Transcript Season 5 Episode 6

THE WEST BLOCK: Election Edition

Episode 6, Season 5

Saturday, October 17, 2015

Host: Tom Clark

Pollsters: Darrell Bricker, Barry Kay

Political Strategists Panel: Mike Robinson, Marit Stiles, Michele Austin

Political Pundits: Libby Davies, Jay Hill, Jim Munson

Unpacking the Politics Panel: Susan Delacourt, Evan Solomon, Mark Kennedy

Global Reporters: Eric Sorensen, Jacques Bourbeau, Vassy Kapelos, Mike Le Couteur

Location: Toronto

This week, on The West Block: federal party leaders’ criss-cross the country to make their final pitch to voters and we have a number of strong voices to help break it all down? What is the state of politics in this country?

Then, the story told by the polls, the rise and fall of the three main parties and how much we can read from the projections as we cast our eye to Monday’s vote.

And, the journalists are back to unpack the politics of this final week of the campaign, and the moments you may not have caught on the longest election campaign since 1872.

Tom Clark: Well, welcome to our final Decision Canada edition of The West Block. I’m Tom Clark. Now, as you can see, I’m not in our regular studio in Ottawa. Instead, we’re coming to you from Toronto where we are in final preparations for a fascinating election night. Eleven weeks, nearly 80 days and it’s all come down to these final few hours. Now, it is all about getting out the vote and making that final pitch to the voters. All three major party leaders are criss-crossing the country to do just that. Here’s just a sample of their closing arguments:

Tom Muclair: Are you ready to bring change to Ottawa? Stephen Harper only managed to replace Liberal scandals and corruption with Conservative scandals and corruption, but what Mr. Trudeau calls ‘real change’ is actually just the same old Liberal Party with the same old insiders pulling the strings and the same old scandals.

Justin Trudeau: This government is out of touch. This government is out of ideas and if we stay focused and work hard, they’ll soon be out of time. It’s time for real change and we have the plan to make that happen now, right here.

Stephen Harper: On Monday, for Canadian families, do not kid yourself, the reason we have this here, is to make it clear there is an awful lot at risk. If we mismanage our economy, friends, we as Conservatives understand no matter what the NDP and the Liberals say, we cannot borrow or tax our way to prosperity.

Tom Clark: Well there you have it, the final closing arguments from three very tired men. Well, until we see the final vote count we won’t know exactly what form our next government will take, but the polls and predictions have given us some interesting trends throughout this campaign. And joining me now to break it all down, Darrell Bricker with Ipsos Public Affairs, the polling firm used by Global News and by Barry Kay with the Laurier Institute, who has been taking all the poll numbers and predicting what that may mean in terms of seat count. Welcome to you both. Barry, I want to start with you and if we could throw up the graphic, your latest seat projection, not your final one, but your latest projection indicates that is going to be a relatively strong Liberal minority government, the NDP in third place. Is this something that has been growing inexorably to these numbers? Is there a possibility, in your mind, that these numbers could change dramatically between now and voting day?

Barry Kay: I wouldn’t think that’s likely, but one should remember that just two or three weeks ago actually, the Conservatives were ahead of the Liberals. There’s been growth for the Liberal Party, especially in the province of Ontario, frankly just in the last few days. And for a while I kept thinking that that might grow even more substantially, but it seems to have rested just as we’ve hit this final weekend. The Liberals have stopped growing in Ontario. I’m not sure if the Gagnier scandal has anything to do with that or not, but at the moment, yes, you’re right, the Liberals are substantially ahead of the Conservatives, but nobody is anywhere in near a position of being in a majority government circumstance.

Tom Clark: I want to go over to Darrell because as we take a look at the polls and the projections, and both of you have got your heads deep into it, there are so many variables in this, and variables that could affect, for example, even a projection in terms of seats. And I’ve gotta believe that one of the variables in all of this, Darrell, has to be you can ask everybody how they’re going to vote, but how many of those people are actually going to vote and how does that skew or possibly skew the results?

Darrell Bricker: Well, one of the things that we know is that there’s at least 40 per cent of the people who we interview for a poll who are lying to you. They say they’re going to vote in terms of the election and they actually don’t show up. Now that’s not really a problem if it’s distributed across all the parties equally. The real problem would be if one party’s voters are more enthusiastic or more interested in voting or have the habit of voting more than other parties. And right now in this election, we’ve got a situation in which we’ve got one group of voters who tend to be more habitual and that’s the Conservative voters, just because of the profile, than the Liberals. But we see a lot of enthusiasm behind the Liberal vote so maybe it’ll change this time with less enthusiasm behind the Conservative vote, so between those two options.

