'God no': Liberal MPs say Canadians don't want an election as parties point fingers over budget vote

OTTAWA — Liberal members of Parliament lined up Wednesday to say Canadians are in no mood to go to the polls for a second time this year, as the government warns it lacks the votes needed to pass next week’s federal budget.

The spectre of a possible Christmas-time election has been raised as Government House Leader Steven MacKinnon accuses opposition parties of presenting demands that he says are unserious and signalling that the minority Liberals should not count on their support.

Opposition parties, in turn, have said the Liberals bear the responsibility of negotiating a way to stay afloat and that whatever happens lies at their feet. That leaves Canadians watching a game of parliamentary chicken, with some perhaps wondering if Santa Claus won’t be the only guest visiting their household this December.

“I think we’re tired of elections,” said Marcus Powlowski, Liberal MP for Thunder Bay—Rainy River. “We want a government that actually functions. I think it would be very premature to have an election just because we could have an election.”

Chris Bittle, MP for the Ontario riding of St. Catharines, added, “I can assure you that Canadians don’t want an election right now.”

“If the opposition parties want to force that, they’re going to risk Canadians blaming them for sending us the polls in December.”

Speaking to reporters ahead of the Liberals’ weekly caucus meeting on Wednesday, MacKinnion bluntly accused Opposition Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre of trying to trigger a “Christmas election,” suggesting it could be his way of avoiding scrutiny from some in his own caucus about his leadership.

Poilievre declined to say on Tuesday when asked if the Conservatives wanted to bring down the government by voting against the budget, which would constitute a confidence vote for the minority Liberal government.

With 169 seats in the House of Commons, the Liberals need to find another party, or at least three MPs, to vote with them, or simply not vote against.

Poilievre on Tuesday reiterated the calls he had put in writing to Prime Minister Mark Carney, which he says he also voiced to the prime minister during their most recent meeting, namely that the Liberals ought to deliver what Poilievre calls an “affordable budget.”

He has defined that as a spending plan containing a litany of tax cuts, including to the government’s own industrial carbon pricing system, as well as capping the federal deficit at $42 billion.

The Parliamentary Budget Officer, an independent watchdog of Parliament, has predicted the federal deficit for 2025-2026 could grow to around $70 billion.

On Wednesday, MacKinnon panned Poilievre’s proposition as “essentially stripping all revenues from the federal government.”

Multiple Conservative MPs heading to their own caucus meeting that morning told reporters the question of a possible election is one for the Liberals to answer.

Poilievre was nevertheless set to stage an event in Toronto on Thursday that the Conservatives have billed as the “No More Sacrifices Youth Event,” which refers to a line from a speech Carney delivered to students at the University of Ottawa last week, where he said Canadians should brace for “sacrifices” as he prepares to present his first budget.

This week, the party also sent out a fundraising blast to supporters, saying Canadians could find themselves going to the polls “thanks to these Liberals.”

Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne told reporters on Wednesday that the government believes Canadians understand the “headwinds” it is facing, given the level of uncertainty in the world, but argued they see the country as still having “fiscal capacity.”

“We need to make generational investments,” Champagne said.

He also added the government needs to make “tough choices.”

“People understand that we need to do a number of things, make government more efficient, adopt technology, we need to make sure that we have a sustainable level when it comes to the public service, so all these things will be presented in the budget.”

The Liberals will table their budget on Nov. 4.

Interim federal NDP Leader Don Davies has said the party has no intention of voting for “austerity.”

Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet has presented what his party calls six “non-negotiable” demands, which include higher Old Age Security transfers to seniors aged 65 to 74 and sending those in Quebec around $800 million in what it says is owed in rebates from the cancelled consumer-carbon price, which other Canadians received during the April federal election, but Quebec did not, because it has its own system. 

Corey Hogan, a Calgary Liberal MP, dismissed any talk about a possible election as a “bit of an Ottawa conversation,” referring to the circle of endless chatter from MPs, staffers, lobbyists, and journalists, which consumes the blocks around Parliament Hill, but that Canadians elsewhere pay no mind.

Liberal caucus chair and Ontario MP James Maloney dismissed the ongoing back-and-forth as the normal posturing that happens before a government presents its budget.

“Let’s wait and see what happens. These things have a way of working themselves out.”

Asked whether he wanted an election, Maloney declined to sugarcoat matters.

“God no.”

-With files from Catherine Levesque

National Post

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