Unthinkable but true

Well, the unthinkable has occurred. Lucienne Robillard has announced that she will resign her Montreal seat on January 25, two years and two days since she won the 2006 election. She has given no reason for her abrupt decision to resign. Months ago she had already announced that she would not run again. That is why they nominated Marc Garneau in her riding. I do not know whether Robillard thought that there would not be a spring election so she had to resign now. The media treats a spring election as a near certainty. I am inclined to agree with the media on this one even though I do not like it. I am a Liberal, but not all Liberals seem to have realized that an election a few months from now is likely counterproductive for the Liberals. I do not see ourselves in any more of a position to win then than we are now. Liberals were recently talking boldly about defeating the government on their own non-confidence motion initiative in the new year. However, even if they were given the opportunity to do this, my guess is the non-confidence motion would not pass. My guess is the Bloc would vote against it so that they could pass judgment on the 2008 budget before making a decision on whether to the defeat the government. But it is the 2008 budget that makes me think a spring election likely. I see it as very difficult for this parliament to survive the 2008 budget. The Liberals do not want to keep abstaining and the Bloc already yanked their support of the government this autumn. I see it as unlikely that the Bloc would go back to supporting the government because this fall Duceppe seemed quite enthusiastic about an election despite the fact that it would cause the Bloc to lose seats. The only way an election can be avoided is if the Liberals are around 10 points or even more behind in the polls. In that case, we might see the Liberals abstaining or registering only token votes against the budget. This makes a Westmount—Ville-Marie by-election unlikely. Westmount—Ville-Marie is a target riding for the NDP, especially in a by-election. This is due to the 15% the NDP received there in the last election. However, Westmount—Ville-Marie was always a stronger Liberal riding than Outremont as far back as the Chrétien glory days. The Liberals got 45% there in the last election, compared with 35% in Outremont.