OTTAWA — As former prime minister Joe Clark learned the hard way in 1979, confidence votes can sneak up on you.
Clark’s government fell that year in a surprise confidence vote that he lost by just six votes. Three Conservatives were out of the country at the time, and the Social Credit party, which was never elected federally again, abstained.
Confidence votes include budget matters and direct motions like the one Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre plans to introduce next week, simply stating the House has no confidence in the government.
Both Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh have said they won’t vote to bring down the government this week, killing some of the suspense.
Peter van Loan, the Conservatives’ House leader during the first Harper minority government, said the Liberals can use prorogation or other tools to cling to power, but fundamentally they are in a good place because the Bloc, the NDP or, however unlikely, the Conservatives, have the numbers to keep them alive.
“There’s all kinds of tactics available for them to hang on a little bit longer, if that’s what they want to do. But fundamentally, the dynamic is this: they only need one of the other three parties to support them,” he said.
Van Loan said when he was House leader the Conservatives desperately wanted an election, so they didn’t really negotiate hard to avoid one. He said the Liberals aren’t in the same spot and that will make everything difficult.
“Our approach was to manage from a position of strength and basically depend on being in a strong enough position that should the other parties force an election, they would pay a price at the ballot box.”
Blanchet described the situation the House of Commons finds itself in as a sort of confidence vote chicken, and it is likely to become a regular feature of this Parliament.
Here is a breakdown of all the vote combinations that could sustain or end the Trudeau Liberals’ time in power.
There are 338 seats in the House of Commons; two are vacant. That means the magic number for legislation to pass is 169 votes. That includes Speaker Greg Fergus, who only votes in a tie, and usually votes to continue debate. MPs can still vote electronically, but they must be in the country to do so. With the potential an MP could be sick, stuck on a plane, or out of cellphone range, the Liberals will probably want at least 172 votes in their column to feel safe.
There are also two byelections that could be called at any time: one in the B.C. riding of Cloverdale—Langley City and another in Halifax. Both could be difficult for the Liberals to hold onto, potentially further disrupting the balance.
Liberals versus all the opposition parties
If the Liberals are to fall anytime in this session this is the scenario that is most likely to make it happen.
The Liberals have 153 seats. The Conservatives have 119, the Bloc 33, the NDP 25, the Greens have two seats and there are four independents.
The three main opposition parties combined add up to 177 seats, easily enough to clear the 169-vote threshold and bring down the government. Even if the Liberals were to attract the support of the Greens and all four independent MPs, they would still not have enough votes to avoid losing a confidence vote.
Liberals with the help of one opposition party
The Liberals would have much preferred a majority in 2021, but as minority parliaments go, the current one gives them plenty of options for dodging a date with the electorate. While both the NDP and the Bloc said they are voting to sustain the government next week, the Liberals only needs one of them.
If the confidence and supply deal with the NDP were still in place, the two parties would have a combined 178 votes. Even allowing for MPs who might be ill or out of the country, that would be enough MPs to keep the government afloat.
The same could be said for the Liberals working with the Bloc; the separatist party’s 33 seats added with the Liberals, is an even more comfortable margin of victory. The Conservatives could also theoretically vote to keep the Liberal government alive, but given Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre’s comments, a snowball’s chance in hell seems an apt metaphor for the likelihood of that.
The NDP abstains
Yay or Nay are not the only choices for MPs voting in the House, MPs are also free to abstain or simply skip votes.
If the NDP were to decide to skip a vote, the number of votes cast in the House of Commons would drop to 311 — 153 Liberals, 119 Conservatives, 33 Bloc, two Greens and four independent MPs.
In that case the magic number of votes becomes 156, three more than the Liberals have on their own. Three of the current independent MPs are former Liberals. They include Han Dong who left caucus over foreign interference concerns and Pablo Rodriguez, who just began sitting as an independent as he launched a Quebec Liberal leadership bid. Those two can reliably be expected to vote with the government, but Toronto MP Kevin Vuong, who was booted from the party during the last election, has voted with the Conservatives many times.
The fourth independent MP, Alain Rayes, was elected as a Conservative, but left the party after Poilievre became leader. He does usually vote with the Conservatives on most measures.
If the Liberals got the support of two of the independents and both Greens they could narrowly survive a confidence vote, even if the Bloc and the Conservatives voted to bring them down.
The Bloc abstains
Much like if the NDP sits out a vote, Bloc MPs have the option to sit on their hands during a vote as well, but it’s easier for them to survive.
With the Bloc on the sidelines, the number of total votes in Parliament would come down to 303 votes, meaning the Liberals would need just 152 votes.
In that case, the combined forces of the NDP, Conservatives, Greens and all of the independent MPs would not be enough to bring down the government, unless the Liberals were missing an MP in their ranks.
National Post
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