The first third of the election campaign is now behind us, yet it's still too close to call between a Conservative minority or majority.
The Conservatives have released their platform this morning. It calls in particular, for:
- scrapping the 1.95$ per vote subsidy to political parties and the long-gun registry (the NRA is rumoured to be involved in the campaign),
- passing a panoplia of bills to stiffen crime penalties, reform youth justice, clamp down on pot and strengthen police powers
- maintaining the 3 point cut in corporate taxes (this is becoming a key issue),
- providing further tax cuts to certain types of families at a later date (intended for stereotypical families where one parent stays at home, REAL Women of Canada praised it which is pretty much all you need to know)
- a loan guarantee for 4.2 billion to exploit the Churchill Falls hydroelectric plant in Labrador by constructing an underwater cable between Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, and
- seeking to establish free-trade deals with the EU and India by the end of the decade.
The 'coalition' rhetoric is still very present though the issue per se has died down despite periodic stoking -- ethics is now considered a key issue. This is accompanied by a constant yammering of Liberal taxing.
The Conservatives have had a 'bubble' campaign designed to target certain key ridings and to minimize mistakes yet there have been regular miscues. The most serious one so far is similar to when people were kicked out of Bush Jr. rallies for the wrong bumper sticker -- students were kicked out of Harper's rallies in Guelph and London for belonging to a campus environmental group, or just having a photo of them with Ignatieff on their Facebook account. The RCMP assures the PM's security.
Harper has been ridiculed by the press for only allowing five questions per day -- two in English, two in French and one for a local reporter.
Harper challenged Ignatieff to a one-on-one debate; when Ignatieff accepted Harper failed to respond. There are a few people, such as Rick Mercer, willing to organize one, and the general public approves of the idea.
They've had other miscues -- a few staffers, one caught in scandal, the other a fraudster, were caught working on the campaign and had to be removed. The leader's tour is often said to be late for events. One of their newest ads was plagiarized from Tim Pawlenty's presidential exploration bid. There have also been unwelcome statements by candidates, or skeletons in their closets. Since the last update, Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke loudmouth Cheryl Gallant referred to Ignatieff as 'Ignaffi'. Star candidate in Ajax-Pickering Chris Alexander (former Afghanistan envoy) insisted there is no poverty in Canada during an all-candidates debate -- and justified himself by pointing out that no one makes less than 2$ a day. Larry Smith, on Montréal's West Island, also just suggested that Québec's culture where you have to vote "du bon bord" (for the winner) is a good thing, which could create problems for the Conservatives in Québec as the campaign there focuses on putting the regions in power, and therefore giving them influence, and it might make people self-conscious.
For laughs; if you can understand French; this is the Conservative candidate in Compton-Stanstead (the riding bordering Vermont and New Hampshire):
How to "solve" money problems
(Side note: the politics of patronage dies hard in Québec and the Maritimes, although it is heavily frowned upon in the West, which was incidentally one of the reasons for Reform's rise. In the past, especially in Nova Scotia, you had to vote for a member of government if you wanted your roads paved. In Duplessis' Québec, one riding needed a bridge but voted for the opposition 18 years -- and during those 18 years, never got their bridge. Duplessis was also known for sending his troops into rural ridings during campaigns with goodies such as washing machines to shore up the vote.)
However, polling shows the Tories at a steady 35 to 40 percent of the vote, usually leading in Ontario, sometimes by a large margin there, and that's why they may yet win a majority. Still, they almost no longer reach above 40% like at the start.
The Bloc Québecois, so far, has probably had the worst campaign of the four parties, especially in the past week. Gilles Duceppe came out swinging against any federal support for Churchill Falls, which can play well with their hard-core supporters but is patently unfair. The campaign theme itself is naff, their first ad on ethics very cliché, while Abitibi-Baie James MP Yvon Lévesque claimed many of his constituents wouldn't vote for an Aboriginal candidate. Polling had them slightly below where they were last time until yesterday -- some of yesterday's polls were absolutely rotten for them, two of them putting them below 30% in the province, one of them only one point ahead of the Liberals there and the other just 7 points ahead of the Conservatives… who were in fourth place in that poll. The federalist vote in Québec is very fractured, still enabling them to win most seats except near Ottawa, Montréal, the Saguenay and Québec City. There is a risk of questions about their relevance surfacing, which they didn't have last time.
The NDP campaign is a bit of a mixed bag. They're doing well in Québec (but their vote is fairly flat) but stagnating elsewhere, and seat projections have them between their 2006 (29 seats) and 2008 (37 seats) results with a slightly lower share of their vote. Their campaign seems somewhat disconnected, and the whole just seems less than the sum of their parts. They have focused so far on helping small businesses, pensions, capping credit card rates and health care (their entire platform will be released Sunday), on the campaign and in their English TV ads. Their French TV ads are well-done but do not yet have any content per se; in particular, the example used in their economy ad is in Québec yet they have no ad in French on it. They have had a couple of candidates defect during the campaign, one to the Liberals, the other to the Conservatives. The pace of the campaign has not suffered from Jack Layton's hip injury, and he had a good showing on Radio-Canada's Tout Le Monde En Parle.
The Liberals, without a doubt, have had the best campaign of the four major parties. Their TV ads are excellent, and Ignatieff has begun to improve his leadership scores although he is still behind Layton on the key scores. Their 'education passport' has been well-received, and the direction of their campaign -- investing in Canadians -- is clear. There have been a few miscues -- one candidate left after being revealed as leader of an association for the defence of whites (!), another made comments against mandatory sentencing for sexual assault, while the candidate in November's by-election in Vaughan endorsed his former opponent (former OPP chief Julian Fantino) -- but this has not had much of an effect. Polling has them somewhere near their last result to somewhere slightly below the 2006 result (25 to 29%) ; their biggest improvement has been in the West, limiting seat gains however, but their vote in Quebec has stabilized or is slightly increasing and their 14 MPs there should all be OK.
The Greens have slid from last campaign, and have been unable to secure a spot at next week's debates. The campaign is almost entirely focused on getting Elizabeth May elected in Saanich-Gulf Islands. Their platform focuses on democratic renewal and on carbon pricing (it can be read here).