A new poll finds that the NDP surge wasn’t a fluke, but instead is here to stay, however, that didn’t stop 16 seats from going blue as a result. These vote splits mainly occurred in Ontario at the expense of the Liberals. Meanwhile, there is speculation as to whether the NDP’s Quebec counterpart the Quebec Solidaire would ride the same wave. A recent poll also suggests that if Quebec voted today, the separatist Parti Quebecois would form a majority government.

While Manitoba controls its flood and got two Prime Ministerial visits and plenty of support, Quebecers are left to deal a retreat of Canadian Armed Forces, all the while, Harper visits the rest of the brigade in Afghanistan. NDP leader Jack Layton took the opportunity to tour the region and called Harper’s actions ‘an insult.’ He is the first national leader to tour the region and many of his newest seats are in the area.

Conservative-minded people are supposed to take a minimalist mind to government. Reduce state intervention, reduce state size, reduce state spending. Today, Stephen Harper unveiled the biggest cabinet ever and appointed 3 unelected ministers to the senate. During his term in office, spending  increased and Harper plans to spend more on prisons, corporate tax cuts and F-35 fighter jets.

The Results are in, the Conservatives won a majority government which secures them for 4 years of uninterrupted power. They and the NDP were the big winners while the Liberals were wiped out and the Bloc Quebecois decimated.

Jack Layton is travelling coast to coast to coast attacking his opposition concerning healthcare and a wide variety of issues, but it turns out that Layton isn’t so clean when it comes to honesty and healthcare himself. While he claims that he stands by Tommy Douglas and the public healthcare system, he slapped it in the face in the 1990s. 

The Conservatives only had one defense when it came to the Motion of Contempt that kicked them out of power. It was that it was a solely opposition-based ordeal. Now that the Auditor General comes out with a report on the G8 and G20 summits echoing the opposition’s call of ‘lack of transparency,’ Harper will have quite a bit to worry about. From the campaign of accountability came the ‘In and Out’ scandal, staffers who are being investigated for fraud, G8 funding for borders which landed 300km away from any type of border and was used as bribe money for a riding.