Canadian Government: The Fat Lady Has Sung

The Liberal government of Prime Minister Paul Martin will fall according to Reuters. Read the story here:

Canada’s minority Liberal government, under heavy pressure over a corruption scandal, looks set to lose a confidence vote next week, government and opposition officials said Friday.

Prime Minister Paul Martin has proposed Parliament vote on his budget next Thursday and says he will call an election if he loses.

The main opposition Conservative Party wants the vote immediately but indications are that whenever it is held, the Liberals have a poor chance of surviving, even though the vote will be close.

“This government is finished,” a senior member of the cabinet confided. If the Liberals fall next Thursday it would open the way to a June 27 election.

The Liberals and their left-leaning New Democrat allies have 151 seats in the 308-seat parliament, while the Conservatives and the separatist Bloc Quebecois have 153. The speaker of Parliament is a Liberal but he only votes in case of a tie. One seat is vacant.

To have any chance of winning the Liberals need the support of two independent members of Parliament, at least one of whom now says he will in all likelihood vote against the government.

“The math is very favorable … we’re confident we’re doing the right thing and that the numbers are in place,” senior Conservative legislator Vic Toews told reporters.

Even the New Democrats, who insist Parliament be kept alive long enough to pass the budget, are not holding out much hope.

When Reuters suggested to a well-placed New Democrat official that the government side looked set to lose the vote, the official replied: “I think you’re right.”

For all the Conservatives’ determination to bring down the government, polls show the electorate is in a volatile mood and there is no guarantee the party would win an election and end 12 years of Liberal power.

One Conservative member of Parliament is severely ill with cancer and is due to have an operation next Wednesday, which means he will miss the vote Thursday.

His absence would in theory give the Liberals a greater chance of survival but the New Democrats said for the sake of fairness they are ready to withdraw one of their own legislators from Parliament during the vote.

“What we are potentially doing is failing to take advantage of a sick member, and we’re simply refusing to do that,” New Democrat Member of Parliament Ed Broadbent told reporters.

If the New Democrats did withdraw a member to compensate for the missing Conservative, it would leave the Liberals with 150 seats to 152 for their opponents.

The chances of Martin surviving suffered a blow Thursday when independent legislator David Kilgour — a long-term advocate of Africa — expressed disappointment with a proposed aid package for Sudan’s troubled Darfur region.

“If (Martin) doesn’t do significantly better in the next week then he can assume that my vote’s going to be against him,” Kilgour told Reuters.

It is over!

The political game is afoot – a summer’s election for Canada.