Conservative Majority?

The big story is the out rightdestruction of the Liberal party. However hard core support will remain at over twenty percent and this isbroadly spread even were no liberal has been elected for decades.  The switch to the NDP is thus likely to electneither in many ridings that were highly competitive liberal ridings.

The anomaly is that the suddenemergence of the NDP in Quebec is allowing theQuebec voterto abandon the Bloq Quebec gracefully. It is here that the Conservatives may be unable to benefit and may welllose the handful they hold.

Thus East of the Ottawa river we should see a lot of change but likely asmall net gain for the conservatives and a strong gain for the NDP.

I expect though that the NDP risewill dump a lot of seats here into the conservatives.  The liberals rarely have to lose a lot for ariding to switch and the NDP base in most ridings is simply not strong enough.  A conservative majority is very possiblehere.

A conservative majority will meanthe end of party government allowances and the swift demise of the Bloq Quebec.  Those seats will likely go conservative inthe next election.

We are seeing a completereshaping of the left of center party system in such a way as to make a consolidationof the left totally necessary.  Theconservatives bled their way through this process during the Chrétien era andallowed three liberal majorities because of it. The abrupt emergence of the NDP makes it impossible for the Liberals toavoid or even to imagine merger.

Canada election riding projections is showing aminority Conservative government

APRIL 29, 2011

http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/04/canada-election-riding-projections-is.html

Trendlines has a riding byriding projection for the Monday, May 2, 2011 Canadian election

The most recent projection out of 308 ridings (155 needed for majority)
147 for Conservatives

78 NDP

55 Liberal

27 Bloq Quebec

Nanos Research's latest nightly tracking poll released Fridayshows the Conservatives have 36.4% support, with the NDP at 31.2% and theLiberals trailing with 22%. The gap between the Conservatives and NDPnarrowed to five points from six points in the previous day's polling. This isa dramatic shift from March 30, when the pollster found the NDP had just 15.9%support against 39.1% for the Conservatives and 32.7% for the Liberals.

NDP that is taking from Liberals and Bloc Quebecois. Both Liberals and the Blocare collapsing. Conservatives are mostly holding steady. However, it is only aone or two poll surge. So the polling could be off, since the NDP has neverbeen close to being this strong historically. We will know for sure on Monday. 

The NDP platform is no longer flat out socialist (like in decadespast) and tries to be pro-small business and is committed to a balanced budget.

We’ll give small businesses a 2 percentage points tax cut, and bring intargeted tax credits for companies that hire here in Canada.

We will maintain Canada’scommitment to balance the federal budget within the next 4 years, as per theDepartment of Finance projections

the NDP has promised not to interfere with Bank of Canada ratedecisions. This reassurance was needed because of a prior statement that theywould like to see the Bank of Canada hold off on hiking interest rates.

Canadian election scenarios

CONSERVATIVE MAJORITY GOVERNMENT

The Conservatives need to win an additional 12 seats to get a majority thatcould govern without needing support from other parties. Normally a party needssupport of around 40 percent of the electorate to win a majority, but if theleft-of-center vote is split between other parties, they could win a majoritywith a smaller share of the vote than that.

Likelihood: possible, if the NDP surge splits the left-of center vote

CONSERVATIVE MINORITY GOVERNMENT

If the Conservatives win more seats than any other party, they will get thefirst chance of forming a government, but may have to make concessions to winsupport from at least one other party and stay in power as a minoritygovernment. The party has so far pledged to reintroduce the budget it presentedin March before the government fell. All the opposition parties had promised tovote against that budget, so an identical document is unlikely to pass. But allbets are off if the Conservatives are only a few seats from a majority, as theopposition might not dare unite to bring them down for fear of a public outcry.

Likelihood: possible, but it's unclear if it would be stable

POSSIBLE NEW ELECTION

If the opposition brings a new Conservative minority government down at thefirst opportunity, Harper has said he will seek a new election. But thatdecision would be up to Governor General David Johnston, and manyconstitutional scholars say he would probably first ask another parties to tryto form a government before calling what would be Canada's fifth election inseven years.

Likelihood: very unlikely

NDP-LED MINORITY GOVERNMENT

If the Conservatives can't form a successful minority government, Johnston would turn to theparty with the second highest number of seats to see if it could form agovernment. Under current poll numbers that could be the NDP, so Canada's newprime minister would be Jack Layton, a man who has come from behind to capturethe imagination of a good section of the population. He would need support fromother parties, probably the Liberals and possibly also from the separatist BlocQuebecois to stay in power.

Likelihood: possible, provided support for the NDP stays strong

LIBERAL-LED MINORITY GOVERNMENT

If the Liberals end up with more seats than the NDP, Liberal leader MichaelIgnatieff could be given the chance to form a minority government. He wouldalso need support from other parties to stay in power.

Likelihood: unlikely, given current poll numbers

NDP MAJORITY GOVERNMENT

It's still a long-shot option, but if the Liberal vote collapses completely,and support for the Conservatives also sags badly, the NDP has a remote chanceof getting more than 154 seats, handing them a majority in Parliament.

Likelihood: very unlikely