N.S. political scientist expects summer election and a short campaign

HALIFAX -

Tom Urbaniak believes an election call is imminent in Nova Scotia.

"At this point, I'm almost taking it to the bank that we will have a summer election," said Urbaniak, a professor of political science at Cape Breton University.

Nova Scotia doesn't have fixed election dates, meaning Premier Iain Rankin could call an election anytime between now and next spring.

When an election is called, Urbaniak says Rankin will be looking for a relatively short campaign.

"I'm expecting a campaign of just over 30 days and the Liberals will expect that that will be an advantage to them because the opposition leaders, Tim Houston, Gary Burrill, have been low profile during this third wave of COVID," said Urbaniak.

"Liberals are looking at some polling that shows a favourable picture for them at the moment, and so they're hoping to coast into election day without making too many waves between now and then."

Rankin started Thursday off by announcing the province would contribute $37 million to a $112 million project that would see Halifax Transit expand a depot and purchase 60 battery-operated buses by 2024.

"We need to make sure we're looking at how we electrify transportation and that's what today is about," said Rankin.

It was the latest in a long list of pre-election style spending announcements in the province. The premier was also a guest on News 95.7 where he told host Todd Veinotte the province was getting closer to an election.

"We've been able to do a lot in the last four months and I am looking forward to asking for another mandate soon," Rankin told the show.

Opposition leaders aren't waiting for an election call to hit the ground.

"All the signs are there, the traditional premier going around the province, passing out money and making promises," said Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Houston.

"Every indication in the world would be that we will be in an election campaign within a few moments in Nova Scotia," added NS NDP Leader Gary Burrill.

Houston spent part of the day in Guysborough, N.S. Thursday.

"We're the party that's laying forward a vision for what's possible," said Houston.

"We need to fix our health care system, we put out the plan for how that's possible, what we would do. The investments we would make to fix our health care system. We have to rebuild our economy and those are the two questions Nova Scotians will ask themselves. Who can fix health care and who can rebuild the economy?"

Meanwhile, Burrill plans to spend both Thursday and Friday campaigning in Cape Breton.

"An NDP government will provide a stimulus of $50 million for each of the next three years to the CBRM in order to address immediately the fiscal inequity between the two cities in the province," said Burrill.