Tom Clark: And you know there was an interesting thing that we saw—I last week was out at University of British Columbia, long lines of students voting. I’m not sure how many of them any pollster gets to reach, but these lines were going for an hour and a half, two hours, kids lining up to vote, some for the very first time. I want to take a look at something that I find quite fascinating. I took a look at your numbers, Darrell, and let’s look at what the most recent ones are and I know you’re in the field right now, and we’re going to get an update from you later, but here’s what you had recently. You had the Liberals at 37. You had the Conservatives at 31 and the NDP at 24. Now, let’s go back six months though, six months, the Liberals and the Conservatives and the NDP virtually tied 30 per cent each, but let’s go back almost exactly a year ago and what do we see? Yes, it looks very familiar: Liberals at 38, Conservatives a 31, NDP a 23, almost exactly the number that we have today. So, in one year from 24 to February or whatever it is—September 2014 to October of 2015, nothing changed.

Darrell Bricker: Yeah, well as Shakespeare would say, a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing. So essentially, we’ve expanded a lot of ammunition and not gained very much ground.

Tom Clark: And it’s fascinating to think, Barry, that yes you talk about the expenditure of money and the campaigns and the passion and the slight movements in the polls here and there, but it looks as if Canadians are exactly where they were a year ago. Now are you seeing that when you take a look at these numbers as well? We get perhaps tied up in the moment of little change on a week here and week there, but over the long term, looks as if Canadians came to this conclusion a long time ago.

Barry Kay: Well, it’s all about timing. Look, a month ago, the Conservatives were ahead. A month before that, back in the summer, the NDP was ahead. Indeed, it’s gone up and down. Prior to the Alberta election, the NDP was nowhere or they were mired in third and now they seem to be back close to where they were. You’re right, but the timing that we looked at these particular events I think says it all with regard to how changes happen. A great deal has happened in that year, even though we’re very much where we were a year ago.

Tom Clark: Let me ask both of you this and we’re trying to sort of divine what’s going to happen on Monday, but not necessarily the result. What I’m interested in, in terms of what you’re seeing, the attitudes that you’ve polled and so on, are we finally getting to an election that may be decided in British Columbia? Are we going to have to remain late, or is this all going to be decided in Ontario and Quebec?

Darrell Bricker: Oh in my view, I think we’re going to have a fairly late night. I mean we’re going to be obviously seeing some trends that work their way through the province of Ontario, but depending on what happens particularly where we’re sitting today, within a few miles of where we are, a few kilometres of where we are this election could go one way or the other. If the Conservatives are able to get at least half the seats in the 905 which is the donut of seats around the City of Toronto, it’s going to be a long night.

Tom Clark: And it’s all about the splits, right? I mean because Barry, you’ve taken a look at riding by riding and some of them are so close, you give the edge perhaps to one party or the other, but if the splits go one way, the results going to be dramatically different.

Barry Kay: Yeah, the GTA though, the area around Toronto is probably the Liberal’s strongest area in the whole country and I would imagine that in this particular area, between Oshawa and Oakville, the Liberals are going to mop up most of that. British Columbia, interestingly, is fascinating. And remember also, unlike the old days, British Columbia’s polls close only a half an hour after everyone else. I expect lots of close seats, especially in the suburban ring just on the east side of Vancouver.

Tom Clark: I thought it was fascinating in your latest projection, it’s basically 13, 14 and 14 and the number of seats for the three major parties—

Barry Kay: In BC, yeah.

Tom Clark: I’ve never seen that one before. It is going to be a fascinating night and it’s delightful that both of you are going to be here with us on Monday night. Darrell Bricker and Barry Kay thanks very much for being here. Thank you for your time.

Well, as you get set to cast your ballot, we’ve got a lot more great analysis for you coming up. We start with an eye on strategy in the final days. The four brothers, the campaign co-chair steps down and try to keep expectations in check. Stay with us.

Tom Clark: Well, almost all the polls are done. There’s a few more to go, but they’re all agreeing with each other. The seat projections, not surprisingly, are pretty similar as they all use exactly the same polls. So, is this a done deal? Joining me, three people who know the party machines from the inside out: Liberal, Mike Robinson; New Democrat, Marit Stiles; and joining us from Ottawa, Conservative, Michele Austin. Welcome to you all.

So, let me start here in Toronto, Marit, so is this a done deal? Is the election effectively over at this point?

Tom Clark: So you think that you could turn around what about 83 seats into a minority government in the next two days?

Marit Stiles: I think a lot of the projections don’t show what’s really happening on the ground and I think that what we’ve been seeing, for example, even especially over the last few days, is that whereas the polls might show some decline or we’ve just sort of stopped there, what we’re saying is that our volunteers, our voters, are very, very motivated. So they’re coming into the campaigns, they’re asking for signs at the last minute that they weren’t going to ask for before. Now they really want them because they’re like, we’re fighting for this.

Tom Clark: Michele, let me throw this to you because you’re somewhat in the same position if you take a look at those seat projections. It’s not good news for Stephen Harper and the Conservatives. Is there anything he can do other than partying with Rob Ford to turn this around in the next couple of days?

