Posted on 05/16/2005 5:18:29 AM PDT by Clive
OTTAWA (CP) - The federal Conservatives, after a week of bitter parliamentary gamesmanship, now appear willing to pin their hopes for a spring election on a single, high-stakes roll of the dice Thursday when the federal budget comes to a vote.
"We will respect that vote," Jay Hill, Tory House leader in the Commons, said Sunday.
Prime Minister Paul Martin has already promised that, if his minority Liberal government loses the budget showdown, he will call an immediate election. But it's been less clear what would happen if the government wins.
It could mean only a temporary reprieve for Martin, since under parliamentary rules the Conservatives - or another opposition party - could try to table another non-confidence motion and bring down the government later in the current session.
Hill signalled, however, that the Tories would likely back off if they can't topple Martin this week.
"If circumstances don't change I suspect we (wouldn't) see any further action prior to the summer recess," he told reporters.
The comments came just as NDP Leader Jack Layton, who has been trying to prop up the Liberals in recent weeks, hinted that his support may not last indefinitely.
The New Democrats still want to see the budget passed, Layton said on a television news program. Question Period. But after that, he suggested he may reassess the public mood on whether there should be an election later in the spring.
"What we've said is we want to get this budget through, to show some results to Canadians," said Layton.
"Then let's see how people feel. I believe you may find that people don't necessarily want an election, but they see the House in such chaos that they feel that maybe we just simply have to have one."
Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe, who has been beating the electoral drums for weeks, showed no sign of stopping on the weekend.
"Beyond the simple arithmetic in the House of Commons, Paul Martin no longer has any credibility or legitimacy," Duceppe said in a statement issued as he attended a youth event in Montreal.
"He only has one choice left - to stop hanging onto power and call an election without delay."
Martin clearly was getting ready in case he had to hit the campaign trail.
The prime minister was to travel to Halifax on Monday, where he was expected to announce a child-care agreement with Nova Scotia - the latest in a series of spending initiatives he has trumpeted in recent weeks.
The Liberals have signed similar day care pacts with four other provinces, have agreed to funnel new money for various social programs to Ontario and Saskatchewan, and have signed a deal with Alberta to share gasoline tax revenue with municipalities in that province.
The Conservatives and Bloc, in an alliance of convenience, tried twice last week to vote Martin's government out of office. The Liberals, however, dismissed those motions as merely procedural devices and not true confidence measures.
Harper responded by pushing through adjournment motions to shut down Commons business for three consecutive days in a show of protest.
The guerrilla warfare was accompanied by increasingly acrimonious rhetoric, with Harper accusing Martin of trying to stall the budget vote until cancer-stricken Conservative MP Darrel Stinson - and possibly Dave Chatters, another Tory fighting cancer - would be too ill to attend.
Ed Broadbent and Alexa McDonough of the NDP both offered to sit out the budget vote if any Tories couldn't make it, a move that party leader Layton said was an effort to restore civility to the debate.
It appeared on Sunday, however, that the Conservatives and Liberals had managed to patch things up on their own.
Hill said party whips had worked out a deal that will effectively pair Liberal Natural Resources Minister John Efford, who is undergoing treatment for diabetes, with Stinson, who has surgery scheduled this week.
Both men should now be able to stay home without affecting the balance of forces in the Commons, said Hill. The agreement was expected to be formalized Monday.
Hill also said the Conservatives would abandon their delaying tactics and let House business proceed normally until the budget vote - as long as the Liberals keep a promise to bring in a motion officially guaranteeing the vote will be held Thursday.
The numbers are so close in the House that the fate of the government may hang on three Independents and Speaker Peter Milliken, who votes only to break a tie.
Hill wouldn't entirely rule out the possibility that the Conservatives could table another non-confidence motion somewhere down the road if they lose on Thursday.,
But he said it would be unlikely unless there are unforeseen circumstances - such as startling new revelations from the continuing Gomery inquiry into the federal sponsorship scandal.
Barring that kind of dramatic development, said Hill, "we want to honour and respect Thursday's outcome as much as possible."
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(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
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