LILLEY: We could be in an election campaign within a week

Will NDP and Bloc vote to oust the Liberals after denouncing them?

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Published Sep 17, 2024  •  Last updated 0 minutes ago  •  3 minute read

A voter looks at the ballot list as they head to advance polls in Lasalle, Que., Monday, Sept. 9, 2024. Photo by Christinne Muschi /The Canadian Press

Parliament will vote on whether to hold an election a week from now, potentially seeing Canadians vote before Americans head to the polls. The Trudeau government has confirmed that the Conservatives will be granted an opposition day on Tuesday, September 24 with a vote on the motion coming the next day after Question Period.

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Given that Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has said multiple times that he will bring in a confidence motion as soon as possible, that means a vote on the government’s survival should come within a week.

If the Conservatives are smart, the motion put before the House of Commons will simply state, “That the House has lost confidence in the government.” If they add anything related to the carbon tax, anything related to Trudeau’s policies, then the motion will definitely fail.

If the motion is a straight up and down vote on the competency of the Liberal government, it should pass. If the Conservatives muddy the waters and start talking about a pile of other issues, then it shows they, like the NDP, want to bark about how bad the NDP are but aren’t serious about forcing an election.

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A straight up and down confidence motion though lets the Conservatives win either way.

Either MPs vote to end the Trudeau Liberal government and force an election or the Bloc and NDP give Poilievre the ability to beat on them day after day for supporting a government they denounce with their words and support with their votes.

“What yesterday’s by-elections showed really clearly are a couple things. First of all, they show that people are done with the Liberals. They’re done with Justin Trudeau. They’re done with the Liberals. They’re finished,” NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said on Tuesday.

Well, if Canadians are done with the Trudeau Liberals, then Singh should join Poilievre and Bloc Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet in voting against the government.

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Of course, as I have written elsewhere, an election in Canada before the Americans vote may be what the Trudeau Liberals want to happen. If the government falls on September 25, that means the PM needs to go to the GG on September 26 to seek an election and a vote will likely happen on November 4.

That would mean Canadians would vote the day before the American election.

Why would the Trudeau Liberals want to have that happen? Because having an election on November 4 would allow Justin Trudeau to campaign against Donald Trump for the entire writ period rather than campaigning against Pierre Poilievre.

The Trudeau Liberals are so convinced that Trump is the devil that they believe campaigning against the Republican candidate is a winning strategy for a Canadian election.

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There are a few problems with that theory.

Pierre Poilievre is not Donald Trump and Canadians understand that despite more than a year of Liberal social media tactics and advertising. American politics is different from Canadian politics and no matter how many times Liberals try to bring in American issues while denouncing “American style” politics, most voters understand the difference.

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Running against Trump, rather than Poilievre, may be the last best chance for the Liberals to try and scrape their way back to relevance and eke out a win.

Despite the polls, Poilievre and the Conservatives would be foolish to discount the Trudeau Liberals at this point.

The Liberals are the most successful political party in the Western world, they play dirty, and they play for keeps, they will do whatever it takes to win even if that means another minority propped up by the Bloc Quebecois and the NDP.

The Canadian public is clearly in the mood for change, whether the MPs we have sent to Ottawa will express that mood when they get the chance to vote next week remains to be seen.

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