This P.E.I. district has just 2 candidates running in the provincial election

Incumbent PC candidate Bloyce Thompson and NDP candidate Marian White are the only two candidates running in District 8: Stanhope-Marshfield, making it the only district on the Island with just two names on the ballot.

Thompson said he wasn't expecting to be running against just one other candidate.

"I was a little surprised, but I know it's a big commitment" he said.

"A lot of people are surprised by it as well. But, you know, it's very positive and there is two candidates on the ballot, so there is a choice."

White acknowledged it's a challenge taking on an incumbent but said Island New Democrats have already won by mounting a full slate of candidates this election.

"We're really making history here," she said.

"I'm just shocked the other two parties didn't get the 27 candidates — I don't know what they've been doing for four years that they couldn't have come up with someone to put on a ballot. So my chances of winning? I think I've already won, but we'll know next week what the numbers are."

Stanhope-Marshfield is the only district left on the Island that can be considered a bellwether district, meaning the winning candidate there is always in the caucus of the winning party.

The district was realigned in 2019, absorbing the rural portions of former districts Tracadie-Hillsborough Park and York-Oyster Bed. Those districts were held by former Liberal premier Wade MacLauchlan and Liberal MLA Buck Watts.

In the last provincial election in 2019, Thompson defeated MacLauchlan — who was the sitting premier at the time — with 39.5 per cent of the vote.

But without a Liberal, Green or Island Party candidate running this time around, a vote against Dennis King's Progressive Conservative government in this district is a vote for the NDP.

"The challenge for me going up against one person and the incumbent is quite huge but it's also really exciting," White said.

"It's an opportunity for those Greens and the Liberals and others to lend me their vote if they want anyone but a Conservative … If you're not voting Tory, then come to me with your vote."

Thompson knows he won't have the advantage of multiple parties to split the vote for those who don't want to support the PCs, but says it hasn't changed how he's hitting the campaign trail.