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Harper is 'lying,' Duceppe repeats

Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe accused Conservative Leader Stephen Harper of lying Monday, the second time in as many days that he has questioned the Tory leader's honesty.

Asked by reporters about employment insurance benefits available to Quebecers laid off at manufacturing plants east of Quebec City, Duceppe said Harper has been exaggerating them.

"Mr. Harper is saying that 360 hours a year means 50 weeks on unemployment. He is lying. He is lying. The figures … are very clear, and let's say in Gaspé, you find the most: it's 32 weeks, not 50."

Duceppe was campaigning in Saint-Jean-Port-Joli, Que., about 120 kilometres northeast of Quebec City on the south side of the St. Lawrence River.

On Sunday, talking about discussions of a possible Conservative-led coalition in 2004, Duceppe said he never intended in this campaign to go into great detail about the talks aimed at toppling Paul Martin's Liberals and installing Harper as prime minister.

However, the Conservative leader's recent assertion that any government led by a party without the most seats would be "illegitimate" forced him to change his mind.

Harper invited him to take part in those discussions, Duceppe said. So as far as Duceppe is concerned, there is only one conclusion that can be drawn: Harper "is lying."

On the harmonized sales tax, Duceppe said the Bloc wouldn't have voted for the Conservative budget even if it had included a deal to compensate Quebec.

The province wants $2.2 billion in compensation from Ottawa for harmonizing its provincial sales tax with the federal GST in the 1990s. There was no mention of the HST deal in the recent Conservative budget.

Christian Paradis, Natural Resources minister in the previous Harper government, told Radio-Canada Friday that the Conservatives would work to conclude a deal with Quebec by Sept. 15.

Duceppe said the Liberal platform is also unacceptable, because it doesn't include an HST deal and doesn't preclude a Lower Churchill hydroelectric deal, which he says intrudes on provincial jurisdiction.

Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff was asked why there is no reference in the platform to the HST compensation deal currently being negotiated with Quebec. He said that deal is still being worked on and that there is room in their fiscal plan to fund it, but he didn't elaborate.

On gun control, Duceppe denied there are rural-urban tensions in his caucus over support for scrapping the long-gun registry.

"Mr. Harper is just trying to impose here the kind of mentality and kind of policies you see in the United States," he said. "He doesn't fit with us."