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Joe Oliver, the finance minister, has been road-testing the “fragile global economy” line for a few weeks — not to mention the suggestion that such conditions are not optimal for taking “imprudent risks with inexperienced leadership.”

It has all the hallmarks of a 2008 re-run, when Stéphane Dion was pilloried for being a leader who was not worth the risk. “When you’re running a trillion and a half dollar economy, you don’t get a chance to have do-overs,” Harper said of Dion’s infamous false start interview with CTV, when the-then Liberal leader was asked what he might have done differently on the economy.

A key difference this time around could be that Canadians appear to have an appetite for a change of government and, crucially, little fear about the alternatives.

Voters might buy the line that the problems with the economy are imported but, consequently, they don’t seem to think things would be any worse under a different shade of government.

An Abacus Data poll last week suggested only 30% believe an NDP win would adversely affect economic growth – scarcely more than say they would vote Conservative. The number for the Liberals was similar. Both parties scored well on job creation, infrastructure spending, the environment and even on security. The only area where there was an evident caution was on the opposition parties’ taxation policies.

Having decoupled the economy from government performance, the Conservatives have, inadvertently, taken the sting out of historic fears of NDP competence. At a time when three in four voters say they are interested in changing the government, that is not good news for a ruling party.