Canada PM admits things aren’t great in debate

Trudeau took up all the shrillness and anger in the room.

In Montreal on Friday, Trudeau was asked why he didn’t immediately call Harper out for the “old stock” quip.

The three main party leaders attempted to build momentum for their visions to boost Canada’s ailing economy amid growing concern that party promises are based on budget numbers that are outdated and overly optimistic.

In a paper for the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, economist Jack Mintz argues that about 60 per cent of the value of the small-business deduction goes to households earning more than $200,000 a year. Green Leader Elizabeth May was not invited.

Also today, the Conservatives promised to seek a stay of a Federal Court of Appeal decision to allow a Muslim woman to wear a niqab while swearing the oath of citizenship – a decision Harper is defending.

“Forty thousand Canadian jobs would be exported to the United States with Keystone XL”. They do not inherently or expressly reflect the views, opinions and/or positions of iPolitics.

Overall, the nightmare of the two opposition leaders attacking each other while letting Harper off the hook came at least partly true. Although he was passionate, he stumbled over his words and did not inspire confidence.

“If you think this economy is doing great, Mr. Harper is your guy”, said Trudeau. It is an interesting historic factoid, but does it really matter to voters?

Mr Harper had a reply at the ready, however, citing his stewardship of the Canadian economy during a time of global turmoil.

Very few NDP supporters watched the debate, says Aufricht.

“That’s a campaign commitment a new government will implement”, said Alexander. The only time you’ve said that deficits are not going to be run is in election years.

On that occasion, Harper was forced to push back and say he did not agree with Walmsley’s premise. How much bigger will the deficits get?

Mulcair paid obeisance to the notion of a knowledge economy, but then told an obviously rehearsed anecdote about a family he had met on his kitchen table tour. We should not be surprised if Canada’s self-styled national newspaper repeats its endorsement this time. The NDP will “enforce overarching sustainable development legislation”, he said. Canada has the third largest oil reserves in the world. “We don’t measure our level of optimism through our level of spending”.

He defended the plan, saying Canada has experienced low growth for almost a decade under Mr. Harper.

“I have said we will bring in more”. That catastrophe, and not anything the federal government did, is the only reason there were any emission reductions in Canada.

Remember that the Liberal Party leader started out this endless election campaign threatening to become the Michael Ignatieff of 2015. A foreign policy debate is scheduled to take place in Toronto on September 28th between Harper, Mulcair and Trudeau.

Harper dismissed the views of his once valued colleague with an insulting comment about public servants.

The NDP leader added that such a system “can guarantee a reduction”.

“Mr. Harper unfortunately, and it is undignified, is fear mongering”.

He came across as honest and it was one of the calmest moments of the night for Trudeau.

In explaining this policy, Mulcair emphasized that it only covered federally regulated sectors, such as banking and transport.

Mulcair also ripped into Harper over Keystone XL, the controversial pipeline project to ship Alberta oilsands bitumen to the U.S. Gulf Coast, arguing he wants to keep jobs in Canada instead of sending them south of the border.

Trudeau – who voted in favour of an NDP motion proposing the $15 minimum wage – was particularly rude on this issue.

If Canadians were to choose their prime ministers just on the basis of the quality of a candidate’s speaking voice, NDP leader Tom Mulcair would win by a landslide. “That’s the reality for every party, and obviously you can make your own conclusions on what it means for the different platforms”.