Tag: vote of confidence

Here’s the chart from Angus Reid on the leadership momentum of the Big 3:

This bodes well for the Liberals in this critical last week of the lengthy campaign.

It you think of the trend then the pre-eminence of Justin Trudeau is even more striking. The desperate attempts of the Harper attack machine to paint him as just not ready have boomeranged badly, and he has clawed his way up from the lowly position he had some 6 months ago, to being Top Dog.

The only worrisome thing for Liberals in this last week of the titanic struggle we have been waging, in the air and on the ground, is that the Conservatives are still ahead in the single most important segment of voters under our archaic FPTP system: those who turn out to vote – those over 60.

Having a big margin in all other segments is intellectually satisfying but does not bring home the bacon.

When I voted yesterday in the advance polls, I was struck by the fact that in the long line of voters patiently waiting to cast their votes, I noticed very few who seemed younger than 55.

The only consolation is that at most Harper will gain a minority government, but it will be short-lived, with his failure to gain confidence of a 170 MPs in the first Throne Speech.

Then it will be Trudeau’s turn to see if he can gain the confidence of the House in his Liberal minority government.

The odds are that Mulcair will lead his NDP to support a minority Liberal government on a case by case confidence and other matters vote basis, until at least the archaic FPTP system of electing our MPs is replaced by a more democratic form, where every vote counts towards representation in the House.

After all, it must be abundantly clear to even an anti-Mulcair dyed-in-the-wool NDP supporter that some form of proportional representation is the best system for that party; that system alone will give the NDP voice their fair share of MPs in our Parliament.

And for the Greens, voting strategically to unseat a sitting Tory MP is in their best interest, because it will lead to the abolition of the FPTP system, and to them gaining their fair share of MPs.

After all, Elizabeth May really needs a handful of MPs to support her valiant but solitary battle with the mainstream parties.