40th parliament may be in its last days

It’s looking more and more probable that Newfoundlanders & Labradorians will not only be going to the polls for a provincial election this fall, but also for a federal election this spring. With the always-contentious federal budget looming later this month, the parties have been actively working to prepare themselves — as you may have noticed by seeing a variety of attack ads this winter on your televisions — for a spring campaign. But there are indications that the Liberals may even attempt to topple the Conservative government before that, the first step of which may have been the introduction of a motion in the House of Commons yesterday. It referred to a legal battle the Conservative Party finds itself in as “electoral fraud” and goes on to call it an “assault on the democratic principles upon which parliament and the electoral system are based…” For their part, the Conservatives are enjoying higher-than-usual numbers in recent polls. But with Danny Williams out of the picture and his ABC campaign an amusing footnote, can this election possibly be as entertaining as the last?