THE MOST VULNERABLE LIBERAL RIDINGS

Many of the Liberal MP's sitting in the current make-up of the House of Commons won their seats with a majority, many approaching the 60 percent mark. Others barely held their seats, benefitting from incumbancy and Harper's unknown factor. The Liberal party is going to have to devote a lot of effort to holding onto the following ridings:

West Nova- Lib 39.2 Con 38.1 Swing riding.

Madawaska Restigouche- Lib 38.3 Con 35.4 Swing riding.

Saint John-Lib 42.9 Con 39.3 Tory riding from 1984-2004.

Honore Mercier- Lib 38.4 BQ 34.6

Hull-Alymer- Lib 32.7 BQ 29.4

Lasalle Emard-Paul Martin held the riding but he can't resign for fear of the Liberals losing here.

Outremont-Lib 35.1 Liberal weakness in Quebec could lose this riding.

Algoma-Manitoulin-Kapuskasing- Lib 38.2 NDP 34.5

Beaches-East York Liberal 40.4 NDP 35 Former NDP riding, Green Party leader cost NDP votes.

Brant- Lib 36.9 Con 36

Huron Bruce- Lib 39.7 Con 38.1

Kenora- Lib 36.6 Con 31.3

London West- Lib 37.7 Con 35.5

Missasauga-Erindale- Lib 44.8 Con 39.2

Missasauga-South Lib 43.9 Con 39.8

Nickle Belt- Lib 43.1 NDP 38.5

Oakville- Lib 43.2 Con 42.1

Thunder Bay-Rainy River-Lib 35.1 NDP 33.4

Thunder Bay-Superior North- Lib 36 NDP 34.9

Welland-Lib 35.5 NDP 30.7

Churchill- Lib 40 Tina Keeper won this but the NDP vote split with former NDP MP running as an independant.

Saint Boniface- Lib 38.6 Con 35

Desenthe-Missinippi-Churchill River- Lib 41.5 Con 41 Vote fraud alledged on reserve.

Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca-Lib 34.9 NDP 31.4 Swing riding.

Newton-North Delta- Lib 34 NDP 32.4 Con 30 Swing riding.

Richmond- Lib 42.8 Con 38.7 Swing riding.

West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Lib 37.5 Con 36 Swing riding.

THE LIBERALS IN QUEBEC

The last Liberal debate in New Brunswick, Canada's only officially bilingual province, had the unfortunate effect of upsetting some francophones about the amount of French being spoken. Considering the quality of French being spoken was more Joe Clark stumble than Trudeau/Mulroney fluency, it's bad news for the Liberals.

Liberal prospects are rather dim in Quebec at the present, and a leader with weak French would only do more harm. In the last federal election the Liberals came third in 44 of Quebec ridings and fourth in three. The Liberals received less than 15 per cent of the vote in 37 of the Quebec ridings. It was the seventh consecutive federal election where the Liberals did not win the majority of ridings in Quebec, a disasterous fall from the last Trudeau win with 74 of 75 Quebec seats.

Michel C. Auger recently wrote that the Liberals hoped to sign up 10,000 new members during the leadership contest, but they are struggling to achieve one third of that goal. The next election doesn't look any better for the Liberals. Strapped for cash and not the most effective party at fund-raising, the Liberals have to wonder how much money they can afford to spend in ridings where they came third, with as little as three per cent of the vote in one riding. With the Conservatives coming second in forty ridings, and with the Conservatives having money to spend, it will be the Conservatives who are now the voice of federalism in Quebec.

Chretien delivered power to the Liberals and all it cost them was Quebec. With no room to grow in Cape Breton and PEI, the Liberals must now look to the west. With Alberta out of the picture for them, that really means BC. Will it be another 25 years before the Liberals win big in Quebec? What happens in Quebec when the ridings are next redrawn to reflect the growing population off of the island of Montreal? The Chretien/Gagliano gang that delivered the power and patronage that Liberals so love may have wound up also killing the Liberals in Quebec-and there is no one on the horizon to fix the problem.