Byelections are highly anticipated political events. Without giving them too much weight, they can be good barometers for determining how political parties are faring in a particular area at any given time.

At the moment, four federal ridings are now officially vacant, and three other MPs have indicated that they will resign their seats by the end of the summer. But the byelection in the Montreal riding of Outremont must be called no later than this Saturday.

As a result, there has been all sorts of speculation about what date the prime minister will choose for that vote — he has as long as six months after the call to set the voting date. But his newly declared candidate for the riding seems one step ahead of most of us.

Yesterday, on his website, Gilles Duguay wrote that he was looking forward to the September vote.

That raised some eyebrows because the byelection has not been officially called yet. So Duguay appeared to be either remarkably well informed or, perhaps, just hopeful.

Today the website has been taken down. It is, says Duguay, "under construction."

Duguay is a career diplomat who is now the official Conservative candidate in Outremont, a longtime Liberal riding. He has also received his first lesson in politics: leave the big announcements to the prime minister.

According to Elections Canada, these are the deadlines by which the four by-elections must be called:

Outremont (Quebec), July 28th.
Saint-Hyacinthe-Bagot (Quebec), August 25th.
Toronto-Centre (Ontario), December 30th.
Willowdale (Ontario), January 9th.