OTTAWA -- Prime Minister Stephen Harper moved to address key weaknesses in his suddenly wobbly campaign Tuesday, extending a helping hand to hard-hit manufacturers and an olive branch to the arts community.

With one week to the Oct. 14 vote and his polling numbers sliding, Harper claimed to have anticipated the economic downturn as he unveiled a campaign platform that sweetened the pot for battered manufacturers.

The Tory platform gives $100 million a year over four years to hard-hit manufacturers, while promising to slash tariffs on imported new machinery that the Conservatives say will save industry $345 million a year.

And in reaction to criticism the party is anti-culture, Harper promised to scrap controversial changes to tax-credit eligibility the arts community argues would give the government power to determine what films and television shows are made in Canada.

He billed his moderate, low-cost platform as the right course of action amid economic uncertainty, unlike the free-spending, panic-fuelled proposals of Liberal rival Stephane Dion.

"If you are making it up in response to the latest news, or the latest change in the stock market, then it is obvious that you don't really have a plan," Harper told a business audience in downtown Toronto.

"The strengths of a plan are advance preparation and consistent execution."

Harper had barely begun to speak before Dion swiftly derided his new direction, blasting the prime minister for not preparing and protecting Canadians for the economic downturn.

"Mr. Harper is coming too little too late, with little help for the industry and the manufacturing sector and the aerospace industry," Dion said during a stop in Vancouver.

"They don't believe in the role of the government to help the people and help the economy."

If elected, Dion has promised to put an economic recovery plan in place within the first 30 days and accelerate planned infrastructure spending to create jobs because "Canadians cannot wait, the economy cannot wait."

NDP Leader Jack Layton called the aid to manufacturers a "desperate act at the last minute" to "paper over" Harper's hands-off approach to the economy.

The additional $100 million a year for aerospace and automotive industries is just a fraction of the $50 billion in tax breaks Harper has been giving away to some of the country's wealthiest corporations.

The Tory proposals, while modest, appear targeted directly at the Harper's growing vulnerability in Quebec and Ontario -- two vote-rich provinces where a new poll shows the Conservatives falling sharply.

The latest Canadian Press Harris-Decima poll released Tuesday had the Tories falling to 31 per cent, 10 points below their campaign high water mark and only five points ahead of the Liberals. The NDP were at 21 per cent and the Green Party at 13 nationally.

In Ontario, the Tories tumbled eight points back of the Liberals and barely ahead of the NDP, while in Quebec, the party was at 19 per cent and behind both the Bloc Quebecois and the Liberals.

Harper said the choice for Canadians is between his cautious, responsible course and an opposition that wants to "jump off the cliff" in panic.

"The alternative is a bunch of guys who want to do something, and they are big things ... (but) they are also very bad ideas that would make the problems of ordinary people -- job creation, savings in the stock market -- infinitely worse, and make them worse very, very quickly."

While most voters don't blame Harper for the economic turmoil, "many voters will be looking for a government that is pragmatic and open to intervening to cushion Canada and Canadians from the worst impacts" if it persists or worsens, said pollster Bruce Anderson.

Dion described Harper's characterization of his proposals as "distortion and dishonesty" -- particularly those pertaining to the Liberals' controversial Green Shift carbon tax.

Citing an open letter from 230 academic economists who favour taxing carbon as the best approach to deal with the issue of climate change, Dion said Harper is the only economist in Canada who doesn't seem to get it.

The Conservative platform comes at a critical time in the election campaign. After leading comfortably for most of the campaign, the party suddenly finds itself in need of a boost to arrest a sharp four-day slide in national polls.

To be sure, the economy has not been on the side of the incumbent party.

Monday's 573-point bloodbath on the Toronto Stock Exchange was the third massive drop in a week and came as most western governments, with the exception of Canada, embarked on massive economic interventions.

The Harris-Decima survey suggests the Conservatives have lost 12 points in Quebec and 15 points in Ontario, ground zero for the country's economic woes.

The rolling poll sample represents 1,251 interviews conducted Friday through Sunday and is considered accurate to within plus or minus 2.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20 -- though the margin is much higher for regional samples.

NDP Leader Jack Layton has pledged billions in new spending, to be offset by a rollback in corporate tax cuts promised by the Tories.

Layton is in agreement with Harper, however, that the Green Shift carbon tax proposed by Dion is not the way to go.