Beyond The Commons

Aaron Wherry covers all the goings-on in and around Parliament Hill. Follow Aaron on Twitter: @aaronwherry

Categories: Beyond The Commons, Capital Read

Weekend at Iggy's

by Aaron Wherry on Friday, June 12, 2009 12:33pm - 31 Comments

The official word from the Liberal leader’s office is that you can stop holding your breath. He’ll talk on Monday.

Of course, Mr. Ignatieff already passed judgment on this government. The text of that verdict, delivered ten days ago, after the jump.

Question: Will you be moving a motion of non-confidence before the summer break and will you also be supporting the Main Estimates, voting for the Main Estimates (off microphone)?

Michael Ignatieff: I don’t want an election. Canadians don’t want an election. But here’s where I am. I’m trying to make Parliament work with a government that every day is displaying more flagrant examples of incompetence. We’ve got a major medical crisis with the isotopes. They’ve got no plan. We’ve got, Toronto Dominion Bank just announced that the deficit over five years will be, wait for this, $168 billion. That’s the biggest number anybody has ever heard of. The public finances of this country are not under control. Right? Third, we’ve got an unemployment crisis with unemployment surging across the country. We’ve got Premier Campbell, we’ve got Brad Wall, we’ve got Premier McGuinty saying let’s do something about a national standard for EI. I’m not fancy about how we do it, but let’s do it. Right? We’ve got stimulus that needs to get out the door and only 6% of the stimulus has actually reached the country in the middle of the construction season.

Tags: Budget, economy, infrastructure, Michael Ignatieff

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http://intensedebate.com/people/jolyon jolyon

I believe more in Wells first rule of politics than I do Iggy will be considering whether to pass/fail the government over the weekend because the report is entirely irrelevant. All that matters is what the internal Lib polls are saying and, like Wells wrote yesterday, if Libs were gearing up for an election there would be some prep happening and everyone would not be getting ready for their summer hols.

http://intensedebate.com/people/KadyITQ KadyITQ

See, I'm not totally sure about that last point. In my experience, nobody ever really thinks there's going to be an election, right up until the point where suddenly, there is.

Wayne

You are absolutely on Kady : Us political junkies have the shortest memory neurons available to humankind and attention spans of a toddler. Invariably every time I can honestly rememberan election almost everyone agree their wouldn't be one and the same with the results because if you go back and actaully comapre polling results they are rarely spot on and when they are it is more of a fluke than anything else just ask Nick!
http://intensedebate.com/people/jolyon jolyon

Once again, I agree with you Kady, up to a point. I could have written 'libs are not yet planning an election but, who knows, they might grow a spine over the weekend. Or whips could think they are on hols a week early and mess up a vote next week' but I prefer a strident comment to one with a bunch of qualifiers.

And, Kady, how do you get the fancy blue stripe across the top of your comment? Is that for Macleans pundits only, you only, or can we all get them?

http://www.canadianrosebud.blogspot.com rockfish

I agree with the effervescent ItQ – while an impulsive reaction would work best for both an ever-gorging election-mad media and Harper, drawing out a little drama and the pretext that this is a heavy, critical decision gives Ignatieff more 'leader' cred. It doesn't necessarily mean the end result will be a complete positive for him, tho. I'm just assuming that while the gov't has been polling like crazy over the past few weeks, the Grits may have a couple small data lists to base their decision on. But that the Harpers are wasting vital federal dollars on heavy polling (i've been hit twice in the last week) and focus grouping is more reason to get them out now.
Smith

Please.

The only reason he's waiting until monday is so he can test poll how he backs down from his election threat.

http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

The fact the he just came from making a speech and had an event to go to (I suspect Don Newman's retirement shindig) might have been some of the reason he didn't have time to read it.

AT1

I could see it going either way, except for the fact that Iggy must be keenly aware that he will be pressed to explain how an election will speed up delivery of the stimulus (or any other issue that can be contrived to generate a non-confidence motion).

Marg Bedore

Why should he worry about delivery of the stimulus Harper says 80% is out the door. Is that a lie?
http://intensedebate.com/people/danby danby

He would also be forced to come up with a platform – which would open the door to lots of expensive ads that attack his policies – and those ads really work

http://www.TennisVagabond.com Big Dave S

After this weekend, Iggy will mess with Harper until he's done. Unless he decides not to bring down the government. Then he's already done with the messing.
brick tamlin

The *party* has been doing the polling, and the money comes from people like me who donate it.

http://intensedebate.com/people/james_curra7266 James Curran

Well that's a crock. In fact these Cons have spent more taxpayers dollars on polling than any other government in the history of Canada. And, history shall prove that.

