09-01-2009, 12:07 PM
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#23 (permalink)
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warrior bodhisattva
Super Moderator
Location: East-central Canada
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No more Liberal support for Tories
Oh, hey! Another fall election?
Quote:
No more Liberal support for Tories, Ignatieff pledges
Juliet O’Neill, Canwest News Service
Andy Clark/Reuters
SUDBURY, Ont. -- Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff announced on Tuesday he will no longer support the Conservative government, which means the country could be headed to a national election early in the fall.
Mr. Ignatieff made the announcement that he won't vote to prop up the government on the second day of a three-day caucus meeting in this northern Ontario city.
"We can do better," said Mr. Ignatieff, in an address to his national caucus at a retreat to prepare Liberals before the Sept. 14 resumption of Parliament.
"We can be the smartest, healthiest, greenest, hardest-working, most open-minded country there is - but only if we choose to be."
Prime Minister Stephen Harper, responding to the announcement in Calgary, said he believes the vast majority of Canadians don't want to deal with more "political instability."
"I haven't met a single Canadian that wants to see an election right now," he said. "I think Canadians have been pretty clear. They want Parliament to focus on the economy. That is what the government will be doing in the fall session."
But Mr. Ignatieff attacked Mr. Harper's economic record, saying Canada has experienced the worst unemployment and the worst deficit.
"Stephen Harper doesn't get it," said Mr. Ignatieff. "He doesn't get that Canada's in a race - that we've got to position our country to compete in the 21st century. We've got to make Canada a world leader again, and we've got to do it now."
Mr. Ignatieff also said Mr. Harper has refused to protect Canadians abroad and pledged to bring in a law "to make sure these abuses never happen again," he said, referring to the government's initial reluctance to help Suaad Hagi Mohamud and Abousfian Abdelrazik, two Canadians who were stranded in African countries.
"The government must stand up for Canadians. That is the heart of what every Liberal believes," he said. "A Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian."
On Monday, Liberal caucus chairman Anthony Rota had said there was "no real unanimous mood" on pulling the plug on Mr. Harper's minority Conservative government.
Transport Minister John Baird said the Liberals would be holding up federal infrastructure funds vital to the economic recovery if they plunge the country into a trip to the polls. However, Mr. Ignatieff dismissed Mr. Baird's assertion on Monday as "nonsense."
Senior Liberals said before the meeting that employment insurance would not be a sole trigger for an election.
Mr. Ignatieff said bipartisan meetings aimed at dealing with the Liberals' call for a national employment insurance standard over the summer were "a bit of a charade" on the government's part.
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No more Liberal support for Tories, Ignatieff pledges
__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön
Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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