Harper campaign makes last visit to Toronto

Trudeau pitched the message as a matter of bringing the country together.

“Well, the last thing we want to do is to be cocky, but in short things are going very well”. “And the Liberal campaign, when you cut away all the fancy rhetoric, that’s all it is really about”.

Considering the possibility Canadians will elect a minority government on Monday, CTV’s Question Period asked NDP, Liberal and Conservative veterans to comment on what will happen to their parties and leaders if that’s how the votes add up.

Harper has boiled down his campaign message to a simple theme – the Conservatives will give more Canadians more money, the Liberals will take it away, a point illustrated each day by someone called up onto Harper’s stage and tossing money on the table in tune with a cash register’s bell.

It’s the final day of the federal election campaign and the major party leaders are hitting the major battlegrounds.

He leaves the province Saturday and begins heading west, stopping for an event in Laval, Que., before moving on to Ontario for two rallies in the Toronto-area, one of which is expected to be attended by former Toronto Mayor Rob Ford and his brother Doug, the controversial local politicians who’ve pledged to put the backing of their thousands of supporters behind the Conservatives.

A picture of the Ford family, along with Harper, was plastered on the front page of the Toronto Star on Sunday. “More so than the Liberal Party, in particular”, he said, noting the party’s strong base in Quebec, and several close races in Toronto.

When The Globe and Mail, Canada’s largest daily newspaper, asked him and the other three main opposition party leaders what personal leadership style made them best suited to be prime minister, Harper’s reply focused on his stewardship of the Canadian economy that has become his top priority in this longest-ever election campaign in the country’s modern history.

“Elections in a few ridings will be decided by not who votes, but who decides not to vote”, he said. “They are exhausted of swapping Conservative scandals for Liberal scandals at every election”.

“We can’t afford for you to stay home because staying at home is a vote for tax hikes for years to come to pay off those massive deficits”, he warned.

Bhatia said in the last eight years he has seen his business grow from 40 employees to 156 employees, and many of them have gone from renting apartments to owning their own homes.

He said the victor – him, of course – would have an obligation to do so “very rapidly”.

The electoral landscape he’ll be travelling is challenging for his party with polls suggesting a surge in Liberal support; on his tour Harper has two goals – make sure his own supporters show up to vote and swing the undecideds his way.