Michele Austin: Well listen, this isn’t over and this is actually quite exciting as an observer putting aside partisan politics. The Conservatives need to get out there vote and they’re very, very good at doing it. So they have about 24 to 48 hours to get everybody motivated out to vote and I’m telling you, nobody knows how this is going to end up. The Conservatives could still pull this out.

Tom Clark: Well, Mike, everybody is saying that the polls are meaningless at this point. So you’re riding number one in the polls, are they meaningless?

Mike Robinson: Well, I don’t think they’re meaningless, but I mean, I think that Michele and Merit are right. I mean, it’s not over and the Liberal Party’s going to work very hard over the next 48 hours to make sure that what you were reporting in terms of the polls turns out to be reality come Monday night. But in my experience, when there is a trend that occurs in a campaign, in the last 48 hours if it goes anywhere, it tends to accelerate the trend that it’s already there rather than go back to swing hard back to another formation, so I think it’s very encouraging to the Liberals coming into this very important working and the ground game is very important and the Liberal Party has probably knocked on, I think the figure that’s using is 10 million doors with 80,000 volunteers and so they’re ready with their ground game which I think will be every good as good as the Conservatives and the NDP.

Tom Clark: Can I just do this, I’ve sort of isolated three individual things from all the three leaders in the last few days that I think are probably tactically not the right move and I want to start—we’re going to go through them quickly. I want to start first of all with Justin Trudeau and what he said in French in Quebec. Listen closely. Let’s take a listen:

Justin Trudeau: Est-ce-que je leur demande de voter pour nous à travers la pays? Oui. Est-ce-que je leur demande pour un gouvernement majoritaire? Oui.

Tom Clark: Okay, that’s Justin Trudeau asking in French for a majority government. That raised some eyebrows. Let’s go now to Stephen Harper. We just mentioned this, is spending some time with the four brothers in Toronto and that raised some eyebrows. Take a listen.

Stephen Harper: Our platform is very clear, and the support of that family for our party is longstanding and well-known.

Tom Clark: Well okay, so that family, he didn’t say their names out loud, but it was the Rob Ford family. And finally this, in the last 48 hours, the NDP have put together an ad on what they consider to be a big Liberal scandal. Take a listen to just one line of that ad.

Tom Mulcair: Trudeau’s key campaign advisor was caught helping an oil company fast-track a pipeline through a new Liberal government. The Liberal—

Tom Clark: Okay, so let me explain why I picked those and let’s start with the last one. That ad, Marit, said that he secretly worked to fast-track a pipeline with the Liberals indicating that he was buying or selling a favour. You looked at the documents, no such thing, but this really is the Hail Mary pass by the NDP is it not? It’s the last thing you’ve got going for you?

Marit Stiles: You know, the Liberals throughout this campaign have tried to portray themselves as a totally different party and this is a campaign about change. I mean I think that we are going to see, whichever way it goes, on Monday night, some significant change of this country. And so, it’s important to remember what this is the party of. This is the party of the sponsorship scandal. This is a party that is making backroom deals potentially before their government has even been elected.

Tom Clark: Let me stop you there. Backroom deals potentially, that’s quite a charge you’ve just made. In fact, it’s bordering on criminal activity, so I’d like to ask you: what evidence do you have to suggest that there was a backroom deal going on that would be contrary to the Criminal Code of Canada.

Marit Stiles: You have been somebody who’s been working for this company, TransCanada, who is also working on the Liberal campaign as the campaign co-chair which is a very significant position. In many instances, probably alone with the leader, I mean, I have no idea what their conversations have been, but I would like to know.

Tom Clark: But the ad makes it very clear that what you’re alleging.

Marit Stiles: Well, it bases it on the emails that we know exist.

Tom Clark: Well I’ve seen those emails and nowhere in the emails does it suggest that a backroom deal was done for energy east pipelines, but—

Marit Stiles: But if you look at the voting record for example, of the Liberal Party up to now, there have been some strange moves. Like there was a little motion the NDP brought forwards in the last government asking to protect the Lugo breeding grounds and they voted against them, why? It causes us to—

Tom Clark: Okay, it’s great we’re talking about whales, but I want to actually talk about fish—

Marit Stiles: Oh well, matter, we can talk about energy east.

Tom Clark: Michele, I want to bring you in on this because Stephen Harper is also referred to this as corruption and I’m wondering what corruption you’re talking about and I just want to preface it by saying one thing, normally we have Rick Anderson sitting with us. Rick has recused himself from this conversation because Rick, while he was a senior party official with the Conservatives, also worked for TransCanada. He admits this openly. He says he’s done absolutely nothing wrong but didn’t want to be part of this conversation. So, where does this stand on the scale for you in terms of a matter of corruption?

