Tuesday, September 23, 2008

NDP/Liberal Coalition Government: A Crisis in the Making?

It is old news that Jack Layton of the troubled NDP mused about forming a coalition government with the Liberals to prevent the Conservatives forming government. The question is, what would the affect of this be?

By convention the party leader who won the most seats in the House of Commons becomes the Prime Minister. But that is complicated if the winning party doesn't hold a majority of the seats in the house.

In theory a coalition government could occur, just like in theory when Stephen Harper dissolved parliament the Governor General could have asked Stephane Dion to form a government. That didn't happen (thank god).

What would the consequences be if Stephen Harper won a plurality of seats, but fall short of a majority and the NDP/Liberals were able to convince the Governor General to appoint either Layton or Dion as Prime Minister (god help us all).

Massive constitutional crisis? Riots in the streets? Alberta succeeding from confederation? Williams rejoicing?

Any theories?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Unless these two ultra left-wing parties get together before the election what difference will it make? The Tories will get, at least, an increased minority unless something really drastic happens. After the dust settles what will be different? The Liberals and the and the NDP will oppose everything just as they did previously and the Liberals, being in even worse financial shape than they are now, will abstain. As far as forming a formal alliance after the election, if the NDP takes on the Liberal debt they will also be in no position to fight another election immediately.
Don't panic folks, there will be no formal alliance and we'll be back to empty Liberal threats, as well as empty Liberal seats when it comes time to vote on Tory motions.