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Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government was elected just a few seats shy of a majority, meaning the Liberals will need the co-operation of one of the opposition parties to pass their budget.
The budget is considered a confidence vote, meaning the government will fall if it fails to pass and Canada would be heading for a second election this year.
While the Liberals gained an extra vote on the same day the budget dropped, — via former Conservative MP Chris d’Entremont crossing the floor — the Liberals are still a couple votes short of a majority in the House.
Conservative MP Matt Jeneroux also announced Thursday he will resign as an MP — but it’s unclear when his resignation will take effect.
The government survived one confidence vote on Thursday evening — a Conservative amendment that called on the House to reject the budget. A similar vote on a Bloc amendment is taking place Friday.
The budget itself will be put to a vote sometime after Remembrance Day.
Here’s how the votes need to land for Carney’s budget to pass — and avoid sending Canadians back to the polls.
If Bloc backs Liberals
With 22 seats, the Bloc Québécois has more than enough seats to get the Liberal budget over the finish line.
The Liberals currently have 170 seats, but that includes the Speaker who would only vote to break a tie. Therefore the Liberals have 169 votes from their own ranks.
Combined, the Liberals and Bloc have 191 seats, which would outvote the Conservatives, NDP and Greens.
But the Liberals will likely need to make changes if they want to get the Bloc onside.
Leader Yves-François Blanchet moved an amendment that the House “reject” the budget because it failed to meet the Bloc’s demands. Blanchet also said on budget day that he could “hardly see” how his party could back the budget.
But the government can still make changes to the budget before further votes come — and it already includes a nugget that one Bloc MP might find hard to reject.
The budget includes support for the Exploramer Shark Pavilion in Sainte-Anne-des-Monts, Que., and the Chantier Naval Forillon shipyard in Gaspé — both of which are in Alexis Deschênes’s riding, potentially offering incentive for the new MP to allow the budget to move through the House.
If NDP votes for budget
Despite having lost recognized party status in the House, the NDP still has some leverage with just seven seats.
If New Democrats vote in favour of the budget, those two parties could outvote the others 176 to 166.
NDP interim Leader Don Davies said Wednesday that his party has “serious concerns” and “questions” about the budget but indicated the party is still weighing its options.
“The budget’s low on a lot of details and so we’re going to be consulting stakeholders and seeking answers to some of those questions as we deliberate,” he told reporters on Parliament Hill.
The budget also includes a number of items which target a handful of NDP ridings — including Davies’s — which could be enough to sway at least some New Democrats.
If Greens back budget
Leader Elizabeth May is the Green Party’s only vote in the House.
May said Tuesday that she couldn’t support Carney’s budget unless there are improvements to the climate policies outlined in the document.
“I’m asking the prime minister to think about the fact that he’s not the CEO of a company called Canada,” May told reporters. “He’s the prime minister of this country, with a minority government.”
But even if the Liberals can get May on board, her lone vote won’t be enough to make a difference without another opposition MP.
The Conservatives, Bloc and NDP’s 172 seats would be enough to outvote the 169 Liberal MPs and May — meaning the budget and government would be defeated and an election would be imminent.
If opposition parties all vote against
This scenario is simple. The Liberals don’t have enough seats on their own to pass the budget.
If the Liberals fail to convince any opposition MPs, the budget will be voted down, the government will be deemed to have lost the confidence of the House and Canadians will be heading for the polls.
If NDP or Bloc members abstain
MPs aren’t required to vote on every item before the House, and can opt to abstain.
As has happened several times, parties sometimes abstain from a confidence vote if they don’t want to support the government but also don’t want to force an election.
If Deschênes or a few NDP MPs want the budget to pass to ensure their ridings get the support the budget is offering — but don’t want to break party ranks and support the Liberals — they could simply not show up to vote.
On the other hand, either party could abstain as a whole to prevent another election.
If the Bloc caucus opts out of a vote, the Liberals would still have enough seats to outvote the remaining opposition parties — 169 to 151.
If the NDP caucus abstains as a whole, the Liberals would win the vote 169 to 166.
Other scenarios
All the above scenarios assume that votes are whipped, meaning MPs are rallied by their party’s leadership to vote as a block.
But in some circumstances parties allow for a “free vote,” when MPs are allowed to vote their conscience. In such cases, whether that bill or motion passes will depend on individual MPs.
An opposition party could also play a bit of a numbers game if they want to have their dissent recorded. Rather than have the entire caucus abstain, a party could theoretically have MPs show up to vote against the government, but have enough of their MPs sit it out so as not to trigger an election.
