OTTAWA — Canada’s political leaders are parking the buses and handing voters the keys to the country for what promises to be a transformative trip to the ballot box.
With the resurgent New Democrats looming in his rear-view mirror, Prime Minister Stephen Harper shifted gears slightly on the final day of the campaign, dismissing a vote for Liberal rival Michael Ignatieff as a waste of paper.
“The best he can now hope for is to be a back-seat passenger in an NDP government,” Harper said to rabid partisan cheers at rallies in Stratford, P.E.I., and London, Ont.
The latest Canadian Press Harris-Decima poll appeared Sunday to buttress that conclusion.
The poll, conducted Thursday through Sunday, had the Conservatives at 36 per cent support, with the NDP six points back at 30 per cent.
The Liberals were languishing at 19 per cent, with the Bloc Quebecois tied with the Greens at six per cent each.
The poll surveyed 1,035 random Canadians and carries a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
Remarkably, Harper — who has for so long been the target of strategic voting rhetoric — urged Liberal voters to support the Conservatives in an effort to block the NDP.
“Let me be clear to traditional Liberal voters.
“Many of you do not want NDP economic policies, you do not want NDP tax hikes, and to make sure that the next Parliament does not raise taxes, Canada now needs a strong economy and it can get it with a stable Conservative majority.”
Ignatieff, who is expected to suffer a pummelling at the hands of voters, seemed to take the tactic personally.
“Mr. Harper has no vision for Canada, but he has a very sharp vision for the Conservative party of Canada, which is to try to drive a stake through the heart of the Liberal party,” he said.
“He has not succeeded, he will not succeed, he will never succeed.”
Ignatieff was the only one of the three federalist party leaders to take questions Sunday; both Harper and NDP Leader Jack Layton put a stop to their daily news conference free-for-alls.
Ignatieff found out pretty quickly why that might not have been a bad idea: within a minute, he was being peppered with questions about whether he expects to keep his job — an issue he doesn’t want to be wrestling with before ballots have even been cast.
“I want to stay, I want to continue, I want to win this election on the second of May,” Ignatieff said.
“But my fate is not just in my hands. Hey, folks — it’s in the hands of millions of Canadian voters out there, and this election is not over.
“After the election, we see where we are, but in every case my fate is in the hands of democratic institutions. It’s a fact, and it’s a fact I welcome.”
In his last interview of the election campaign, Layton extended an olive branch of sorts to his political adversaries, offering to work together after the votes are counted Monday.
“The essence of that plan is to phone all the other leaders and say, ’This what we’d like to accomplish, depending on the scenarios, hoping we’re in the leadership position,” Layton told The Canadian Press.
He did not rule out working with the Conservatives, however unlikely that may seem given the bitter tone of the election campaign.
He’ll work with anyone, “if there’s a dance partner — if Stephen Harper happens to be there, (or) another leader.”
And he dismissed as a smear campaign the furor over reports on the weekend that said Layton — a brash city councillor and deputy mayor of Toronto at the time — was a customer at a massage parlour when it was targeted in a police raid in 1996.
“I don’t think Canadians like personal attacks and that’s what they find distasteful about Ottawa politics these days,” he said. “I expect many will recoil with this kind of smear.”
Ignatieff was in Ajax, Ont., one of several bedroom communities ringing Toronto where the Conservatives have high hopes.
Polls suggest Ignatieff’s fate is sealed, but he was in a feisty mood in the campaign’s final hours and made a passionate defence of his party and his leadership.
“I have a strong feeling that every Liberal knows in their guts the difference between being a Liberal and an NDP,” he said.
“We know how to balance a budget. We know how to get a deficit under control. We know how to make promises and keep ’em. Mr. Layton and his party have never formed a government in the history of Canada. We’ve been there. We’ve done it. And every Liberal knows in their heart of hearts, we’re two different families, two different traditions.”
At his first event of the day in Montreal, Layton stuck to his feel-good winds-of-change script to avoid any surprises, particularly in Quebec, the epicentre of his remarkable march up the polls.
“We have a historic opportunity here, and in fact it began right here in Quebec,” he said.
“The change begins with a vote. Your vote.”
It’s not uncommon for Harper to end news conferences in the final days of a campaign, but it is unprecedented for Layton — a stark illustration of how much is at stake for the NDP as they seek to capitalize on surging support in Quebec.
The principal victim of that surge, Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe, appeared resigned to his fate Sunday as he campaigned in his own riding — a sure sign of serious trouble for a prominent federal leader.
Duceppe predicted that his supporters in the Montreal riding of Laurier-Sainte-Marie would vote in droves, much as they have done since he first claimed the seat in 1990.
But he didn’t sound like a man who believed it.
“I’m always concerned about results as long as they’re not known,” Duceppe said. “I have to work until the very end.”
He said he ran an honest campaign and talked about issues important to Quebecers, unlike the other parties, describing the Bloc as the only party that’s defending the province’s interests.