Parties Urged to Agree on Safe Way to Hold Possible Election in Pandemic

Voters head to cast their ballot in Canada's federal election at the Fairbanks Interpretation Centre in Dartmouth, N.S., on October 21, 2019. The Canadian Press/Andrew Vaughan

OTTAWA—What happens if Canada’s minority Liberal government is defeated this fall and Elections Canada concludes it can’t safely conduct an election because a second wave of the deadly coronavirus is sweeping the country?

That worst-case scenario was on the minds of some federal politicians as they watched New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs pull the plug Monday on his minority Conservative government, becoming the first jurisdiction in Canada to send voters to the polls in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.