The flames of political discontent from the sponsorship scandal are scorching the Liberals, and now a new poll shows the party's national support falling to 27 per cent.

That represents a 10 percentage-point drop in the past two months, according to an Ipsos-Reid poll conducted for CTV and The Globe and Mail.

The Conservatives are up to 30 per cent, a four-point rise. The NDP are at 19 per cent.

In Quebec, where Liberal gains would be crucial to any hope of forming a future majority government, the Grits trail the sovereigntist Bloc Quebecois by 30 points -- 48 to 18.

But the Liberals are down in virtually every region, and are statistically tied with the Conservatives in vote-rich Ontario.

Ominously, 45 per cent of Canadians say the Liberal government of Prime Minister Paul Martin has lost its "moral right" to govern.

The poll is just the latest development in five days of hell for the Liberals, who have been seen their numbers sag in other polls, are under constant Gomery-fueled attack by the opposition -- and are now hearing stories that some of their caucus members are considering defecting.

The Liberals "are not just panicked, they're freaking out," said Bob Fife, CTV's Ottawa bureau chief.

"Just a few hours ago, the prime minister sent a letter to all Liberals across the country asking them to stay united, and essentially laying out an election platform."

According to senior Liberals Fife talked to Monday, the government could be reduced from the current 133 seats, to about 60 seats in the next election.

As for the Conservatives, Fife says "they think the gods are lined up for them, and this is the best time to hit the hustings, and I think that's going to happen in the next several weeks."

'Responsibility to act'

Earlier in the day, Martin sounded defiant in his first media remarks on the sponsorship issue since details of Jean Brault's testimony at the Gomery inquiry were revealed last Thursday. The former Groupaction ad agency president's allegations of corruption were the most serious yet to be raised at the inquiry.

"Not only do I have the moral authority to govern, I have the moral responsibility to act," he told reporters on Parliament Hill earlier Monday.

He also expressed his personal disgust for what he heard of Brault's allegations: "I was as offended as any other Canadian, even if that testimony is contested, I was personally offended by what I heard.

"That is not the way that politics is done in Quebec. That is not the way that politics should be done in Canada. And it is certainly not the way that I believe that politics should be done," Martin said.

Brault alleged that he systematically kicked back huge amounts of taxpayer money to the federal Liberal party's Quebec wing -- a deception he claims involved senior Liberal organizers and people close to former prime minister Jean Chretien.

With two other polls in recent days showing Liberal popularity falling in likely response to Brault's testimony, Martin's government is under tremendous pressure.

Ontario Liberal MP Pat O'Brien, who opposes his party's gay marriage policy, said the Conservatives have approached him about switching parties. O'Brien said he knows of at least three other Liberals who have been contacted about switching.

That grouping doesn't include Alberta Liberal MP David Kilgour. On the weekend, Kilgour attacked his party in a newspaper interview, saying, "The Liberal party is seen as looking on the public trust as a vulture looks on a dying calf."

Kilgour admitted the Tories have courted him. He left the Tories in 1990 in a spat over the GST.

Question period

In question period Monday, all three opposition parties made the sponsorship scandal the focus of their attacks.

"We, Mr. Speaker, are the government that put the Gomery Commission in place in order to find the answers that Canadians want to hear," said Martin.

But Scott Brison, the government's public works minister, dodged a question about why Parliament's public accounts committee inquiry into the scandal was shut down before hearing from Brault before last year's election.

Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe kept up with his theme of having the Liberals put an estimated $2.2 million in "dirty money" they allegedly got from Groupaction in trust.

"The Liberal Party said from the outset we will reimburse any money received inappropriately," Martin said.

"We'd like to not take any chances: They've been using dirty money for three elections; we don't want them to do it four times," Duceppe shot back.

Duceppe also alleged some of the money must have ended up in secret funds: "It's not a parallel group, it's parallel accounting."

Brison has said reviews of the Quebec wing of the Liberal Party's bank accounts by outside auditors found no irregularities.

Snap election?

Conservative spokesman Geoff Norquay told The Canadian Press that the polls also seemed to suggest that most respondents didn't want an immediate election.

An unnamed Tory MP said these results were likely a knee-jerk reaction, and he expected the Liberals to recover somewhat.

But both Tory and Liberal MPs said election readiness was becoming a high priority.

The most recent Ipsos-Reid poll was conducted April 8 to 10. It is considered accurate to within +/- 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.