All of the four main party leaders are back in Ontario and Quebec on Monday after spending the end of last week in Vancouver for the first of the leaders debates.
Alberta is akin to an electoral desert for the New Democrats, so Layton's first campaign stop in the province was confined to the airport in Calgary. He got off the plane, met with a handful of supporters inside a terminal, and took to the air again headed east.
Layton held a different sort of campaign rally in Castlegar, B.C., earlier in the day.
NDP Leader Jack Layton attends a rally in Calgary on Sunday, Dec. 18. (CP Photo/Chuck Stoody)
Castlegar is in a riding the NDP believes it has a chance of winning, and Layton attacked the Conservatives, saying that party hasn't delivered for British Columbia.
"In fact, I was trying to think of any accomplishments of the Conservative party in the last 12 years," he said. "And the only one I could think of was that they changed their name three times."
Taking aim at the Tories makes sense in the British Columbia Southern Interior riding, because the NDP figures there's a chance it can win with Conservative MP Jim Gouk not running.
"In the last election, the NDP was just a few hundred votes behind the Conservatives," Layton said. "The Liberals were 8,000 votes behind."
Layton's key message: don't waste your vote on the Liberals.
NDP candidate Alex Atamanenko hopes the Greens, who siphoned off 3,000 votes in 2004, aren't as big a factor this year.
"Actually, last election, we had Green party members come over to our side and vote for us. And I'm anticipating that we'll have even more," he said. "But you never know."
Layton is in Ottawa on Monday.
Other leaders in Ontario, Quebec
Stephen Harper takes his campaign to Quebec City, where he's expected to sell his Conservatives as a viable option for federalists who are angry over Liberal corruption.
Liberal Leader Paul Martin campaigns in Cambridge and London, Ont., on Monday. He is expected to announce an increase in the lifetime capital gains exemption, which provides relief on the taxes small business owners pay when they sell or transfer their businesses.
Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe will campaign in Montreal, Gaspé, Iles de la Madelaine, and Matane.
Heading in the other direction, Green party Leader Jim Harris goes to Winnipeg.
