Liberals leaning on weak competition, aiming for majority in snap election request

With rumours of a federal election taking place next month, many Canadians are asking one simple question.

Why?

A recent survey from Nanos Research, commissioned by CTV News, showed only 26 per cent of Canadians were in favour of heading to the polls this fall.

Jim Farney, the director of the Johnson Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy at the University of Regina, suggests it’s no wonder the Liberal government would want to ask the Governor General to dissolve Parliament and set the stage for an election on Sept. 20.

“There’s a fairly narrow window,” Farney said. “As we saw provincially last year in COVID times, you get into the end of October and things start to get pretty unpredictable public health-wise.

“If they were going to go this year, they have to go more or less now.”

The Nanos survey revealed 37 per cent of Canadians were upset at the thought of a fall election, 34 per cent were unsure, and 26 per cent were happy at the thought of an election.

Farney said the obvious attraction for the Liberals is the opportunity for a majority government, with polling data showing the party remains relatively popular in key areas like Quebec.

The other angle Farney suspects was tossed around in the Liberal war room is the state of the competition.

“The opposition parties are not in great shape,” Farney said. “(There’s) favourable weather there just in partisanship terms.”

According to Farney, new Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole has failed to galvanize his party and win over the public. The Green Party was expected to make a huge leap forward in the next election, but that was before a New Brunswick MP crossed the floor to the Liberals in June, followed by an internal upheaval trying to remove Annamie Paul as party leader.

“They’ve completely imploded now, (which is) probably good for the Liberals,” Farney said.

Another concern for the Conservatives is the rise of the Maverick Party and the People’s Party of Canada.

“There’s kind of fractures in the Conservative coalition. I don’t think they’re that serious but they’re there,” Farney said.

While the NDP and leader Jagmeet Singh are polling well among Canadians, Farney assumes Liberal strategists “know when it comes to the ballot box, there’s a sizable number of NDP sympathizers who will end up voting (Liberal) just to make sure they get 50 per cent of the policies they want.”

“I don’t think you can look forward anytime soon and see anything better on the horizon. If this is as good as you’re going to get, you might as well grab it,” Farney said.

Outside of political aspirations, Farney suggested the idea of holding another election two years into the federal government’s current term isn’t far-fetched considering how COVID-19 has drastically changed the country.

“There’s still a sense of a different direction for this government. What they’d run on two years ago kind of no longer makes sense,” Farney said. “So it makes sense for them to go to the country (and) put forward a new plan for the next four years considering our radically different circumstances.”

One interesting facet of this election Farney is eager to see is how COVID-19 will affect a typical federal election campaign, especially for the usually charismatic Justin Trudeau.

“One of Trudeau’s political gifts is his tremendous ability to energize large crowds,” Farney said. “We’ll see what a federal campaign under COVID conditions looks like.”