Sorry folks, it's been a dreary Sunday morning in Ottawa, and I'm running out of ways to chirpily write the Nomination News titles (not having Kady's talent for such things). [See below for three updates.]

• Ottawa Centre ON - There was a gathering of Ottawa-Gatineau Liberal candidate hopefuls the other night in downtown Ottawa, and P.G. sources had a few tidbits to pass along. First is that the draft-Cyrus Reporter movement is apparently not working. However, long-time Liberal activist, fundraiser and former candidate Isabel Metcalfe is apparently readying a bid to run for the nomination. All-but-in already are Scott Bradley and Janet Yale, although the latter's footsie with Ottawa West – Nepean, ON is being noted by supporters of the former. The riding is currently held by two-term NDP M.P. Paul Dewar, and the Green Party has already renominated its 2008 candidate Jen Hunter.
  
• Gatineau, QC - More scuttlebutt from that gathering is that Liberal nomination candidate Steve McKinnon could be seeing a challenger in coming days. McKinnon kicked off his own campaign the morning before Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff visited a paper-mill in the riding [UPDATE: it was actually in the riding next door, Hull – Aylmer, as a reader wrote to correct me]. The Liberal nomination meeting there is scheduled for Thursday, September 3. The current two-term M.P. is the Bloc Québécois' Richard Nadeau, and the NDP Québec co-president and former Liberal M.P. Françoise Boivin has apparently said she would like to run again as well.
• Pontiac, QC - A commenter on an earlier post relays that former Liberal M.P. Robert Bertrand has now ruled himself out of another nomination run at the meeting which is now scheduled for Sunday September 13. Still running are Greg Fergus, Cindy Duncan McMillan and Georges Lafontaine, as we ran down here earlier. Fergus, McKinnon and Yale are all using the same communications firm for their websites, which one source from that Liberal candidates' gathering took to signify that they may be on some kind of common slate. Pontiac is currently represented by two-term Conservative M.P. Lawrence Cannon.
• Kingston and the Islands, ON - Will he or won't he? Only Commons Speaker and long-time Liberal M.P. Peter Milliken's riding association knows for sure whether he plans to run again or not, and perhaps not even them as yet, although he is certainly expected to run one more time, the Belleville Intelligencer is reporting. Milliken is one of 7 Liberal M.P.s first elected in 1988.
• UPDATE: St. Paul's, ON - The Green Party has a new candidate in this Toronto riding, after an uncontested nomination meeting this past July 4. According to the Elections Canada website, Debborah A. Donnelly was acclaimed and will be facing long-time Liberal M.P. Carolyn Bennett.
  
• Windsor – Tecumseh, ON - Another commenter pointed out that Conservatives have renominated 2008 candidate and University of Windsor management lecturer Denise Ghanam in this riding, although I can't find any verification of that in the news and neither her website nor her Facebook page have been updated to that effect. If anyone can supply further details (that means you, BBS), please drop me a line and let me know the details (such as whether she was acclaimed, the date of the meeting, etc.). This riding is now held by four-term NDP M.P. Joe Comartin, although in spite of her shoestring campaign (just 18% of the limit was spent last time) Ms. Ghanam was able to move ahead of the Liberal candidate here and into second place. [UPDATE: We now have the nomination confirmed, but still working on dates and other details. Same for Ms. Lumley below.]
  
• Windsor West, ON - The same commenter mentioned that Lisa Lumley has also apparently been renominated for the Conservatives here. I'm unable to confirm that either, so if anyone can give me a source, a date and whether it was by acclamation or contested, I'll be able to add that into the database. The riding is currenty held by four-term NDP M.P. Brian Masse who won it in a by-election after the retirement of long-time Liberal M.P. Herb Gray. Here again, however, Lumley was able to move past the Liberal candidate and into a second place finish, although spending much closer to the limit than Ms. Ghanam (69%).
• Nickel Belt and Sudbury, ON - A reader travelling through northern Ontario dropped me a line to say that the NDP nomination meeting in these two ridings has been set for Thursday, September 10. The party picked up both seats from the Liberals in the last election, the former held once before by the party in the 1980s, but the latter a Liberal enclave since at least 1947, save for a brief by-election interregnum between 1967 and 1968, the last time the NDP won there. Incumbent NDP M.P.s Claude Gravelle and Glenn Thibeault are expected to be uncontested.
  