Michele Austin: Well let’s raise the ghosts of PM’s past as Justin Trudeau’s campaign has done and quote Jean Chrétien, “The proof is the proof is the proof.” Dan Gagnier has resigned. He’s obviously in a difficult position and he’s left his campaign in a difficult position. And unfortunately in situations like this, it’s not just what he’s done which is obviously provided advice and helped to solicit access, but it’s the appearance of a conflict so I think the Liberals are in a bit of trouble with this issue and it’s their campaign co-chair. This is an important position.

Tom Clark: Well, in the case of Rick Anderson, it was the person who guided Stephen Harper through all the debates, but Mike over to you. Is this damaging do you think for the Liberals in the final days?

Mike Robinson: Well, I think there’s no question that it was a distraction. It took Mr. Trudeau away from the key message that he wanted to deliver at the end of the campaign, but I think what’s appearing now is that the hyperbole, the rhetoric, the accusations using words like scandal and corruption is way over the top and it’s just a sign of the desperation of the other parties as they enter the last phase in the campaign. I mean, I don’t think if the Conservative Party was ahead by 10 points in the polls they’d be having a rally in Etobicoke tonight with the Ford brothers. I don’t think that Mr. Mulcair, if he was 10 points ahead in the polls would be using the kind of language and making the kind of accusations that he’s making.

Tom Clark: In fairness to Michele because you brought it up, the Ford brothers getting together with Stephen Harper, Michele a lot of people are saying, you know why on earth would he want to do that in the dying days of his campaign to go back to the Ford brothers? Is this not sort of a counter intuitive thing for him to do since they represent everything that he has fought against in his political life?

Michele Austin: Well, the Ford brothers are certainly not everybody’s cup of tea, but Toronto likes them and we’re at a point, we’re in a very, very tight race and the Conservatives need to bring out the vote and the Fords have an excellent track record of bringing voters to the ballot boxes. So, part of this is also making sure that the Liberals have a challenge in 905 which is extremely important in this election and so the Conservatives have leant on popular support of Doug Ford and Rob Ford.

Mike Robinson: And I think there’s going to be a price to pay for that to be honest with you because I think a lot of other voters in the greater Toronto area who remember how Rob Ford behaved and what a disgrace he was for the city and for the country around the world, will say if he’s reverted to those kinds of desperate tactics at the end, maybe he’s the one person who’s sitting at 24 Sussex Drive.

Tom Clark: We’ve only got a few seconds left so I just want to quickly go around to all of you and say, on election night, what’s the one thing you’re going to be looking that’s going to be an indication as to how things are going? Do you want to start?

Marit Stiles: I think the NDP has got to hold onto a few of the seats in Atlantic Canada where we’ve been strong and I think when we see the numbers come in Quebec, I think that you’re going to see some surprising results there. I think that a lot of our incumbent seats are a lot stronger than people have said they are and there’s a few Conservative seats in play that the NDP looks to take.

Tom Clark: Mike?

Mike Robinson: Well I think that we will get an early indication in Atlantic Canada and I think that’s going to be very positive for the Liberals, but I think we have to be careful not to read too much into that because their lead there is very substantial. It will be when we get into Quebec and we see how this very fluid situation in Quebec is actually broken down because the numbers are moving more in Quebec than they’re moving anywhere else in the country, so that’s what I’m going to be watching for.

Tom Clark: Michele, final word to you.

Michele Austin: Well listen, all eyes are on Ontario and Quebec for the Conservatives. They have to gain in Quebec and they have to at least hold in Ontario in order to deliver a good election, so that’s where we’re going to start watching.

Tom Clark: Marit Stiles, Mike Robinson, Michele Austin in Ottawa thank you very much for joining us. We look forward to talking to you in the hours ahead as this gets more interesting.

Well still to come, some more key things to watch for on election night and the future of the leaders after the final vote is counted. That’s coming up next.

Tom Clark: Welcome back. So, what’s it like to have once been on the inside, but now on the outside looking in and does that vantage point change your perspective on politics and politicians? Well we have three people here who know the answers to that: Former Conservative MP, House Leader and Tory whip, Jay Hill; Former Deputy NDP Leader and NDP House Leader Libby Davies; and I gotta get this right now, Former Member of the Liberal caucus, in fact a former Liberal senator, now a Senate Liberal Senator, Jim Munson. Did I get that right?

Jim Munson: That’s excellent. That is excellent, Tom.

Tom Clark: First of all, let me ask all of you, you’ve seen this ultra long campaign. Are you glad you’re out, or in your case that you never got in?

