On timing

There's no doubt that the Cons' delays in their litigation against Elections Canada do seem awfully conveniently timed to try to avoid having any response heard before the planned general election. But it's worth noting that it's far from a sure thing that such a plan will work.

Here's the rough timeline as described by the CP:

The Conservatives were scheduled to submit their final briefs last Friday, with Elections Canada originally scheduled to respond by Oct. 11. That date has been delayed to Oct. 21.

What's worth noting is that the word "scheduled" doesn't figure to be entirely accurate in context. Neither party is required to make any submission only on the day in question; instead, the listed days figure to be the deadlines for any submission.

So if Elections Canada had been planning all along to complete its written submissions by October 11, there's no reason why it can't still do so - particularly if the materials filed by the Cons don't raise any major surprises.

As a result, the Cons may merely have raised some uncertainty for themselves. Rather than knowing that the Elections Canada response was coming during the campaign, they now have to be ready for it without having any idea whether or not it'll arrive before voting day. And it would make for just desserts if the Cons end up spending the last couple of days of the campaign bleating about the unfairness of Elections Canada actually being prepared to respond to their arguments before the last minute.

(Edit: fixed typo.)