.ca/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005
Release: 2026-08-01.1
Licence: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 InternationalLicence recorded on this release: OGL-Canada-2.0 (project-authored structured data only)

All records·Coverage·Corrections

CorroboratedVerifiedChanged party affiliationIndividual

Belinda Stronach joins the Liberal Party and Cabinet (2005)

May 17, 2005

CanadaFederalHouse of Commons

What the record says

Participants

1 participants named in the record

Belinda Stronach
CTF-EP-000072-01
Conservative Party of CanadaToLiberal Party of CanadaTo another partyWhere the seat went: The seat was carried to another partyBoth sides of the change are parties, and they are different parties. The member sat with one caucus and then sat with another, without the seat being returned to voters in between.What you may rely onThat a party gained a seat it did not win. It says nothing about why: the record separates where a member went from whether they chose to go.How it countsThe direction the floor-crossing total is drawn from, but not the total itself. A small number of legs whose labels read party-to-a-different-party are ruled election-time relabelling, and count toward nothing.
Riding
not recorded
Effective
May 17, 2005
Kind of transition
Changed party affiliation
Voluntary
Not recorded
Direction
Not recorded
Appointment
Not recorded
What happened afterwards
Recorded outcomes only. An absence here means nothing has been recorded, not that nothing happened, and no causal link to the affiliation change is asserted unless a source establishes one.
- cabinet appointment — Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development
  May 17, 2005 · result: yes · causation: not established · influence access, office
  Belinda Stronach became Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development on the same day as the Liberal affiliation began. The Prime Minister’s statement documents the linked offer and appointment; the record does not establish an illegal quid pro quo.
- reelected
  January 23, 2006 · result: yes · causation: not established · election validation
  Belinda Stronach was re-elected in Newmarket—Aurora as a Liberal on January 23, 2006, with 27,176 votes (46.2%). This voter validation is distinct from the earlier Cabinet appointment.

How rare is this?

5 of the 6 are recorded to the day; the other 1 are recorded to the year only, so no exact interval can be quoted.
4 of the 6 meet the database's publication standard; the other 2 are unreviewed leads.
1 of the 6 carry a recorded outcome after the transition; any share must be taken over those 1 and published beside that number.
Withdrawn records are excluded from this set.
No senator appears in this count: we hold Senate events, but none has passed the publication gate.

How the comparable set is defined

Claims and the sources cited for them

Every statement this record makes is stored as a separate claim with its own review state and its own citations. A claim with no citation is shown as such rather than omitted.

Belinda Stronach changed from Conservative to Liberal on May 17, 2005.
Supported
Field:
affiliation_change
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Wikipedia: Belinda Stronach
  UND
  Legacy record-level citation; claim-level locator pending review.
  Archived copy — September 1, 2026
  CTF-S-000073 · Reliability tier: tertiary · Rights: link only
- Statement by Prime Minister Paul Martin
  Government of Canada · May 17, 2005 · record Statement; Belinda Stronach will cross the floor and join the government and Cabinet; 2005-05-17 · EN
  The Prime Minister’s statement announces both the change and Cabinet appointment.
  Archived copy — December 7, 2025
  CTF-S-PMO-STRONACH-2005 · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
- Roles — Belinda Stronach — Current and Past
  House of Commons of Canada · section Political Affiliation; Ministries; 2005-05-16 to 2005-05-17 · EN
  House roles give the party and ministry boundary dates.
  Archived copy — September 1, 2026
  CTF-S-HOC-STRONACH-ROLES · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
Belinda Stronach became Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development on the same day as the Liberal affiliation began. The Prime Minister’s statement documents the linked offer and appointment; the record does not establish an illegal quid pro quo.
Supported
Field:
cabinet_appointment
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Roles — Belinda Stronach — Current and Past
  House of Commons of Canada · section Political Affiliation; Ministries; 2005-05-16 to 2005-05-17 · EN
  House roles confirm both effective dates.
  Archived copy — September 1, 2026
  CTF-S-HOC-STRONACH-ROLES · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
The Prime Minister’s official statement said Belinda Stronach would cross the floor, join the government, and enter Cabinet. This documents a linked offer and appointment without establishing an illegal exchange.
Supported
Field:
documented_link
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Statement by Prime Minister Paul Martin
  Government of Canada · May 17, 2005 · record Statement; Belinda Stronach will cross the floor and join the government and Cabinet; 2005-05-17 · EN
  The official statement explicitly links the announced change and Cabinet entry.
  Archived copy — December 7, 2025
  CTF-S-PMO-STRONACH-2005 · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
Belinda Stronach was re-elected in Newmarket—Aurora as a Liberal on January 23, 2006, with 27,176 votes (46.2%). This voter validation is distinct from the earlier Cabinet appointment.
Supported
Field:
reelected
Confidence:
High
Signed by:
Official-source deterministic verifier
Concerns a living person
- Résultats antérieurs — Newmarket—Aurora
  Élections Canada · January 23, 2006 · record Résultats officiels — Élection générale du 23 janvier 2006 · FR
  The official French result independently records the same final totals.
  Archived copy — March 18, 2025
  CTF-S-EC-STRONACH-2006-FR · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026
- Past results — Newmarket—Aurora
  Elections Canada · January 23, 2006 · record Official Voting Results — General Election (January 23, 2006) · EN
  The official English result records the candidate, party, vote total, share, and election date.
  Archived copy — May 16, 2018
  CTF-S-EC-STRONACH-2006-EN · Reliability tier: primary official · Rights: link only · Accessed: August 1, 2026

