Liberals take aim at NDP in final week of New Brunswick election

FREDERICTON – New Brunswick’s Liberal party is taking aim at the New Democrats as the provincial election campaign enters its final week.

Liberal Leader Brian Gallant says the NDP platform doesn’t contain costs for 24 of its main commitments, but NDP Leader Dominic Cardy says some of the things the Liberals are criticizing aren’t even in the party platform for next Monday’s election.

Cardy says the attacks are a desperate effort to cover gaffes in the Liberal campaign.

Geoff Martin, a political scientist at Mount Allison University in Sackville, N.B., says the Liberals may be going on the attack because the NDP could play the role of spoiler in some close races with the Progressive Conservatives.

Political scientist Tom Bateman of the University of New Brunswick says the Liberals may have peaked too early in the polls and party officials might be telling Gallant to launch an offensive in the final days.

Gallant says he has an obligation to tell voters what he thinks of Cardy’s and Premier David Alward’s campaign promises.