Jim Munson: Well where I’m at is I have the Blue Jays ‘let’s go Blue Jays, let’s go’ in the back of my head because normally inside a campaign, Tom, as you would know, you’re hearing somebody else’s voice, and Ed Broadbent voice, a Joe Clark voice, that kind of thing. A Trudeau voice, that’s how far back it goes, but it has been rather unique sitting on the outside and looking in and paying attention to a local candidate. I’ve had the opportunity to sit on two planes with Mr. Ignatieff and Mr. Dion; it wasn’t very pleasant towards the end obviously. We lost and I’ve had the opportunity to be on five or six campaigns like yourself. This has been a nice respite and a wonderful way to take a look at what’s going on and it’s going to be interesting on Monday night.

Jay Hill: Is that a yes or a no?

Jim Munson: I’m now sounding like a politician, right? Yeah, well I am.

Tom Clark: He still retains it. Libby, how about yourself? I mean from your perspective, is there a moment when you’ve said gosh, I wish I was still in this fight? Or in terms of what you’re seeing, are you glad you’re sitting in?

Libby Davies: Well, I’ve been grinning from ear to ear from day one and what are we now, day 77. I’ve been helping out on a number of campaigns, especially in BC, but it’s just not the same kind of pressure. I watch what’s going on. I often think, wow, would I have said this? Would I have said that? But helping people as opposed to being on the hot seat makes it very different, so I’ve been glad not to have that pressure. And you know, I made my decision not to run and although people keep on saying to me, don’t you regret that now? And I keep on saying, no I don’t. I made my decision and I feel very good about it. And so it’s put it in a different vantage point and I can still play a role. You can still be very active in a campaign for your party. You can help candidates, but it’s just not the same kind of pressure.

Tom Clark: Jay, let me focus this up for you because we’re talking about the vantage point. What we’ve seen in this campaign, and I don’t mean just to single this out, but let’s deal with the very specific base of the Conservative campaign, the blue team, getting themselves involved in the culture war, I mean really sort of putting that big wedge in. some people say it’s an anti-Muslim screed that they’re going on and playing to some popular belief. When you see that and either the effectiveness or the ineffectiveness of that, is this something that concerns you as somebody who had dedicated a big part of their lives to politics?

Jay Hill: Well I think it is a concern, Tom. The reality is that negative campaigning, if can call it that, is effective. People know that, campaigns know that, leaders know that, but there has to be an element of truth to it and I think that there is a line there where a campaign—if they go hard on a certain wedge issue as you call it, and they go beyond the believability factor. I mean there has to be credibility to what they’re saying for it to move people in the polls, to change their desire to vote a certain way. And so, I think it’s a reality. I can remember probably the worst instance in my political career of that happening was in 2004 when the Liberals in the last week of a campaign in June of 2004 came out with ads that showed a hand gun pointing right at your face because we were opposed to the long gun, gun registry. It had nothing to do with handguns, but the TV ad was that way. They showed a nuclear aircraft carrier because we supported an aircraft carrier for our navy and so it was an exaggeration to be kind, but it was very effective, at least the sense was. It was very effective and it earned Paul Martin at the time a minority government when the momentum was with the Conservatives in the dying days of that campaign, so it can be effective.

Jim Munson: Sometimes they go too far though.

Jay Hill: I just want to answer the first question. Yes, I’m very glad that I’m out, five years.

Jim Munson: But sometimes they can go too far. We all remember Jean Chrétien and the Conservative campaign. And you talk about Jay, the believability aspect of all this, but when you denigrate somebody, when you take a look at somebody’s face and say oh my goodness, can this man be prime minister or not? Well we saw what happened—

Tom Clark: You’re talking about that ad—just so everybody understands what you’re talking about. That ad, it was in 1993 and the Conservatives ran an ad that sort of seemed to poke fun at a facial deformity that Jean Chrétien had.

Jim Munson: Absolutely. And in Canadian standards, the way I like to look at these things, was simply unfair because it wasn’t the truth, but you’re destroying an individual.

Jay Hill: Well they crossed over from policy to personal and I think that—

Libby Davies: But I think this campaign—I mean I agree, there’s always been negative advertising, there’s always been going after someone, but I feel in this campaign Tom, that it’s become a lot deeper and it’s very disturbing. I think what we saw on the niqab for example, it’s really a divisive kind of politics. It’s pitting people against each other. It’s them and us and I feel that in this particular instance, Mr. Harper, he really exploits people’s fears, it does become a culture war and it has huge implications. Let’s not forget, we were talking about two women and then they tried to characterize it—they sort of tried to make a positive by saying well it was about women’s equality and women’s ending discrimination and so on, which really they’ve done nothing about in this country, so it became very unbalanced. But I do think Canadian react very badly to that. They don’t like it, but then again, as you point out, the evidence shows us that apparently negative advertising does work, but it seems to me that it is more of a creeping sort of Americanism that’s coming into our politics and I think most Canadians don’t like to see that happening.

Tom Clark: All three of you at one point or another, have been involved in a campaign where you either tried to define what the so-called ballot question is going to be or at least identify what the ballot question was out there. Can I just ask all three of you what you think right now just hours before we go to vote, what do you think the ballot question is for most Canadians, admitting that there’s probably a number of valid questions, but what’s the key one? Jay, let me start with you.

