By Randall Palmer and Leah Schnurr
OTTAWA, Sept 27 (Reuters) - With Canada's three main
political parties all getting around 30 percent support in
polls, the odds of a period of political instability after the
October 19 election are rising.
It could also shed an awkward spotlight on the
constitutional role played by Governor General David Johnston,
who is Queen Elizabeth II's representative in this member of the
British Commonwealth.
A proposal from Canada's Green Party leader Elizabeth May
for the two main parties on the left to take power immediately
if Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper fails to get a
majority - even if his party has more seats than anyone else -
has triggered concerns that Johnston will face a very difficult
decision.
While few see a full-blown constitutional crisis erupting,
investors and economists warn that prolonged political
uncertainty could undermine Canadian financial markets at a time
when the economy has seen two straight quarters of negative
growth, for many the definition of a recession, as the nation's
energy sector suffers from plunging oil prices. The Canadian
dollar is already trading at near 11-year lows.
Johnston, 74, who is appointed by the Queen on the
recommendation of the prime minister, is usually a figurehead
who presents awards and attends commemorative events while also
giving routine royal assent to Canadian laws once they pass
Parliament. But after an election, he plays a critical role by
asking one of the political leaders to form a new government.
This is easy if one of the parties gets a majority of the
338 seats in Parliament. It gets a lot trickier if they are all
short of that, and there is the possibility of a coalition being
formed between parties, or at least some kind of cooperation
that would allow one to govern with the other's support.
"There could be a lot of confusion and disagreement and
competing claims, and it's not clear how those would get sorted
out," said Mark Jarvis, from Toronto-based think tank the Mowat
Centre. "In a worst case scenario, we could potentially have a
great deal of confusion about who has a legitimate claim to form
a government."
COULD FAIL QUICKLY
If Harper's Conservatives get more seats than his two
opposition left-of-center rivals, the Liberals and the New
Democratic Party, then by tradition, the governor general would
be expected to ask Harper to form the next government. Harper
has said the party with the most seats should govern.
But some constitutional experts said the Greens' proposal
could be a viable alternative and reduce instability.
The danger if Harper forms a government without a mandate in
seats or votes is that it could fail quickly.
He would likely lose the first vote in the House of Commons
after the election, which would be a vote on the so-called
Speech from the Throne, in which the new government lays out its
policies. Its rejection would show that Harper would find it
next to impossible to govern effectively.
May proposes that Johnston not wait for that but instead ask
the Liberals and the NDP to form a government if they are
prepared to support each other. She says the Greens, who have
about 4 percent support in polls, wouldn't join a coalition
themselves.
Certainly, there is a good chance that this election will
create historical waves. A Canadian prime minister has never
been defeated on the first throne speech after an election, and
Canada last had a coalition government in 1917.
Edward Schreyer, who was governor general from 1979-84, said
if a combination of parties could show they could form a
coalition with majority support, they would be allowed to form a
government. "What the country needs, what the governor general
must look for, is evidence of a stable government," he said.
But insiders in all three main parties said if Harper had
the most seats he would have the right to form a government and
present his policies at the throne speech, usually several
months after the election.
'SNOWBALL'S CHANCE IN HELL'
Asked by Reuters whether the Liberals would back a Harper
minority government, the party's leader Justin Trudeau on
Tuesday said at an event in Montreal: "There are no
circumstances in which I would support Stephen Harper to
continue being prime minister of this country."
If the opposition brought down the government in a
confidence vote over the throne speech, then the governor
general would have to decide whether to let the second-place
party try to form a government. He could also call a new
election if Harper asked for one.
While up until now Trudeau has rejected the idea of a
coalition or a formal arrangement with the NDP, he did indicate
last week an openness to backing an NDP minority government,
saying his party "has always been open in minority situations to
working with other members of the house to pass legislation that
serves Canadians."
NDP leader Thomas Mulcair said last Wednesday there was not
"a snowball's chance in hell" of supporting a Conservative
throne speech. He has said he is open to working with parties
other than the Conservatives but says Trudeau has slammed the
door shut on cooperation.
A lack of clarity on who was in the driver's seat "is
negative for GDP growth and unemployment," said Canadian
economist David Madani at Capital Economics.
Paul Taylor, chief investment officer of BMO Asset Management
Canada, said a negative market reaction was guaranteed if there
was no clear winner. "Anything Canadian should come off a little
- the Canadian dollar, Canadian bonds and Canadian equities,' he
said.
STICK TO THE PRINCIPLES
Johnston, a constitutional expert himself, advised then
Ontario Lieutenant Governor David Onley in 2014 when he looked
set to face a similar constitutional problem in the province.
Onley said Johnston told him to "just remember, you stick to
the basic principles ... (those are) the sitting prime minister
or sitting premier has the right to not resign even though his
party may have fewer numbers of seats than one or both of the
other parties."
Johnston's office said in a statement that while various
scenarios can arise if no party wins a majority, it "will not
hypothesize on potential courses of action" he may take, adding
it was inappropriate to speculate on what he would do if party
leaders called him about other power-sharing arrangements.
More recently, Harper fended off an attempt in 2008 by a
Liberal-NDP coalition to bring down his government, calling it
an undemocratic power grab.
Facing a confidence vote that would have defeated his
minority government and seen the coalition take office, Harper
bought time by asking and getting then-governor general
Michaelle Jean to suspend Parliament.
One of her advisors, Peter Russell, told
OntarioNewsWatch.com in 2012 that Jean feared "a dreadful
crisis" if she had allowed the coalition to form a new
government and then the Conservatives had condemned the decision
as equivalent to a coup d'etat. "We would have been there in the
headlines of the world like Greece. (That's) not very good for
the country in any which way."
Jean, who is now secretary-general of the Paris-based
Francophonie organization, declined comment.
One option at the time was to ask the Queen to dismiss or
overrule Jean if she had refused to suspend Parliament, a Harper
spokesman Kory Teneycke said in the 2010 book "Harperland."
Teneycke, who is now Conservative campaign spokesman, later said
his comments were taken out of context.
Experts said there was little chance of the Queen wading
into Canadian politics.
"There's no way that the Queen is going to get dragged in,"
said Robert Hazell, director of the Constitution Unit at
University College London. "Even if he (Harper) were to appeal
to the Queen, Buckingham Palace would refer it straight back to
the governor general."