OTTAWA — Liberal leadership candidate Michael Ignatieff's on-again, off-again ownership of the Quebec-as-nation push is definitely on again.

Ignatieff, the Liberal MP with the impressive academic credentials, has been alternately embracing and distancing himself from the initiative with dizzying regularity.

Early Wednesday afternoon in a round-table discussion with The Canadian Press, Ignatieff was emphatic that a controversial internal Liberal party resolution to recognize Quebec as a nation was not his idea.

"Just so it's clear, for the 20th time, the (Quebec) resolution was not initiated by the Ignatieff camp,'' he said. "It was initiated by people who support a range of candidacies.''

At that point in the day, the concept was clearly dividing the Liberal caucus and was a potential political liability.

By late Wednesday, with Prime Minister Stephen Harper's surprise announcement that he'd introduce a Commons motion to recognize Quebecers as a nation within a united Canada, Ignatieff had begun to change his tune.

"I think it's a good day for Canada,'' Ignatieff said of the Conservative motion.

"That is to say, I'm proud of the way in which the Liberal party and my candidacy listened to Quebec.''

By Thursday morning, Ignatieff was firmly planting his flag in the initiative.

"It really did start with us, in the leadership campaign, going into small towns in Quebec, reaching out, listening to Quebecers . . . ,'' he told CTV's Canada-AM.

"They asked us, as a party, to affirm their distinctiveness, their particular place in the history of our country and I was pleased in my campaign to do so. And I think we have every reason to say this started with us.''

It is just the latest Ignatieff U-turn on the subject.

When the Quebec wing of the Liberal party adopted the nation resolution on Oct. 21, Ignatieff's campaign issued a press release trumpeting his leadership on the issue:

"I was the first to say our party must recognize the fact that Quebecers consider their province as their national home, and that we cannot let the failures of the past forever define our constitutional future,'' Ignatieff was quoted in the release.

A week later, amid a raging public debate over the potential ramifications of the resolution for the Liberal party, the Ignatieff team began calling reporters with "new massaging.''

Credit for the nation notion was to be shared among all the leadership candidates.

"All four of the front-runners have said that they recognize Quebec as a nation . . . including Bob (Rae) himself,'' Ignatieff told The Globe and Mail.

Ignatieff complained that Rae was "was trying to imply that I want to pitch the country into constitutional talks tomorrow morning. This is false. And he knows that it's false.''

True enough, Ignatieff had urged caution in Montreal when the Quebec-as-nation resolution was adopted: "It's the first step in a long road, and we have to proceed prudently and wisely.''

But Ignatieff _ during a Sept. 10 leadership debate in Quebec City _ had been the first federal politician in a decade to pry the lid off the constitutional casket.

"Other candidates have said . . . recognizing Quebec as a nation in the Constitution is too difficult,'' Ignatieff said in his prepared, closing remarks in the Quebec capital. "Yes, it's difficult, but we must do it.

"Otherwise, what alternative are we offering against (Prime Minister Stephen) Harper's status quo and the Bloc's politics of fantasy? I'm not in politics to say that the things we need to do are difficult, but to find solutions.''