Corrections to this record

Permanent citation address did not resolve
The permanent URI published for this record was https://crossingthefloor.ca/en/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005. This site has never served a language-prefixed route and has no /id/ route, so that address returned HTTP 404: any citation made against it did not resolve to the record. The permanent URI is now https://crossingthefloor.ca/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005, the canonical record address. The record's facts, dates, parties, participants, sources and public identifier (CTF-E-000072) are unchanged; only the stored address was corrected.
September 1, 2026 · material correction · CTF-COR-URI-000072

Machine-assisted proposals awaiting a human

A proposal listed here has changed nothing. It names exactly which steps a machine performed and waits for a person to accept or reject it.

outcome research approved
Machine assistance: research entity matching and translation draft
AI-assisted source discovery, entity matching, and French drafting produced this private outcome candidate. A human editor must open every source and verify each date, office, election result, exact locator, and translation before promotion. Promotion still does not publish an outcome.

Editorial review passes

Which checks have been run against this record, and what each one concluded. A review that has not happened is shown as pending, never as passed.

fact checkapproved · August 1, 2026

Revision history

Every change to this record is appended here. Nothing is edited away.

r3 corrected
Corrected the stored permanent URI. It pointed at /en/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005, a path this site has never served, so the citation target returned HTTP 404. It now points at /crossings/belinda-stronach-2005, the canonical record address. No fact, date, party, participant or source in this record was changed.
September 1, 2026
r2 expanded
Added exact chronology, cabinet outcome, source-bound linkage, and explicit causation limits.
August 1, 2026 · Official-source deterministic verifier
r1 created
Imported from the legacy archive as an unpublished research lead. Historical narrative, motive labels, and benefit scores were not treated as verified claims.
July 31, 2026 · Crossing the Floor project maintainer

Jurisdiction

Jurisdiction: Canada
Level: Federal
Legislature: Parliament of Canada
Chamber: House of Commons

Place and party names on this page come from the institutional tables, never from free text on the record.

Record identifier

Record identifier: CTF-E-000072
Revision: 3
Published: August 1, 2026
Last verified: August 1, 2026
Record last changed: September 1, 2026
Evidence on this record: 1 claims, 3 citations
Session: not recordedNo parliamentary session is recorded on this event. The session is never inferred from the date.

Cite this record

Crossing the Floor. “Belinda Stronach joins the Liberal Party and Cabinet (2005)” (CTF-E-000072). The Crossing the Floor Database, release 2026-08-01.1. https://crossingthefloor.ca/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005 (consulted —).

Permanent address: https://crossingthefloor.ca/crossings/belinda-stronach-2005
Release: 2026-08-01.1
Licence: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 InternationalLicence recorded on this release: OGL-Canada-2.0 (project-authored structured data only)

All records·Coverage·Corrections

What the record says

Participants