It's an apparent chink in the Conservatives' electoral armour that opponents will try to exploit over the final full week of the campaign.

Liberal Leader Stephane Dion seized on it Sunday, saying Harper is "in denial" about Canada's economic straits.

"He has no plan and continues with his laissez-faire, I-don't-care approach, doing nothing to help Canada face the worsening economic situation in North America," Dion said during a campaign stop in Iqaluit, Nunavut.

Although Harper is expected to finally unveil the Conservative platform on Tuesday, a senior party spokesman indicated that the prime minister won't spring any new, last-minute economic plan on voters. Nor will he change his message that Canada is well-positioned to ride out the global economic storm as long as it maintains a steady hand on the tiller.

"The prime minister is in a different position than opposition leaders are," the spokesman said.

"When you're not expected to win government . . . you can spend time fearmongering on the economy and cheering for a recession for your own political gain. But when you're the prime minister you actually have to be honest about the situation. To say that we're going to have serious problems in the banking sector, when that is in fact not the case, would be destablizing to markets."

Harper, who took a break from the hustings Sunday, will spend the final week contrasting his "modest, achievable, realistic" platform with what the Tory spokesman characterized as the "grandiose, risky schemes" advocated by opposition parties. That will be bolstered by the party's largest-ever, direct-mail campaign warning voters against Dion's proposal to impose a carbon tax.

However, the latest Canadian Press Harris-Decima rolling survey suggests Harper would be wise to bolster his own platform with assurances that he has a plan to ride out the economic maelstrom.

With just over a week to go until voting day on Oct. 14, the survey pegged Tory support at 34 per cent, down from an early campaign high of 41 per cent.

Potentially more ominous for the Tories, who have based their campaign almost entirely on the perceived strength of Harper's leadership, the prime minister's personal popularity has also dipped to a campaign low.

Forty-one per cent said they have a favourable impression of Harper - down 12 points - while 51 per cent had a negative impression.

Forty per cent of respondents said their thinking about which party to support has been somewhat or greatly affected by last week's stock market meltdown, prompted by the financial crisis in the United States. Concern was most pronounced among those in Ontario and Quebec, the country's manufacturing heartland.

Harris-Decima president Bruce Anderson said the results suggest that Harper's stay-the-course message is not sufficient.

"The trendlines are sending a signal to the Conservatives that at least in Central Canada . . . where people are feeling more apprehensive about the economy that affects them most directly, that they're not feeling the level of attention or the kind of solution-oriented approach that they're looking for from the Conservatives," Anderson said.

While the Conservative trendline is heading down as the parties move into the home stretch, the Liberals are trending up, albeit still lagging well behind the Tories at 24 per cent support.

More encouraging for Liberals; Dion finally seems to be gaining a bit of traction after reasonably strong performances in last week's televised debates. Thirty-seven per cent of respondents - up seven points and statistically tied with Harper - said they have a favourable impression of Dion while 51 per cent had a negative impression.

Green Leader Elizabeth May was the only other leader to get a boost from the debate, up five points to 48 per cent registering a favourable impression.

NDP Leader Jack Layton and Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe got favourable ratings from 57 per cent, both down slightly.

In national support, Liberals were only four points ahead of the NDP at 20 per cent. The Green party was at 13 per cent and the Bloc Quebecois at eight per cent nationally and leading in Quebec with 33 per cent.

The Liberals held a slim four-point lead over the Tories in vote-rich Ontario.

The NDP's Layton spent Sunday in Liberal ridings, stepping up his pitch to replace the Liberals as the official Opposition. Layton urged Liberal and Green supporters to rally behind the NDP to defeat Harper.

"We (must) make sure not only that we get out to vote but that we bring a whole lot of brand new friends with us who voted other ways before . . .to show Stephen Harper the door," Layton told supporters in St. John's N.L.

The NDP released new television ads Sunday, targetting Dion's Liberals directly.

"Stephane Dion and the Liberals have run such a confused campaign, they'll be spending the next two years wondering what went wrong and fighting amongst themselves," Layton says in the ads.

"The real alternative to Mr. Harper is me, Jack Layton."

However, Anderson said the NDP appears to have stalled after a short-lived bounce from Layton's strong showing in the English debate. He said that suggests Layton's economic prescription - rolling back $50 billion in corporate tax cuts at a time when business is reeling from the market nosedive - is "an anvil" holding back NDP growth.

Star Liberal candidate Bob Rae, a former NDP premier of Ontario, trained his guns on both Layton and May. He likened them to independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader, who syphoned off votes from Democratic contender Al Gore in 2000, allowing George W. Bush to win the U.S. presidency.

"We've got the Nader twins at work here. Elizabeth May and Jack, they're both urging people to vote for them. ," Rae said on a national news program.

"The net effect of that is going to be to end up electing Mr. Harper."

Until now, Liberals have avoided going after May, with whom Dion struck a non-compete agreement last year. The two leaders agreed not to run candidates in each other's ridings and Liberals expected May would also endorse Dion for prime minister.

May did sing Dion's praises initially, to the consternation of some Greens who felt she was undermining her own party's chances. But she's muted that praise of late and did nothing to boost Dion during last week's debates, leaving some Liberals wondering what was the point of the May-Dion entente.

Anderson said the Greens are enjoying some "pretty serious" support, particularly in Ontario and British Columbia but probably not enough to win a seat. Hence, he said Green supporters have to decide this week what they want more: to stop Harper or vote for May.

In St. Hyacinthe, Que., Bloc Leader Gilles Duceppe urged Quebecers to coalesce around his party to stop Harper, using some of the most incendiary language thus far in the campaign to make his argument.

Duceppe called Harper a man without morals, a "cheater" and a "liar." He said Harper will destory the environment, stomp on women's rights and dismantle the gun registry.

The rolling survey interviewed 1,236 people Wednesday through Saturday and is considered accurate to within 2.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20 - though the margin is higher for regional samples. Respondents were asked, "If a federal election were being held tomorrow, who do you think you would be voting for in your area?"

More information on the poll is available at www.harrisdecima.ca.