• Edmonton – Sherwood Park, AB - The Liberal nomination meeting for this riding has been scheduled for Monday, July 27, although as yet only Rick Szostak who ran here in 2008 has come forward, reports the Sherwood Park News. The riding was narrowly won last time (with a 3.4% margin) by first-time Conservative M.P. Tim Uppal, in a race that was unusually interesting by Alberta standards. Uppal's nomination competitor James Ford wound up running as an independent candidate, and although outspent by Uppal (95% of the limit vs. 38%) turned in the only second-place finish for an independent last time, and nearly taking the riding. Ford recently told the Edmonton Journal that if an election is held this fall, he plans to run again. Thanks to a reader for passing this along.
• Vancouver Centre, BC - A business-owner who runs a Kitsilano social club, Rachel Greenfeld, is the first candidate to announce a run for the Conservative nomination in this downtown Vancouver riding, currently held by long-time Liberal M.P. Hedy Fry, the Vancouver Courier is reporting. Fry tells the Courier that she met the requirements to have an uncontested nomination, while the Green Party's Adriane Carr was already acclaimed in April. The NDP's Michael Byers told the Georgia Straight the day after the last election that he too would run again, which means that, should Greenfeld win her party's nomination, she will be the only new candidate in the race amongst the major parties there. Carr's entry and the strong performance of previous Conservative candidate Lorne Mayencourt turned the riding into a 4-way race in 2008. The Courier doesn't indicate whether Mayencourt plans to run again himself, or when the Conservative nomination meeting has been scheduled. (h/t the Liberal Scarf blog for this one!)
  

Hedy Fry is also paraphrased as saying that "she won't face a nomination meeting for the Liberals, but as the incumbent for Vancouver Centre she had to meet certain criteria in order to run for the party in the next federal election". But does this mean that the BC section of the federal Liberal Party has different rules than the Québec section, which has already renominated 4 incumbents at actual meetings? As discussed here before, at some length, I've been told several times by Liberal headquarters that Liberal incumbents meeting the criteria have only won the right to be uncontested, but they still all have to go through nomination meetings ... only to be contacted later by another official on the Hill and told that all the incumbents should be considered renominated. Colour me confused on this one, folks, although the Courier could always have misinterpreted what they were hearing too, and got that part of the story wrong. I'm still individually recording Liberal candidates as being nominated when their meetings are held, unless convincingly persuaded otherwise.

Meanwhile, Liberal National Director Rocco Rossi told the Belleville Intelligencer that all the Liberal incumbents have now met those criteria, and he expects them all to be running again unless any should retire.

Turning back to Québec for a second, Bloc Québécois whip Michel Guimond told Le Journal de Québec that he's ordered his MPs to return to work on August 3, and is stepping up the pace of nomination meetings in order to be ready in case the government should fall in September. I am still not seeing any indications of a Bloc candidate in the vacant ridings of Montmagny – L'Islet – Kamouraska – Rivière-du-Loup, QC or Hochelaga, QC however, but perhaps we'll see that sometime after August 3.

He also gave the most definitive description of the Bloc's plans for a fall confidence vote I've seen so far, saying "le gouvernement Harper a perdu notre confiance. On ne voit pas comment on pourrait donner notre confiance à Stephen Harper" and speculating that there was "une possibilité électorale et une fenêtre qui s’ouvrent".

[UPDATE: Perhaps not surprisingly given what we wrote about Sudbury above, the Liberals have scheduled their National Caucus Retreat for Sudbury in late August. Meanwhile, the NDP has scheduled its pre-session Caucus Retreat for Edmonton in mid-September, and the Conservative National Caucus is starting in Ottawa tomorrow.]

If you have nomination news or know about potential candidates, please drop us a line here including a link to a news source if you have it, and then follow all the latest @punditsguide on Twitter. Meantime, the sun just came out here, so it's over and out from Ottawa for now.

Labels: 41st General Election Nominations, Bloc Québécois, Conservatives, Liberals, NDP