Jay Hill: Well, I don’t know what it’ll be. It’ll probably be based on individual thoughts on the matter as it often is. I think that what the Conservatives want it about is about economic management. I think that the element of change want it to be about is a referendum on Stephen Harper on his personality versus his management of government and I guess we’ll see which it is.

Tom Clark: And that’s a really good point because is this essentially, Jim, a referendum on Stephen Harper personally?

Jim Munson: Absolutely a referendum on Stephen Harper. I’d heard other pundits talk about the economy. We all like to talk about the economy and jobs which it should have been about that, but after nine years in power, nine long years in power it is about the man Stephen Harper. You know, it’s like the old song, will he stay or will he go? At this particular point, it’s almost visceral, people don’t explain themselves that well why they don’t like Mr. Harper, but it’s got to a point, it is about change. It is about time and as we were talking earlier, when momentum starts to build, it’s hard to stop that train of change and I think that’s what it is about on Monday.

Tom Clark: Let me ask you this though because if it is a matter of change, I mean if we’re talking about this being a referendum on Stephen Harper, in many respects, it’s also a referendum on Tom Mulcair and if the polls are anywhere near accurate, Tom Mulcair’s future is going to be somewhat cloudy on Monday night. Again, if the polls are right and I put that caveat in there. Do you think Tom Mulcair can survive third-party status?

Libby Davies: I think Tom Mulcair is going to survive. We’re going to do well in the election. I think it’s absolutely about change and leadership and I think even the Conservatives recognize that. Watching the ad where Mr. Harper says it’s not about me, it’s about you. I mean they’re defining it themselves. They’re realizing that it is about him, but of course, that’s only half the question because if it’s about Mr. Harper then what replaces it and then the question becomes Trudeau or Mulcair. And what I’m hoping is that when people get into that ballot box that they realize that Mr. Mulcair is the one who does have the experience and the wisdom and the vision to actually be the prime minster of this country. I think there’s still a lot of doubt about Mr. Trudeau and his experience.

Tom Clark: Okay, if you go on too much longer, I’m going to have to charge you ad rates for this. Okay, but Jay, in the last 20 seconds that we’ve got and I’m sorry to throw this to you so quickly. Stephen Harper, if he is not the leader of the government on Monday night, is he done?

Jay Hill: Well I think it remains to be seen. I think that’s what he said, so I’ll just repeat it.

Jim Munson: There’ll be only one man standing on Monday night and that’ll be Justin Trudeau.

Tom Clark: All right, listen on that note, I thank you—

Jim Munson: That’s pretty bad.

Tom Clark: I thank you very much. Libby Davies, Senator Jim Munson Independent Liberal whatever senator you are and Jay Hill, we’ll see you on election night. Thanks very much for being here. I appreciate it.

Well coming up next, we’ll unpack the politics of week 11, including a rather unusual endorsement for the party, but apparently not for the man. That’s next.

Tom Clark: Welcome back. Eleven weeks, nearly 80 days, the longest campaign since 1872. Joining me to unpack the politics of the final stretch, people who were there in 1872, Mark Kennedy, the Parliamentary Bureau Chief for the Ottawa Citizen, Susan Delacourt a political author and columnist for the Toronto Star and our friend Evan Solomon, Sirius XM Radio Everything is Politics and also a columnist for Maclean’s Magazine. Welcome to you all.

So, I endorse this panel, except for all of you. Of course, I’m talking about the weird endorsement from The Globe and Mail. You know, it’s interesting, in campaigns in the past, endorsements by newspapers were always eagerly anticipated, now with chain newspapers, one guy decides exactly what every paper is going to say, but the Globe did something I’ve never seen before is that they endorsed the Conservatives, but not Stephen Harper, which is—I don’t know, Mark?

Mark Kennedy: It stood out. Listen, when you read it, you could see the logic they were coming to. They were certainly trying to make the case that the Conservatives have a strong economic agenda and on that basis they ought to be brought back into power and then you get to the last paragraph and then they say, well we’d like them to be back in power, just not with him as prime minister, which as we all know, is impossible. You can’t have one or the other. So—

Tom Clark: So does it really just sort of undermine the whole idea of newspaper endorsements—somebody called it ‘towering idiocy’ which I thought was sort of an apt description, but—

Susan Delacourt: I think we’ve seen a lot of things coming to an end in this election campaign, the leaders tours, debates in their current format and I think this may be the end of, not just because of the Globe, I just think that people are less inclined to pay deference to an editorial position, especially done at long distance. Are they necessary? I’m not sure. It’s one of those things that sort of, has lasted in journalism probably one election longer than it needed to.

