For those of you who don't follow Canadian politics, a number of interesting developments have occurred recently. There are at present four major parties in Canada: Liberals; the National Democratic Party; the Bloc Quebecois; and the Conservatives. (It should go without saying that 'Liberal' and 'Conservative' do not perfectly map onto U.S. political categories.) After years and years of majority government, the Liberal Party barely squeaked by in the past election, forming a minority government with the help of the NDP and a sprinkling of independents. The reason the Liberals took such a beating is the sponsorship scandal. The general result of inquiry into the scandal has been a severely declining respect for the Liberal Party, and an increasing association of the Liberal label with corruption and abuse of power. After dominating Canadian politics for so long that people had begun to joke that Canada was the only democracy that was also a single-party dictatorship, the Liberals only barely managed to pull enough seats in the House of Commons to stay in power.
Such a situation is unstable. In April polls seemed to indicate that, while Canadians did not want an election, the opposition parties would stand to gain rather significantly if an election were called. The situation became so troublesome that in an unusual move, the Prime Minister (Paul Martin) addressed the nation, promising to call an election after the Gomery commission, which is investigating the sponsorship scandal, delivers its final report in November. Things began to look election-like. The government made a rather hefty budget-deal with the NDP to keep things stable. On May 10, the House of Commons passed a motion, 153-150, that the Liberal government should resign. Since it was not technically a non-confidence vote, the Liberals are still in power; however, there will be a vote on the budget, and Martin promised that if they lost that vote, he would ask the Governor General to dissolve Parliament, thus starting the election process. The margins are so razor-thin that it is up in the air. If all MPs were able to attend, the vote would (it is thought) split 153-153, with the Speaker casting the deciding vote (for the government); but two of the independents have been playing coy. There were rumors (denied, of course) that the Liberals were offering a special appointment to a Tory Member of Parliament or two in order to reduce the Conservative vote.
Then Belinda Stronach, a Conservative MP, defected to the Liberals for a cabinet position. With this change, if the two undeclared independents support the Liberals, they will stay in power. The Conservatives retreated a bit, saying they will vote for the budget but try to bring down the government on the Liberal-NDP budget amendment. It's less likely than it was. However, the Stronach move might have cost Martin an independent vote --although the independent still won't commit to anything.
Manalive, Parliamentary politics is complicated.
UPDATE: And the Liberal government remains in power, after a 153-152 vote (Speaker breaking the tie).
