Can Ontario NDP exorcise Rae’s ghost?
One of the uncertainties of Ontario’s approaching election is whether voters are ready to forgive the New Democratic Party, and, if so, by how much?
It’s been more than 20 years since the demise of the province’s sole NDP government, which came to power in 1990 under Bob Rae and so unnerved Ontario’s usually placid voters that they’ve never quite gotten over it. After a single mandate the party was reduced from 74 seats to 17, and in five elections since has only managed to exceed that number once, to its current 21 seats in a 107-seat legislature. Andrea Horwath, entering her third campaign as leader, tends to be more popular than her party but has struggled to erase the residue of distrust, even while the other parties have put forward little in the way of attractive alternatives.
So is this the year? The CBC’s poll tracker puts both Liberals and NDP far behind the Progressive Conservatives in popularity, though seat projections have Horwath’s party in second spot with the Liberals a distant third. No one is ready to concede the election yet, though, given suspicions that PC leader Doug Ford’s potential for self-destruction remains a very real possibility. Should Ford’s opponents’ dream come true, and he blunders himself out of his commanding lead, the question is who would benefit more, Horwath or Premier Kathleen Wynne?
The legacy of mistrust Rae left behind derived from his party’s epic mishandling of the economy. Faced with a downturn, he initially tried to spend his way out of the trough, then sought to simultaneously push up taxes while putting restraints on spending. In the end he managed to upset both left-wing and right-wing constituencies, with unions and business alike upset at soaring deficits accompanied by broken promises and a sinking economy.
While he made plenty of mistakes, hindsight suggests Rae came to power at a particularly unfortunate moment, when a province already on the brink of trouble was more-than-usually unsuited to the NDP’s big-spending approach to government. Whatever the case, the party has been spinning its wheels in third place for 23 years while PCs and Liberals took turns upsetting voters.
Horwath’s effort to ease the party towards the centre in 2014 backfired when Wynne outflanked her with a barrage of debt-fuelled spending programs. The NDP leader has made it clear that won’t happen again, unveiling a platform that matches Liberal promises of another spending binge, but disavows the huge debts the Liberals would run up to finance it.
“People are fed up with politicians who offer nothing more than sound bites and decisions that just keep making life harder for themselves and their families,” Horwath said in launching the plan. “I am here today because it doesn’t have to be this way.”
As usual with big spenders, the math behind the plan is equal part pixie dust and daydreams. Horwath would slap yet another tax hike on higher incomes, even though federal and Ontario Liberals have already jacked up rates three times without managing to balance a budget or reduce a debt. At some point, even the most credulous voters are going to have to question the theory that taxing the rich is the road to fiscal salvation, when it never actually works in practice.
It might not matter, much, however. Wynne continues to plumb the depths of personal unpopularity. Given a choice between two profligate spenders — one of whom has had five years of steadily-sinking polls — Horwath has to think her prospects look promising. A Liberal campaign that seems bereft of strategy, other than calling Doug Ford nasty names, may add to her hopes. As well, over 15 years in power the Liberals have matched and exceeded Rae’s record in debt and deficits.
One open question, and a hard one to measure, is the current confused state of New Democrat world. The country’s two existing NDP governments are at war with one another over Alberta’s determination to build a pipeline to the Pacific, and the B.C. government’s determination to thwart the plan by whatever means. B.C. premier John Horgan has shown himself to be an intransigent ideologue, intent on disrupting a nationally-important project rather than upset the three Green party members propping up his government, and their coterie of implacable activists.
In contrast, Alberta Premier Rachel Notley finds herself in the unlikely position of oil industry champion, insisting Alberta — and Canada — can adhere to a responsible environmental regime without shutting down a crucial industry on which millions of Canadians depend. The party’s federal leader, Jagmeet Singh, has been missing in action, leaving it to others to try (unsuccessfully) to broker a compromise. The spectacle bolsters the impression that the NDP is great at floating high-minded ideas when it’s out of power, but can’t even get along with its own people once given the chance to govern.
As usual, Ontarians appear to be having trouble rousing themselves to the contest. That could mean they’ve already made up their minds, which would be bad news for Wynne and her party, or that levels of distaste for an unappealing legislature have pushed interest to new lows. One bit of circumstantial evidence that can’t help but cheer Horwath appeared over the weekend in the Toronto Star, which interrupted its dogged efforts to boost Liberal prospects long enough to notice that, unlike Wynne’s party, the NDP platform makes some nominal effort to pay for its promises.
“There’s nothing inherently ‘progressive’ about running bigger and bigger deficits,” it added, a suggestion that must come as a shock to a government that has spent 15 years doing nothing but.
When even the Star starts having doubts, the Liberals know they have trouble. Bob Rae quit the NDP years ago. Maybe his ghost will finally go too.