Beyond amendment

Speaking of the possibility of an amendment as the Libs' strategy for dealing with the budget, let's note the obvious problems with such an approach.

First and foremost, banking on an amendment to resolve any outstanding concerns with the budget completely cedes the initiative and the final decision to the Cons. After all, if the Cons accept a package of substantive amendments, then there's basically no room left for the Libs to question or oppose the resulting amended budget.

Which means that once the Libs put their amendments out into the public eye, the decision as to whether or not the Cons would stay in power would be placed solely in the hands of Stephen Harper. And it's not hard to guess what choice he'd make.

That's particularly problematic since any amendment won't figure to do anything to improve the actual implementation of the budget - which Ignatieff has already recognized to be a significant problem.

For example, the Libs can try to strip out any legislated requirements for "leveraged" funding for infrastructure. But as long as a Con government will have the final say as to which projects receive funding it would be easy to implement the Cons' preferred limitations in practice even if legislation allows for broader funding.

Likewise, any legislated concern about the deficit would all too likely either be dealt with through revised estimates rather than substantive action, or offered up as an excuse for service cuts and asset sales.

And the problem is only amplified when one looks at how the Con government would likely administer even the measures within the budget which the Libs broadly agree with. After all, regional development agencies and sectoral supports are sure to be less effective than they should be when they're administered by a government that always puts partisanship ahead of policy.

Finally, it should be kept in mind that this is a road the Libs have been down before. Considering the results the last time the Libs allowed themselves to be prodded into agreement on a confidence measure, there's all the more reason to doubt that they'll be able to accomplish anything useful by following the same path now.

In sum, there's no basis for confidence that the Cons will start governing better once the threat of a coalition is removed. Which means that if the Libs are rightly concerned that Deficit Jim's budget is borderline at best even on its face, then the dangers of Con implementation should break any tie in favour of voting down the Harper government.