Liberal majority government incoming? How Carney could get enough seats in Parliament

Before Nova Scotia MP Chris d’Entremont switched parties from the Conservatives to Liberals, political observers questioned whether Prime Minister Mark Carney’s minority government would even pass its first budget, forcing a second federal election in 2025. But since his floor crossing, and the NDP and Bloc Québécois supporting the first confidence vote on the budget, the main question has shifted: will the Liberals secure a majority? Heading into budget week, the Liberals held 169 seats, just three short of a majority. Now that d’Entremont has abandoned the Conservatives, after being courted by Liberal insiders, the party only needs an additional two floor-crossers to achieve a majority. On Wednesday, The Globe and Mail reported that five Liberal sources (MPs and operatives) told reporters they were in discussions with other Conservative MPs entertaining the idea of jumping ship. Rumours began circulating about the alleged party-hoppers, including members from Quebec ridings. Decade-long Edmonton Conservative MP Matt Jeneroux became the centre of attention, after he was absent from the House of Commons, locked his X account, and skipped a Conservative caucus meeting on Wednesday. In an attempt to shut down speculation mid-week, Jeneroux’s office told CTV, “Despite the rumours being circulated in Ottawa, MP Jeneroux is not crossing the floor and is remaining a member of the Conservative caucus.” But by late Thursday afternoon, Jeneroux released a cryptic resignation letter announcing he was stepping down, resigning as an MP. He insisted there was no “coercion” involved in his decision. However, it was not clear why he was stepping down. Most importantly, now that it has emerged he won’t depart until the spring, the key question is whether he will vote on the budget in the coming days. How the Liberals get a majority of seats in the House of Commons Jeneroux’s empty seat opens an opportunity for the Liberals to eventually gain one more seat in a byelection, which would bring them just one seat shy of a bare majority of 172 seats. The byelection will be months away, and the seat is in a healthy Alberta-blue riding that Jeneroux won by over 3,200 votes, or more than 5 percentage points, last April. One wrinkle, however, is that if Jeneroux is to now be absent from the House, the Liberals will need one fewer seat to command a voting majority of 171. In the meantime, the Liberals are claiming to still be attempting to convince other Conservatives to join their ranks. “My view is I will talk with anyone,” Prime Minister Carney told journalists in Ottawa after welcoming d’Entremont to the Liberal caucus at the beginning of the week. Conservative sources told The Hub the Office of the Leader of the Opposition (OLO) has been working relentlessly to ensure no other members are planning to defect. The CTV reported sources close to Jeneroux claim he was indeed talking to the Liberals about joining their caucus, but that threats of “consequences” for doing so convinced Jeneroux to resign instead. “A narrative spun by the Liberals and their media lackeys and useful idiots like [former senior aide to Stephen Harper] Dimitri Soudas,” one Conservative MP told The Hub about the rumours of more potential turncoats. “Caucus has never been more united and upbeat.” Mr. Poilievre has yet to directly respond to the defection. If the Liberals are planning to secure a majority before the final budget vote, they have one week left, as the House has next week off for Remembrance Day. Out of the more than 300 floor crossers since Confederation, most tend to come from swing ridings, where their new party still has enough popularity to give them the opportunity to get re-elected. Even if the Liberals do not secure a majority before the final budget vote, Ottawa political insiders believe the chances of a non-confidence vote are slim. Yaroslav Baran, former chief of staff to the chief government whip during the Harper government, told The Hub that none of the opposition parties actually want to force a snap election, which would either be a couple of weeks before or after Christmas. “They can say ‘We’re voting against it,’ and then a few of them just don’t show up; maybe, two Bloc MPs, two NDPers and one Conservative just happen to be in the bathroom [during the vote],” Baran explained, saying the party whips discuss voting numbers before any key vote so there are “no surprises.” As the seat count currently stands in the House (a total of 343 seats), Green Party Leader Elizabeth May (one seat) is in talks to support the Liberal budget, having previously supported the minority governments of the Justin Trudeau era. Meanwhile, the NDP (seven seats) are reviewing the budget to see if they will vote to support it. Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet’s Bloc Québécois (22 seats) refuses to support the budget because it does not include a list of demands. Meanwhile, the Conservatives’ seat count has dropped from 144 to 142, while the Liberals made a gain of one, now at a count of 170. “Something’s amiss here,” The Hub’s editor-at-large Sean Speer said on the Roundtable podcast on Friday. “I think there’s still probably another shoe or two to drop here. And you get the sense that we end the week with Pierre Poilievre’s leadership more in doubt than it’s been ever since he took the mantle as party leader.”