Tom Clark: You know that’s an interesting point. I mean I don’t want to stop you from talking about this because actually I endorsed your ability to do that, but you know, talking about things that may be coming to an end and Susan, you mentioned the leaders tours. You know, it was fascinating, my first campaign was in 1974 and the class picture, the media picture, there were 55 of us on the plane in 1974. Today, I think there’s four or five.

Susan Delacourt: Well my first was 1872.

Tom Clark: Yes, right, before the invention of the airplane.

Evan Solomon: There’s no question things are coming to an end. I’m not a hundred per cent sure I agree that endorsements should come to an end. I mean, I think people like guidance and the editorial pages. I like a sharp editorial page. This one was not that. It was sucking and blowing at the same time and I spoke to William Thorsell who is the former editor and chief who wrote a very pointed editorial and even he said that this was incomprehensible because you can’t endorse McDonald’s except for the hamburgers. You know, like that’s it. You know, it just made no sense, but I will say that it pointed to a problem which is this election has become a referendum on Stephen Harper. And even if you like what the record is, nobody, even people who are trying to support him, nobody’s standing up for Stephen Harper and that is a major problem.

Mark Kennedy: Well listen, when parties want to get their message out, they have two ways to do it, earned media, that being they have to try and get reporters to talk about it or write about it and paid me, and now they literally are, using what’s known as a wraparound to have a paid political advertisement in the newspaper. And the Liberals did the same thing on our website. It’s innovative, it’s new and so get used to it.

Evan Solomon: It’s yellow and I mean it, not yellow journalism which I know, but it was the weirdest part about it, was the Conservatives who have spent nine and a half years putting everything in blue, we’ve talked about this, blue brand, brand. Harper blue, Harper blue and all of a sudden you don’t see Harper and it’s yellow. And what is yellow? Elections Canada; it was yellow and black and it was as if the brand was the neutral authority of Elections Canada as if they were using that brand to lend credibility to their brand—weird.

Susan Delacourt: I think that’s a great point. They are borrowing the brand by the way of an institution that they have vilified for the last nine years. I don’t know that Elections Canada would see their brand as synonymous with the Conservative Party. Yeah, Stephen Harper has been no friend of that particular organization.

Tom Clark: If this is, and a lot of people admit or think that this is true, that this is a referendum on Stephen Harper, I personally can’t remember a campaign where it was so personal about one person, one guy in this case, Stephen Harper. If it is a referendum on him, if he loses on election night, meaning that he doesn’t get the most number of seats. Or even if he does get the most number of seats, but perhaps doesn’t get to form the government, overall, is this the end of Stephen Harper?

Mark Kennedy: I think if Stephen Harper wins the plurality on election night, in other words, if the Tories have the most number of seats he will not announce that night. I’ll be in Calgary that night. I don’t expect him to announce that night he would quit. If the Liberals come in with the plurality, I think the odds are fairly high that he would announce that night. I can’t imagine Stephen Harper coming back to Ottawa to be Leader of the Official Opposition and having to throw questions across the aisle at Justin Trudeau, but I mean all bets are off. We’re still three days away or two days away from it happening.

Tom Clark: You wrote an interesting column in Maclean’s Magazine saying that the culture wars that the Conservatives unleashed proved to be unnecessary. The polls certainly seemed to suggest that they didn’t work in any case.

Evan Solomon: Listen, he unleashed this culture war. He could have run on leadership. He had a record he could run. A lot of people may disagree with it, but he had some substance to run on, but he had the culture war. Now there’s a weird act of desperation which is the rally with the Ford brothers to try to get that out. I mean even Tories are telling me they’re embarrassed by that because standing beside Rob Ford, yeah, Ford Nation draws votes but is that really what they want Stephen Harper to do. My gut says if he wins a plurality he stays and Conservatives will say he’s governed as a minority before he’ll give it a shot. Why? Because he believes that then NDP will be in third place, there’ll be a kind of internal war with the NDP as to who’s the leader there and maybe he can kind of fight his way through, but if he doesn’t win a plurality, it’s over.

Susan Delacourt: Yeah, I was talking to somebody last week, a couple of people actually, who said he may not even come out that night if he doesn’t win the most number of seats. You know, that would be like him. I’d be surprised too. It would be a long way for you to travel to not be there. But you know he’s ducked the media before.

Mark Kennedy: You know, Stephen Harper has to maintain his credibility and his own self-respect and one of the things I’ve been surprised with in the last final days, is the sight of a prime minister who is an intelligent man and who at one time in his life used to be quite critical about how politics is played in Ottawa, being a game show host and standing like a huckster and people would throw down fake cash at the sound of a cash register. Odd ways to get votes, not the sort of thing we would have seen him do as the leader of a country, who is now, I think one of the most senior statesmen in the G7.

Tom Clark: Well not only ending up as a gameshow host, but the last major appearance being with Rob Ford, the person who exemplifies everything that Stephen Harper says he’s opposed to.

