MONTREAL - The Bloc Quebecois achieved its goal of keeping Prime Minister Stephen Harper from his desired majority government Tuesday as all three main parties emerged from the Quebec political battlefield with virtually the same number of seats as in 2006.
The deja vu result suited Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe just fine as he addressed a tumultuous crowd in Montreal.
"My friends, we reached our goal," he told cheering supporters in a victory speech.
"Without the Bloc Quebecois, Stephen Harper would have had his majority government," Duceppe said, although he congratulated him on his victory in the rest of Canada.
In Calgary, Harper congratulated Duceppe on his campaign and said that while the two men had disagreements, he hoped they could work together on improving Canada's economy.
Stopping a Conservative majority was the Bloc mantra during the campaign, the first where the Bloc didn't focus on sovereignty as the reason it should have the support of Quebecers.
The Bloc clocked in at 48 seats as final votes were tallied, down from 51 in 2006. The Liberals won 13 and two others were too close to call early Wednesday morning.
The Conservatives won 10 seats, the same as the last general election.
The NDP's Thomas Mulcair held Montreal-area Outremont and Independent Andre Arthur kept his riding of Portneuf-Jacques-Cartier near Quebec City.
The Bloc took 38 per cent of the popular vote, while the Liberals garnered 24 per cent, the Conservatives 22 per cent and the NDP 12. The Green Party notched three per cent of the popular vote.
In 2006, the Bloc garnered 42 per cent of the popular vote in Quebec, the Conservatives 25 per cent and the Liberals 21 per cent. The NDP, which didn't win a seat then, got eight per cent of the vote and the Greens four per cent.
In Montreal on Tuesday, a Trudeau was elected to the House of Commons for the first time since 1980 as Justin Trudeau, the eldest son of former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, won back Papineau riding for the Liberals.
Sounding like his famous father, Trudeau warned Harper not to get too cocky with his victory.
Conservative International Trade Minister Michael Fortier went down to defeat but other Tory stars such as Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Blackburn, Heritage Minister Josee Verner and Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon were re-elected.
Conservative Beauce MP Maxime Bernier, who quit cabinet after he acknowledged he left confidential documents at his girlfriend's apartment, romped to victory in Beauce riding.
The Conservatives considered a breakthrough in Quebec key to winning a majority and had wooed the province during their time in office, making such overtures as declaring the Quebecois to be a nation within a united Canada.
Strategists believed they could win Quebec from the Bloc, whose relevance was being questioned in the face of declining support for sovereignty and whose leader, Gilles Duceppe, was rumoured to be eyeing an exit.
Predictions abounded that the Conservatives could take as many as 30 seats and support in opinion polls was on a steady, upward climb.
But a misreading of the Quebec electorate by the Tories added fire to the Bloc campaign and Duceppe, who insisted his party was the only one capable of stalling the Conservative drive to a majority in Parliament.
The Conservatives obligingly gave him ammunition, first in the form of $45 million in spending cuts to cultural programs across the country -- programs the Conservatives said were inefficient but which Quebecers defended with marches in the street.
The Tories also drew a rebuke from Duceppe for tougher sentences for young offenders.
The Bloc leader described the plan to give harsher sentences to offenders as young as 14 for repeat offences or heinous crimes as sending children to "universities of crime."
Quebecers -- often leery of Harper for having an alleged hidden agenda -- also drew no comfort from the Conservatives' delay in releasing their official platform until the last week of the campaign.
Conservative spokesman Jason Kenney tried to put a positive spin on the Quebec results, saying the Tories were now the second choice for francophone voters.
"We are growing in every region except possibly Quebec -- we are still maintaining a strong base there," Kenney said in Calgary.
"I think we need to learn to communicate more effectively. In the long run, we have that base and it's there to build on."
Jeremy Doel, a Conservative party member from Cochrane, Alta., said the party simply has to get more out of Quebec.
"Something has to change in Quebec," he said. "The party has done so much for Quebec that I'm not sure why they haven't got on board yet."
Another loser of the night was Liberal Leader Stephane Dion, who didn't see the number of Grit ridings drop but failed to improve the party's Quebec total to anywhere close to the days of Pierre Trudeau or Jean Chretien.
Dion suffered from low expectations coming into the campaign but gained more respect from the days when newspaper cartoons depicted him as a rat.
He was praised for his performance in the French-language debate and his stand on the environment but the father of the Clarity Act, which sets the ground rules for Quebec sovereignty referendums, never electrified voters.
The cash-strapped Liberals also suffered from organizational hurdles and the lack of a compelling core of candidates.
The NDP, which had boasted at one point that it stood a good chance in a dozen ridings in Quebec, poured more money into Quebec than it ever had before but failed to expand its presence.
