Canada votes, likely to re-elect Conservatives

Canadians voted yesterday in an election that polls showed was likely to produce the third minority government in four years and give Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper a renewed mandate.

In the lead-up to the vote, the focus of a 37-day campaign narrowed down to who would be the best manager in increasingly troubled economic times. Polls showed enough voters sticking with Mr Harper, though his support came off the highs it reached a few weeks ago.

The last poll of the campaign, by Ekos, projected that the Conservatives would increase their seat count in Parliament at the expense of the main opposition Liberal Party, but would still be almost 20 seats short of the 155 needed for a majority.

Mr Harper had offered only modest tax breaks and spending initiatives, arguing that a steady hand would get Canada through the turbulence that has hit world markets.

Liberal leader Stephane Dion, a bookish francophone who hesitates in English, found it difficult at a time of relatively high energy prices to sell his plan for a new carbon tax to fight climate change, accompanied by income tax cuts and subsidies for the poor.

He started to cut into Mr Harper’s lead as he charged the Prime Minister, a former economist who is also a fairly wooden politician, was not doing enough to prevent financial contagion from spreading into Canada.

But the Conservative lead over the Liberals widened again in parallel with specific action taken to improve Canadian bank liquidity, and analysts said the market rebound this week will make voters more optimistic.