Vince Marmion

Rightly or wrongly, its become common practice for political parties in power to use their governmental priviledge to conduct polls. I'm sure every government outdoes the last in spending of some sort on the latest political fads. Given the Harper government's precarious minority status and pragmatic bend why should this be shocking (or needing history to prove)?
Since you can no longer refer to him as an ideologue with a hidden agenda, I guess this might be among the new lines of criticism?

Vince Light

And really, can you fault them for keeping in touch with their constituents on a regular basis? Heaven forbid the party in power should get to know what the electorate is thinking.

Andrew (not P or C)

Then they would gladly publicly publish the results of all these polls the Canadian taxpayer is funding?

http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

Boy are you right on this one. In fact, in the pretense that they are interested in your views – the Cons have sent out ten percent flyers with questions to be answered (this is polling on our taxpayer monies). I've received 16 as of June 11/09 – the last one being a big ugly paper flag to put in your window which is suppose to prove you are patriotic. Prior to that one had "who would best handle the economy – Cons/Libs/NDP". 16 since mid-January.

What is the limit on this? In haste I threw out the first one, but have saved the rest. I wonder if I contacted the Speaker of the House on the rules I'd get an answer.

Vince Light

I'm sure a quick search at http://www.gc.ca would do the trick, as I highly doubt that Milliken has time to answer.

Looking at 2007-08's numbers, the highest and lowest spenders (exempting MP's that were by-elected) were:

Top:
Yvon Levesque – $34,001.00 (Bloc – Baie James-Nunavik)
Tina Keeper – $31,945.00 (Lib – Churchill)
Marc Lemay – $30,538.00 (Bloc – Abitibi)

Bottom:
Jim Karygiannis: $0.00 (Lib – Scarborough)
Peter Mackay: $150.00 (Con – Central Nova)
Rob Anders: $ 200.00 (Con – Calgary West)

The average likely falls into the $10-15k area, depending on:
Constituency size – rural makes for higher costs (like Churchill, or Northern Quebec/Ontario ridings)
Perceived confidence in the ability to hold the riding – most safe ridings have really low ad costs, except for party leaders and ministers.

That should give you an idea of what is/isn't allowed. Generally they keep it to less than 10% of their Member Office Budget.

brick tamlin

probation if necessary, but not necessarily probation?
herringchoker

Yawn!!! Wake me in October when the summer recess ends.
Smith

I had such high hopes for Iggy. Really I did. But alas, he's just Dion with a better degree.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Inkless Inkless

It's worse than you know. Dion's doctorate from Sciences Po is much better than Ignatieff's from Oxford.
Sam

So – What should he be doing exactly? Please share the perfect solution!

http://intensedebate.com/people/DaveFromToronto DaveFromToronto

Ignatieff can't win this. If he calls for a no-confidence vote, and gets a summer election, he will be accused of needlessly wasting taxpayers' money during tough economic times. If he decides not to try to bring down the government, he will be called a spineless wimp.

http://intensedebate.com/people/SamDavies SamDavies

Totally. It would be political suicide to bring down the government.
While the Liberals are doing better in the Polls, they would lose all they have gained, and likely more, if they called an election. There's really nothing rational that he can do!

Loyal Subject

Perhaps Iggy could resign and give Bob Rae a turn.

http://intensedebate.com/people/danby danby

Would you put it past the Conservatives to be vague about the stimulus numbers, somewhat nudging Mr Ignatieff towards an election. Then they produce some \\"hard" numbers to support their agenda?
Mr Harper is not much of an economic forecaster, but he is a first rate schemer
Dieter Sprockets

Iggy is having lot's of fun in his new country. He'll opt for an election but the NDP won't support his call. This will provide him with a key debating point when the NDP try to frame him as Harper's pal rather then a friend of the coalition.

http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

New country? Is Iggy moving somewhere? Why is his birth and whole life citizenship Canadian? You fell for the Con BS you silly man

Katherine Wall

"We’ve got, Toronto Dominion Bank just announced that the deficit over five years will be, wait for this, $168 billion. That’s the biggest number anybody has ever heard of. The public finances of this country are not under control. Right? Third, we’ve got an unemployment crisis with unemployment surging across the country."

That. Is. Called. A. Recession! Which Harper is not responsible for. I'm a New Democrat with little use for the Conservatives and even I can see he's being completely unreasonable.

He wants a election because he wants power and this is a good time to grab it. He's here for one reasons – ambition – and he had to wait longer than he anticipated due to Dion's stint as leader. He doesn't have the patience to wait much longer.