Early election call won't change their plans: candidates

With rumours rampant that Prime Minister Stephen Harper could call an election as early as Sunday, the lone incumbent in the two Sudbury-area ridings says his game plan won't change regardless of what happens in Ottawa.

"I'm not going to change what I was doing because of Stephen Harper," said Nickel Belt MP Claude Gravelle. "My offices are still opening Aug. 1, as they were before. And I'm still going to be doing a bit of door-to-door -- not a lot, but a bit. We're going to go full blast after the Labour Day weekend."

Gravelle said with the Oct. 19 fixed election date, he had already made plans to open campaign offices in Valley East and Sturgeon Falls next week. But an election call Sunday would affect him in a small way.

"My advertising changes,” he said. “I'd have to pull a couple of ads if the election is called. But that's all that changes."

Once the writ is dropped and the election campaign begins, Gravelle will be facing Liberal candidate Marc Serré, Stuart McCall is vying for the Green Party nomination, while no one has said publicly yet they are running for the Conservatives.

Serré said whether the campaign is called Sunday or not, he plans to be out knocking on doors all summer.

"I'm already attending a lot of events, meeting with people, talking with people,” Serré said. "We are expecting the election to be held Oct. 19, and for the past few months I've been knocking on a lot of doors. So for me, the weekend announcement, if it happens, it doesn't change our plan ... We are moving full steam ahead."

While the federal Conservatives have more to spend this time around than the rest of the parties put together, Serré said that likely won't be a big factor in the riding.

"The Harper government has hardly paid any attention to Northern Ontario, let alone Nickel Belt,” he said. “In our case, I'm focusing on the incumbent as my main opponent."

For his part, Gravelle says Northern summers are too short as it is, and most people don't want to think about politics in the warm months.

"We'll just let people enjoy the summer and I'm going to do a little bit of door-to-door and a few events,” he said. “There's events almost every weekend and I'll go to those and just chat it up with people."

In Sudbury, a byelection campaign is already underway since the seat is vacant. But Diane Benson, a spokesperson with Elections Canada, said as soon as a federal vote is called, the byelection would be over and candidates would have to register to run in general election.

"They'll still have to submit financial returns and they have some duties to report on the byelection activity they may have done," Benson said.

Any money spent during byelection period will have to be reported, but doesn't count against their budget for the general election, she added. The campaign budget for the Sudbury byelection is $446,064.24.

"When and if a general election is called, there are new spending limits in place," she said.

Only Liberal candidate Paul Lefebvre registered to run in the byelection. However, the NDP has nominated Paul Loewenberg as their candidate, Fred Slade is running for the Tories and David Robinson is running for the Greens.