Federal leaders talk economy on campaign trail as markets teeter

Harper was the only major party leader campaigning on Sunday.

If elected, Trudeau said, his government would also spend $100 million per year to expand support for families of veterans and has agreed to implement all the auditor general’s recommendations for delivery of mental health care to former members of the military.

Stephen Harper is in Drummondville, Que. where he is repeating his message that his government is the best bet in uncertain economic times.

But once again, Harper faced questions about who in his office was in on the scheme to have his former chief of staff Nigel Wright cut a cheque for $90,000 to pay off Senator Mike Duffy’s disallowed expenses.

Harper, meanwhile, accuses his political opponents of offering proposals that would damage the economy.

The NDP was seen as the party that most represents change, and 56 per cent of those polled said they were expecting the elections to result in a minority government. “They would finance that through deficits and through big tax increases, including tax increases on workers and on job-creating businesses”.

Scandal-plagued Conservatives under the shaky leadership of Stephen Harper have now drifted to third place behind NDP and Liberals, says new poll.

NDP leader Tom Mulcair, whose party continues to make a strong showing in the polls, discovered just how hard it is to “herd cats” when one of his star candidates, Linda McQuaig, a prominent author and indentified by Mulcair as a certain cabinet appointee if he wins, turned a brush fire into a full-scale blaze during a Canadian Broadcasting Corp. panel discussion. Mulcair and the NDP are now leading the polls. The New Democrat leader touted economic promises aimed at seniors and families with young children in need of daycare, while pledging to be a champion of Canada’s struggling manufacturing sector. “It’s my position and it’s something that we can do immediately”.

The emphasis on “the team” is something the Liberals are hoping to play up in the face of unrelenting Conservative attack ads that paint Justin Trudeau as “not ready” and unable to handle serious issues such as global economic uncertainty and the market meltdown over the last few days.

He was referring to the recession of 2008 and the fact that economists have suggested the economy likely contracted in the second quarter of the current fiscal year after also pulling back in the first quarter – a technical recession.

But Mulcair earlier this month said he would impose “a slight and graduated increase” that would still be “far below the average that the Conservatives had for the 10 years that they’ve been in power”.