OTTAWA // The Canadian prime minister, Stephen Harper, called a snap election today, in a bid to strengthen his hold on power after two and a half years in charge of a minority Conservative Party government. Opinion polls in the past week show the Conservatives have such a large lead over the opposition Liberals that they could win a majority of the 308 seats in parliament after the Oct 14 election. Mr Harper says Canada needs steady leadership at a time when the economy is suffering from the US slowdown. He has already made clear he will not be proposing the kind of high-profile tax cuts his right-leaning government unveiled in the past.
The Liberals say that if elected they will bring in a revenue-neutral carbon tax designed to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Mr Harper says the plan is a disaster. "Between now and Oct 14, Canadians will choose a government to look out for their interests at a time of global economic trouble," Mr Harper said in a statement. "They will choose between direction or uncertainty, between common sense or risky experiments, between steadiness and recklessness," he said after calling what will be Canada's third election in four years.
He made the formal announcement after visiting Canada's governor-general, Michaelle Jean, and asking her to dissolve parliament. Ms Jean is the representative of Queen Elizabeth, the country's head of state. Opponents say Mr Harper is breaking an electoral law that fixed the date of the next election for October 2009. Mr Harper, whose government introduced the law, says he needs a vote now because parliament has become dysfunctional.
Canada has not had back-to-back Conservative governments since Brian Mulroney won a second term as prime minister in 1988. Mr Harper won power in a January 2006 election. An Ekos internet/telephone hybrid survey released today put the Conservatives at 37 per cent, the Liberals at 24 per cent, the leftist New Democrats at 19 per cent, the Greens at 10 per cent and the separatist Bloc Québecois at 6 per cent.
Under Canada's first-past-the-post electoral system, a party needs about 40 per cent of the vote to win a majority. The Conservatives have 127 seats and the Liberals have 95. "It appears that now may be the most auspicious time for the Conservatives to pursue a majority since Brian Mulroney's victory in 1988," Ekos said in a release. It said the change did not so much reflect enthusiasm for Mr Harper as "a very grim outlook" for the Liberals, who have ruled Canada longer than any other party.
The Conservatives regularly attack the Liberal leader, Stephane Dion, saying he does not have what it takes to be prime minister. Mr Dion, a former academic from French-speaking Quebec, sometimes struggles to make himself understood in English, the language spoken by most Canadians. * Reuters
