Looks like Canada’s Governor General – that is, Queen Elizabeth’s representative – will have some real work to do, for once. Two of Canada’s left-leaning political parties – the NDP and Liberal Party – have come to a formal power-sharing agreement that will permit them to unseat the existing Conservative government.  They’ll do this with the help of Bloc Québécois (more of a self-leaning political party).  In order to do so, they’ll first have to win a confidence vote in Parliament, and presuming that happens, they’ll then go to the Governor General to seek her approval (on behalf of the Queen, of course) for formation of a new government. The Governor General’s approval is, in practice, a mere formality. But with the Conservative Party making noises about dissolving Parliament prior to the confidence vote, anything is possible, I suppose.
Excitement to the North! Who knew?
Related: Here’s a very good background article on the mechanics – and possible problems – involved. Note that it was written before the NDP and Liberals inked the deal.
sasha
It is exciting! The drama of parliamentary gamesmanship.
The Bloc is a fairly left leaning party and apart from the separatism issue, reasonably well aligned with the NDP and more progressive parts of the Liberal party.
I think it’s is more likely that Harper will suffer a defeat of a motion of confidence than the opposition will pass of a motion of no confidence, given that opposition days have been canceled. Amounts to the same in the end, but the gamesmanship is different in each case.
I don’t like Harper, and some of his recent moves have been astounding and egregious. He’s sleazy and a wingnut. That said, I think his fiscal policy is, on balance, reasonable. We don’t have a really coherent fiscal platform from the Lib/NDP coalition.
Nonetheless – exciting!
MB
The Bloc will be the end of the coalition, I bet. They’re only committed until summer 2010 (while NDP and Liberals are tied together through another year after that). The Bloc will try to extract concessions in return for support, and then walk away when NDP/Liberals won’t deliver.
So I suppose it’s up to the Libs to give conservatives a reason to switch votes between now and then . . .
sasha
Yes, the Bloq will probably be the end of the coalition. But in the meantime, I’m perfectly happy with them holding the balance of power. They may keep the Libs from doing anything too stupid.
I would vote Bloq if they were a national party.