COUNTERWEIGHTS EDITORS. GANATSEKWYAGON, ON. THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2024. The theoretical big news in Canadian politics right now is (to cite the CBC) :”The NDP is ending its governance agreement with the Liberals … Deal that ensured Liberal minority government’s survival was the first such agreement at the federal level.”

CBC News (in the person of Peter Zimonjic) carries on : “The end of the confidence and supply agreement doesn’t necessarily mean an immediate election. The Liberals could seek the support of the Bloc Québécois or try to continue negotiating with the NDP on a case-by-case basis.”

At the same time : “Singh said ‘the NDP is ready for an election, and voting non-confidence will be on the table with each and every confidence measure’ … Singh said the Liberals will not stand up to corporate interests and he will be running in the next election to ‘stop Conservative cuts.’”

Meanwhile, as further reported by Mr. Zimonjic, Liberal PM “Trudeau said he hopes the next election will not happen ‘until next fall’ so that his government has time to move forward on pharmacare, dental care and school food programs” (some of which the NDP largely initiated).

Whatever happens, Liberals and New Democrats apparently retain similar views on one key issue in any next election . Mr. Singh (again) will be running to “stop Conservative cuts.” Mr. Trudeau has stressed the “contrast with a Conservative leader that wants to cut … the programs that Canadians are relying on to get through this difficult time … that will be a political decision that Canadians get to take in an election.”

With all this in mind, Polling Canada may have aptly enough posted on TwitterX : “Don’t get too excited … This is probably a ‘We’re ending the deal with the Liberals BUT we’re supporting them on a bill by bill basis now.’ Meaning nothing will fundamentally change.”

Meanwhile again on TwitterX as well we counterweights editors ourselves offered angular thoughts on two quotes about the issue.

Jagmeet Singh announced the NDP’s ending of the March 2022 Supply and Confidence Agreement with his own post : “The deal is done … The Liberals are too weak, too selfish and too beholden to corporate interests to stop the Conservatives and their plans to cut. But the NDP can … Big corporations and CEOs have had their governments. It’s the people’s time.”

We quoted this and raised one obvious enough question (stretching back to the Jack Layton NDP’s somewhat ironic symbiosis with Stephen Harper’s Conservatives) : “And once again federal New Democrats are going to give the people of Canada a Conservative government ????”

It is true enough that on current party standings in the Canadian House of Commons, flowing from the 2021 election, the Pierre Poilievre Conservatives, who are doing so relatively well right now in mere opinion polls, cannot defeat the Trudeau Liberal minority government on a confidence motion with the votes of the Singh New Democrats alone.

Very quickly 119 CON MPs +24 NDP MPs =143, where a vote of at least 170 is required to bring the 154 LIB MPs down.

The two Greens and three Independents cannot help much either. Any Conservative plot to defeat PM Trudeau in the House and force an election before his preferred “next fall” in 2025, will require the support of at least 27 of the 32 MPs from Yves-François Blanchet’s Bloc Quebecois, as well as the 24 New Democrats.

On September 4 we also quoted a Polling Canada post of seat projections for the latest very recent Angus Reid federal poll, and offered this speculation :

“This poll which still has PP CONs with overwhelming majority (tho just of seats of course not pop vote) — but also unlike others that do this has NDP 3 seats ahead of LIBs — just may go a long way towards explaining today’s big news from Mr Singh.”

Finally, however, we have concluded that the most apt TwitterX post on the NDP’s ending its governance agreement with the Liberals so far (well the most entertaining at least) has come from the explicitly comedic The Beaverton@TheBeaverton : “NDP leader Jagmeet Singh has terminated his party’s confidence and supply agreement with the Liberals, boldy staking a claim to independence a few days after Pierre Poilievre told him to.”