FREDERICTON - The official start of the provincial election campaign in New Brunswick is more than a week away, but if the number of pot-shots and attack ads so far are any indication, it could be quite a 32-day contest.

For the first time, the province has a fixed election date -- Sept. 27 -- and the parties have been in unofficial campaign mode since the spring.

In recent weeks, the rhetoric has risen along with the summer temperatures.

Earlier this month, the New Democrats made a campaign promise to cut the pay and pensions of elected members, but in doing so they singled out Conservative Leader David Alward in a poster that spoofed the documentary "Super Size Me." In the ad, Alward has his mouth crammed full of french fries, accompanied by the line, "Super size my pension, you're paying for it."

NDP Leader Roger Duguay denied the doctored picture was an attack ad. "It is not an attack because ... on some other issues we will be in agreement with the Liberals and Conservatives, but on that specific issue, for me, it's a scandal," he said.

Alward was critical of the ad, but just two days later, his party doctored an image of Liberal Premier Shawn Graham on the Tory website, portraying Graham as Pollyanna -- the title character in a series of books about a girl who makes a game of finding the bright side of any situation.

That image was later removed from the website.

"If the best the three leaders can come up with is pictures of french fries in their opponent's mouth and pictures of their opponent dressed up as a little girl, then we are in big trouble in the province," said Donald Wright, a political scientist at the University of New Brunswick.

"I think it reflects the utter and absolute absence of imagination in New Brunswick politics."

Wright said New Brunswickers have no interest in politics during the summer, and won't become engaged in the debate until after Labour Day, so the parties have been trying to get coverage in the media through other means.

Liberal Energy Minister Jack Keir gathered reporters in Fredericton last week to question whether the Conservatives were nearing or had exceeded the limit for pre-election spending.

Keir said he didn't know how much they had spent, and wasn't planning to file a complaint with Elections New Brunswick, but he knew they had placed a lot of advertisements and thought it was "a question that should be asked."

Party officials for the Conservatives and Liberals later said they were both within their spending limits.

Then the Conservatives issued a news release saying the government was preparing legislation that would prohibit community and church suppers.

The Liberal government quickly dismissed the claim, saying legislation that passed unanimously in 2007 just improves the regulations for food storage and preparation at such community events.

The Conservatives later softened their claim, but Liberal House Leader Greg Byrne accused the Tories of trying to score political points.

"There are some things that should be above politics, and to try to create fear among those who go to community suppers and churches should be off limits to any political party," Byrne said. "I think it devalues the respect that they have in the eyes of the public."

However, Byrne said he thought Keir's musing about the Tory finances was acceptable.

"I don't think you'll see many people lay awake at night wondering if parties are meeting their election spending limits," he said. "I think those are fair questions for any political party to ask."

The Conservatives have radio ads running in Saint John that are critical of the record of the Graham government. The ads portray Graham as someone who can't be trusted after his government tried to dismantle the Saint John campus of the University of New Brunswick, and tried to sell NB Power to Hydro-Quebec.

Daniel Allain, the co-chair of the Conservative campaign, said the ads are in response to ones run by the Liberals in March.

"Well we're not going to sit idly by and do nothing," he said. "I think we have to show New Brunswickers what this government has done in the last four years."

Wright said he hopes the parties will focus on the important issues, but doesn't expect that to happen until the final weeks of the campaign.

"No party seems to be able to come to terms with the fiscal crisis coming down the pipe," he said. "As a result they're trying to deflect, they're scrounging, they're desperate, trying to find a target on their opponent without much success."