From what I understand about the Canadian government (thanks to scottybear, if the current government gets a vote of no confidence then they HAVE to have elections within a certain time period. Basically it's a time that the government has no confidence in their current prime minister and they vote to throw out the government and leave it to the people to vote on a new government including the PM. It really is quite interesting to hear about it and how it all still ties back to the queen of england.