"Dust off your lawn signs," [John Reynolds] told [Tony Valeri]. The Tories were ready to join the Bloc and defeat the Liberals if the governing minority didn't start to negotiate. All 99 Tory MPs were going to be in the House.

As originally written, it was an all-encompassing, blanket provision, asking that all measures in the throne speech "fully respect the provinces' areas of jurisdiction and that the financial pressures the provinces are suffering as a consequence of the fiscal imbalance be alleviated, as demanded by the premier of Quebec." This is the same premier of Quebec, Jean Charest, who walked away from the health accord with a side deal recognizing "asymmetrical federalism" - the right of his province to make its own way on health care.

[Stephen Harper] acknowledged he'd had telephone calls expressing concern about the situation in the last 24 hours from some premiers. New Brunswick's Bernard Lord, the only premier Harper named, had been worried about the Conservatives' support for a motion that some feared might affect relations between Quebec and other provinces, Harper said.