Liberals play chicken over budget, dare NDP and Bloc to force an election
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Finance Minister Jim Flaherty talks with reporters following Question Period on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Monday, April 24. (CP/Tom Hanson)
OTTAWA (CP) - Opposition parties are playing a game of parliamentary chicken, daring one another to vote against the fledgling Tory government's first budget next week.
If the budget were to be defeated, Stephen Harper's minority government would automatically fall and the country would be plunged into an unwanted election.
Neither the Liberals, the NDP nor the Bloc Quebecois wants an election only three months after the last vote. But each appears to be betting that one of the other parties will blink and wind up propping up the government.
The Liberals are taking the most bellicose stance as they prepare for Tuesday's budget.
They're demanding that the budget include continuation of the previous Liberal government's income-tax cuts and its $5 billion, five-year commitment to create child-care spaces.
The Conservatives have promised to scrap both measures in order to implement their own plans for a $1,200 annual child-care allowance and a one-percentage-point cut in the GST. However, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty is expected to offer other tax relief.
Liberal finance critic John McCallum said Friday his party will also insist that the budget be fiscally prudent and provide more than "token support" for research, higher education and innovation.
Asked how likely it is that Flaherty will bend enough to secure Liberal support, McCallum told reporters: "What I've heard so far doesn't inspire great optimism."
He said Liberals will not hesitate to vote against the budget if it doesn't measure up. And he put the onus on the NDP and Bloc, having joined forces with the Tories last fall to topple the Liberal minority, to prop up the Harper government now.
"We're going to express our own views in a clear way and we'll leave it principally up to the NDP and the Bloc to support the government," McCallum said.
"If there's an election, we'll go to an election. We shall see."
But NDP finance critic Judy Wasylycia-Leis said the Liberal bluster is "more about games and posturing than it is about doing anything responsible."
"They make these bold assertions that they're not prepared to support the government in any way, knowing full well that they don't want an election either because they're in the middle of a leadership campaign."
The Liberals will choose a leader to succeed Paul Martin in December. Until then, Bill Graham is acting as interim leader.
The Conservatives need the support of only one opposition party to survive a confidence vote. Wasylycia-Leis said the leaderless Liberals are gambling that one of the other opposition parties will support the budget but she warned that could be a dangerous assumption.
While the NDP and Bloc have refrained from sabre-rattling and are each negotiating with the government to try to wring some concessions out of Flaherty, Wasylycia-Leis said it's still quite possible that neither party will be able to support the budget.
"If that is the case, it's a game of chicken that backfires (on the Liberals) and we could be into a sudden election because of that posturing."
Should defeat of the budget seem likely, Wasylycia-Leis predicted Liberal MPs would either absent themselves from the vote or find some excuse to support it.
To secure NDP support, she said the budget will need to include "some acknowledgment" that a multi-year commitment to create day-care spaces is required.
It will also have to include adjustments to Employment Insurance to better protect seasonal and part-time workers and an adjustment to the Tory child-care allowance to prevent it being clawed back from low-income parents.
The Bloc shares many of the NDP's concerns. But Wasylycia-Leis predicted the separatist party will swallow almost anything Flaherty dishes up, provided that he also commits to quickly resolve the so-called fiscal imbalance, which would mean billions more for the provinces.
©The Canadian Press, 2006
http://start.shaw.ca/start/enCA/News/NationalNewsArticle.htm?&src=n042873A.xml
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Finance Minister Jim Flaherty talks with reporters following Question Period on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Monday, April 24. (CP/Tom Hanson)
OTTAWA (CP) - Opposition parties are playing a game of parliamentary chicken, daring one another to vote against the fledgling Tory government's first budget next week.
If the budget were to be defeated, Stephen Harper's minority government would automatically fall and the country would be plunged into an unwanted election.
Neither the Liberals, the NDP nor the Bloc Quebecois wants an election only three months after the last vote. But each appears to be betting that one of the other parties will blink and wind up propping up the government.
The Liberals are taking the most bellicose stance as they prepare for Tuesday's budget.
They're demanding that the budget include continuation of the previous Liberal government's income-tax cuts and its $5 billion, five-year commitment to create child-care spaces.
The Conservatives have promised to scrap both measures in order to implement their own plans for a $1,200 annual child-care allowance and a one-percentage-point cut in the GST. However, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty is expected to offer other tax relief.
Liberal finance critic John McCallum said Friday his party will also insist that the budget be fiscally prudent and provide more than "token support" for research, higher education and innovation.
Asked how likely it is that Flaherty will bend enough to secure Liberal support, McCallum told reporters: "What I've heard so far doesn't inspire great optimism."
He said Liberals will not hesitate to vote against the budget if it doesn't measure up. And he put the onus on the NDP and Bloc, having joined forces with the Tories last fall to topple the Liberal minority, to prop up the Harper government now.
"We're going to express our own views in a clear way and we'll leave it principally up to the NDP and the Bloc to support the government," McCallum said.
"If there's an election, we'll go to an election. We shall see."
But NDP finance critic Judy Wasylycia-Leis said the Liberal bluster is "more about games and posturing than it is about doing anything responsible."
"They make these bold assertions that they're not prepared to support the government in any way, knowing full well that they don't want an election either because they're in the middle of a leadership campaign."
The Liberals will choose a leader to succeed Paul Martin in December. Until then, Bill Graham is acting as interim leader.
The Conservatives need the support of only one opposition party to survive a confidence vote. Wasylycia-Leis said the leaderless Liberals are gambling that one of the other opposition parties will support the budget but she warned that could be a dangerous assumption.
While the NDP and Bloc have refrained from sabre-rattling and are each negotiating with the government to try to wring some concessions out of Flaherty, Wasylycia-Leis said it's still quite possible that neither party will be able to support the budget.
"If that is the case, it's a game of chicken that backfires (on the Liberals) and we could be into a sudden election because of that posturing."
Should defeat of the budget seem likely, Wasylycia-Leis predicted Liberal MPs would either absent themselves from the vote or find some excuse to support it.
To secure NDP support, she said the budget will need to include "some acknowledgment" that a multi-year commitment to create day-care spaces is required.
It will also have to include adjustments to Employment Insurance to better protect seasonal and part-time workers and an adjustment to the Tory child-care allowance to prevent it being clawed back from low-income parents.
The Bloc shares many of the NDP's concerns. But Wasylycia-Leis predicted the separatist party will swallow almost anything Flaherty dishes up, provided that he also commits to quickly resolve the so-called fiscal imbalance, which would mean billions more for the provinces.
©The Canadian Press, 2006
http://start.shaw.ca/start/enCA/News/NationalNewsArticle.htm?&src=n042873A.xml
So I dunno.