Another Minority Government Likely For Canada

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30092, 28 March 1963, Page 8

Another Minority Government Likely For Canada

INJZPuI. Spacial Correspondent, MELVIN SUFRIN.I TORONTO, March 26. Present trends indicate a strong possibility Canadians will elect another minority Government on April 8. Professional poll-takers and political writers have spent weeks travelling across the country trying to determine how Canadians will vote.

Practically without exception, they have found apathy and frustration among a great number of voters. This has led them to predict that no party will emerge with a clear majority of the 265 House of Commons seats.

party likely to increase its share of the vote greatly but again there is some question whether this will be translated into more than a few extra seats. Stability The best chance of a stable governing in the event no party wins a majority appears to hinge bn the chance the Liberals and the New Democrats between them win more than half the seats. The Liberals are on record as favouring the acquisition of nuclear arms for the defence forces while the New Democrats are unalterably opposed. Still, in other fields there are few irreconcilable differences.

If their forecasts are occurate, and if no significant awing takes place between now and election day it appears likely the Liberals, led by Mr Lester Pearson, will become the largest group in the next Parliament They won 100 seats on June 18 last and need at least 33 more to acquire a majority. Pundits and pollsters cannot see them getting more than a total of 125. At the same time, Mr Diefenbaker’s Conservatives are expected to lose as many as 25 of the 116 seats they won last year.

way» ft is difficult to distinguish the Liberal programme from the Conservative. Übenl Margin In terms of potential votes, the Liberals appear to have a substantial margin over the Conservatives, but much of this support is centred in Industrial areas where the Liberals won many of their seats last June. The over-all effect could be that the Liberals will win with larger margins without necessarily adding many seats. Conversely, the Conservatives, who lost by small margins in many industrial ridings in 19®, could see their total vote drop without losing great numbers of seats. In addition, ft is important to remember that two weeks before last year’s voting the Liberals were also well ahead in the polls, but popular support swung back to the Conservatives in the final stages of the campaign and each party wound up with about 37 per cent of the total vote. Present estimates are that Social Credit is the only

There is a possibilitity that if the Liberals were to agree to introduce Government medical insurance on a national scale they might come to some sort of informal agreement for the New Democrat support.

Assuming this happens, then the balance of power win fall to either Social Credit or the socialist New Democrats or perhaps both parties together. Social Credit had 30 seats and the New Democrats 19 in the old House. Coalition Chances

Social Credit’s demands for monetary reform, and particularly its proposal to use the money supply to stimulate the economy through greater consumer purchasing, are at odds with the policies of the other three parties. If Social Credit should hold the balance of power alone the life of the next Parliament will be uneasy at the best.

Hie possibility of a formal coalition is highly unlikely. In the event that there is a minority government, its existence will depend on the same sort of live-and-let-live formula that prevailed until Social Credit deserted the Conservatives in February. In suggesting many voters are apathetic, observers say they have found a widespread feeling that the leaders have put the interests of their parties ahead of Canada's welfare. There are some who say the country’s second election in less than a year is an unnecessary waste of money and effort. There is considerable disillusionment with the lack of progress in the last Parliament. While some voters blame the Conservatives for this there is no strong inclination to believe the T.iherals will do much better. The frustration stems from • feeling that in a country with a vast reserve of natural resources it should have been possible to overcome the problems of unemployment and the slow economic growth in the last six years. Mr Pearson's promise of a balanced Budget and lowcoat loans to municipalities

for public works has so far failed to capture the imagination of voters and in many