An Ontario MP’s floor crossing appears to have caught Pierre Poilievre’s team flat-footed and gives the Conservative leader no time to rally his troops until late January.

Markham-Unionville MP Michael Ma shocked Ottawa Thursday evening by announcing he would join Prime Minister Mark Carney’s caucus, bringing the Liberals to just one seat shy of a majority mandate.

The news came as a surprise to Poilievre and his team, who just the night before had welcomed Ma to the Conservative party’s holiday get-together. With MPs now scattered across the country until late January, Poilievre is in the uncomfortable position of wondering if any more of his team will use the holiday break to test the waters for a potential jump.

“The timing (of Ma’s decision) was catastrophically bad for Conservative

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