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PP RUEHGA RUEHHA RUEHMT RUEHQU RUEHVC
DE RUEHOT #1006/01 2111219
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 291219Z JUL 08
FM AMEMBASSY OTTAWA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 8257
INFO RUCNCAN/ALL CANADIAN POSTS COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 OTTAWA 001006 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV CA
SUBJECT: NEW BY-ELECTIONS A TEST FOR FALL ELECTIONS 
 
REF:  A.  OTTAWA 394 
-     B.  OTTAWA 632 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary:  Three federal by-elections for members of 
Parliament will take place on September 8 to fill two formerly 
Liberal seats and one Bloc Quebecois seat.  As in the March 17 
by-elections (ref a), the Liberals would need to win big to boost 
their confidence about bringing down the government once the House 
of Commons resumes on September 15, thereby forcing a possible fall 
election.  So far, however, the Liberals and the Conservatives 
remain virtually tied statistically at between 30 and 32 percent in 
national polls; there are still few visible incentives for a fall 
election for either party.  End summary. 
 
Back to the campaign trails 
--------------------------- 
 
 
¶2. (SBU) On July 25, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced three 
by-elections to take place concurrently on September 8 in the 
federal ridings (districts) of Guelph (Ontario) and of 
Westmount-Ville Marie and of Saint-Lambert (both in Montreal, 
Quebec).  The Liberals hope to retain their holds on Guelph and 
Westmount Ville-Marie, while the Bloc Quebecois remains the 
front-runner to hold onto its seat in Saint-Lambert.  The 
Conservatives and New Democratic Party (NDP) are actively fielding 
candidates in all three races, with the Conservatives' best -- if 
still slim -- hope in Guelph, in part due to an active Green Party 
campaign that could siphon off Liberal voters. 
 
¶3. (SBU) The Liberals have held the Westmount Ville-Marie seat for 
about five decades, and plan to field a "star" candidate, former 
astronaut Marc Garneau.  The NDP is looking to the riding to repeat 
its 2007 upset by-election victory in a similar Montreal-area 
Liberal fortress, in the riding of Outremont.  Some Liberals have 
privately expressed concern that the campaign team responsible for 
the Outremont loss will also handle the Westmount Liberal campaign. 
 
 
¶4. (SBU) The Bloc Quebecois wrested the Montreal riding of 
Saint-Lambert from the Liberals in 2004, largely due to anger over 
the sponsorship scandal and the personal popularity of the outgoing 
Bloc incumbent, former Cameroonian-Canadian film star Maka Kotto. 
The Bloc hopes to retain the riding even without Kotto as a 
candidate, but Conservative strategists have contended that the 
riding is essentially federalist and that voters may be ready to 
turn to the Conservatives over the Liberals.   PM Harper took the 
trouble of celebrating St-Jean Baptiste Day (Quebec's "national" 
day) in Saint-Lambert in June, long before the announcement about 
the by-election. 
 
Will they or won't they? 
------------------------ 
 
¶5.  (SBU)  The Liberals have been sending out mixed signals in 
recent days about their interest in a fall election once the Commons 
returns to session on September 15.  (Government leader in the 
Commons Peter Van Loan on July 27 ruled out either proroguing the 
Commons again this year or delaying the opening of the fall session 
until later in the year.)  Liberal leader Dion had indicated 
publicly that voters he had met during his road show to sell the 
Liberals' "Green Shift" (aka "carbon tax," as the Conservatives 
prefer to label it) were increasingly in favor of an election.  He 
even suggested an election could come "maybe in the fall, maybe in 
the winter," but definitely "between now and October 2009."  Other 
prominent Liberals have even more recently emphasized, however, that 
Dion was not specifically calling for a fall election. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) The by-elections will set the scene, and likely the tone, 
for the return of Parliament.  A strong performance by the Liberals 
could provide a springboard to a fall election, while a lackluster 
Qcould provide a springboard to a fall election, while a lackluster 
showing -- or even losses -- would rekindle attention on Dion's 
leadership woes.  The by-elections will test Dion's ability to sell 
Green Shift policy to voters as well as his judgment in making this 
the centerpiece of the Liberal election platform.  Moreover, after 
suffering embarrassing setbacks in two previous sets of 
by-elections, the Liberals need to show they have turned the corner, 
found their issue, and are back in play.  The Conservatives have 
little to lose on September 8, but could conceivably score a major 
strategic upset victory in Guelph.  Both parties will be holding 
summer caucus meetings soon to finalize their plans for the fall 
session, with the Conservatives continuing to argue publicly that 
they still have "an important agenda" to complete, that they remain 
focused on governing, and that "leadership" will be the key theme in 
any eventual federal election (ref b).  The Conservatives have been 
election-ready for the past year, but with the polls stuck in 
neutral with around 30 pct support for each, neither major party yet 
has genuine incentives to go to the polls early.  In a perhaps 
 
OTTAWA 00001006  002 OF 002 
 
 
telling indication of the Liberals' real feelings about a possible 
fall election, the Liberal national party director recently accepted 
without hesitation the Ambassador's invitation to join an 
International Visitor program to witness the U.S. elections in late 
October and early November. 
WILKINS