CBCnews

Monday, October 13

Posted in Canada Votes - Your Turn Posted by Martin OBrien on October 13, 2008 07:17 PM |

How many of who and why? Tonight on Your Turn, we're asking whether it will be a majority or a minority of whose government, and gathering the hopes and concerns of viewers (who tomorrow will be called ‘voters’) for who will be best for Canada.

The party leaders made their last pitches across the country. Harper promised to continue to protect the economy, and said there was no guarantee for a Conservative win so supporters had to make the final push as hard as they can. Dion accused the Tories of having a campaign platform based on a lie and Layton said the middle class cannot afford to lose another 400,000 jobs from the workforce and the NDP are the party to guard against the loss in the manufacturing sector.

We asked streeters if their vote was still undecided, and if they were still having trouble making up their mind.

We had a unanimous decision from feedback- Robert from Calgary and Ross from Ottawa beamed in by webcam and predicted minority governments. Anthony from Oakville, ON, Bill from Edmonton and Stephen from Burnaby, BC called and said the same.

Larry LeDuc, a professor of political science from the University of Toronto explored the possibilities with Suhana and the people who called, emailed and Skyped in. He also gave some insight into the success of minority governments past at compromising on and facilitating legislation, and the shortest and longest terms they’ve served.

Peter Cleary, the founder of the Facebook group for vote swapping in favour of preventing the Conservative parliament from claiming a majority joined Suhana. He explained that the reach of such groups was sure to expand in future elections and we are just beginning to see the onset of the ‘au-pairing’ of votes.

We were also joined by Margot, a professional psychic, who read the signs and thinks there will be no great change in the government right away but in the near future.

Tomorrow we’ll be watching the countdown to the closing of the polls, taking a behind the scenes look at the CBC’s election coverage, and a peek at election nights past.