Susan Delacourt: And Doug Ford who is being mostly by the Ford’s touted as a replacement for Stephen Harper.

Evan Solomon: And we talked about this last week and it was your interview, Mark with him when Stephen Harper who had just seen that ad, when he looks at the camera and he says it’s not about me. And you just think to yourself, what was the last nine and a half years when they were telling us to call it the Harper government.

Tom Clark: Every press release had the ‘Harper Government’ on it. Yeah.

Evan Solomon: And you know, when he’s running from his own brand, you know that they are in—I’m not—no one’s predicting it. You don’t know how this is going to come out and we’re not fools enough to predict anything Election Day, but they are running from a brand they used to run towards and they’re running it differently.

Mark Kennedy: And the question, I suspect will be on the morning of the 20^th. Again, if the Liberals win that night, and if the Tories are brought down to a fairly low number of seats, the question will be: should Stephen Harper have packed it in a year ago? People will start saying, should he had left because most others do. I mean, Chrétien left, Mulroney left. People leave before they hit the 10 year mark because they know it’s hard to win.

Well coming up next, a sneak peek at what to expect from Global’s Decision Canada Election Night coverage. That’s next.

Tom Clark: Welcome back. Well Monday is shaping up to be a very exciting night. I will be here at election central in Toronto, joined by Dawna Friesen and a number of great political minds to help explain what we’re seeing as the night progresses. Now, though you could say that the star of the night will be the results, and for that, we turn to Eric Sorensen.

Eric Sorensen: Tom, when the polls close, the excitement begins with results from our virtual studios and maps with all 338 ridings. The Conservatives will be trying to protect their majority starting with their base in western Canada. Will the NDP be able to create a second orange wave in Quebec? And, if the polls are right, will the Liberals be able to try and expand outward from the small clusters of ridings that they won in Toronto and other cities in 2011. But, on election night, everybody starts at zero. Our maps will be blank and then, starting in Newfoundland and Labrador, we will begin painting in the colours of every single riding. It will begin with a trickle in the east and then a tsunami of results as polls close in different time zones. We have witnesses the biggest changes in riding boundaries since Confederation. Most boundaries have been altered and more ridings have been added. And with special tools, we will not only add up the seats one for each party, but calculate the possibilities for each to reach a majority or that elusive finish line for a minority government. Now, at dissolution in the House of Commons the Conservatives, in blue, had a majority of seats in Parliament. The NDP was the Official Opposition, the Liberals at historic lows for seats. On Monday, we don’t only start with a clean slate, Elections Canada has added 30 new seats to re-balance and reflect population growth. That means 338 separate elections all in one night—always exciting, always historic. Tom.

Tom Clark: Well thanks Eric. We also have reporters in key ridings across the country. Here’s what they’ll be watching for on election night, starting with Jacques Bourbeau who will be with the Liberal Party. Jacques?

Jacques Bourbeau: Well Tom, I’ll be looking for three things on election night. First the polls show the Liberals have pulled into the lead, but can they continue building on that momentum all the way until Election Day? Second, watch what happens in Quebec. If the polls are right, the Liberals could win more seats in that province, but will it be a red wave. And thirdly, the Liberals have made great strides in improving their fundraising and modernizing their computerized voter identification system, but have they caught up to the Conservatives in that massive logistical challenge of getting out their vote? Now the answers to these three questions will go a long way in determining how successful the Liberals are on election night. And now let’s go to Vassy Kapelos.

Vassy Kapelos: I’ll be at Conservative headquarters where the big question of the night is of course whether Stephen Harper can hold onto power. If the polls are any indication, the Liberals cemented a lead in this past week, so Conservatives face an uphill battle. Once the polls close Monday night, I’ll be watching vote rich Ontario where Harper spent a ton of time in this campaign. I’ll also be watching Quebec because at this point, we don’t really know what’s going to happen there. Both provinces are key in order for Harper to keep a minority government in his sights. Over to Mike Le Couteur.

Mike Le Couteur: I’ll be with NDP Leader Tom Mulcair in Montreal where the orange wave first came ashore four years ago, but this time is very different. At the beginning of this campaign, the party had dreams of taking power for the first time ever, but now behind the scenes, they’re extremely worried that they’ll end up losing seats and drop back down to third-party status. Now the niqab issue really hurt the NDP in Quebec and their cautious campaign never really caught on in the rest of the country. You can expect that if the polls are right, the blame game will start as soon as the election night. Tom.

Tom Clark: And we’ll be back, right after this.

Tom Clark: Well, it’s all over, save for the shouting election night on Monday and we’ve got quite an evening planned for you here at Global. It is going to be smart, interesting, it’s going to be dramatic and probably from time to time, it’s going to be funny. So, until then, make sure that you go out and vote and we’ll see you back here election night.

-30-