Wai Young

Wai Yee Young ( Siu; born May 20, 1960) is a Canadian politician from Vancouver, British Columbia. She was elected to the House of Commons of Canada in the 2011 election, representing the electoral district of Vancouver South as part of the Conservative Party of Canada, but was defeated by Liberal Party candidate Harjit Sajjan in the 2015 election. She subsequently contested the 2018 Vancouver mayoral election as leader of Coalition Vancouver, and the 2019 federal election as a Conservative candidate, but was unsuccessful.

Personal life and career She was born in Hong Kong, and immigrated to Canada at the age of four. She attended Killarney Secondary School in Vancouver, Young has also taken post-graduate coursework in Mass Communications and Urban Planning and Design at Simon Fraser University and the British Columbia Institute of Technology. She is a mother of twins and has been the foster parent of seven children.

After graduating from UBC, Young worked for the provincial Ministry of Children and Family Development and the federal Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration. she also established Canada's longest-running breakfast program for underprivileged children. The slim margin automatically triggered a recount, which confirmed Dosanjh's victory but only by a margin of 22 votes. The Conservative Party requested a second judicial recount, which again confirmed Dosanjh as the victor.

Young once again faced Dosanjh in the 2011 federal election, this time defeating him by a margin of nearly 4,000 votes; she became the first Conservative member of parliament (MP) to be elected in Vancouver since 1988. As the only government MP in Vancouver, she championed for various projects within the city, including the Kitsilano Neighbourhood House, Supportive Community Housing, the Salvation Army Deborah's Gate Program, the Wavefront Wireless Commercialization Centre Society and the Asia Pacific Gateway Skills Program. On January 7, 2014, Young announced $2.5 million of federal funding towards the Killarney Seniors Centre.

On October 26, 2011, Young was elected vice-chair of the Canada-China Legislative Association (CCLA); she was subsequently elected as chair on March 5, 2013. This association provides a forum for discussing bilateral and multilateral issues facing both Canada and China. but instead formed her own municipal party Coalition Vancouver on June 21, 2018; she came in fourth place at the October 2018 mayoral election. In July 2019, Young was announced as the Conservative candidate in Vancouver South for that year's federal election, but lost in a rematch with Sajjan. She subsequently sought the Conservative nomination for Richmond East—Steveston in the 2025 federal election, but was unsuccessful.

Electoral record Federal

2011 federal election redistributed results Party Vote % Conservative 15,571 42.43 Liberal 12,389 33.76 New Democratic 7,732 21.07 Green 808 2.20 Others 202 0.55

Municipal

Awards Queens Diamond Jubilee Medal Recipient YWCA Woman of Distinction Award Nominee Volunteer of the Year, Vancouver Board of Parks and Recreation