Liberals leave Singh grasping for relevance
OTTAWA • The tribulations endured by Jagmeet Singh since becoming NDP leader could be considered misfortune when viewed in isolation. But the frequency of their recurrence is starting to make it look like carelessness.
The ejection of Erin Weir from the NDP caucus Thursday over harassment allegations is just the latest distraction from the leader’s prime directive — to win back the one million voters who backed the NDP in 2011 but defected to the Liberals four years later. Around half of all left-ofcentre voters still support Justin Trudeau, and that is unlikely to change unless Singh can live up to the early hype as “Justin’s worst nightmare.”
There are few signs of rejuvenation — the NDP’s support has flatlined. An average of all public polls has them lagging badly at around 15 per cent — where they were when Singh was elected in October. In fund-raising terms — a useful metric of voter commitment — the NDP corralled less than half of the Liberal total, from half the number of donors, in the first quarter of this year.
The good news is that donations are up from the same period last year and are back to more traditional levels in non-election years (the party raised $1.4 million from 16,000 donors, similar to the $1.6 million raised in 2013). The bad news is the New Democrats are still carrying a $3-million debt from the last election.
It all started so promisingly — Singh was elected as the leader who could compete head on with Trudeau on Instagram. Early articles focused on his hair and colour-co-ordinated turban and socks.
Mr. Weir is unwilling to take appropriate responsibility for his actions and therefore any rehabilitative approach is now untenable. NDP leader Jagmeet Singh
I apologize to anyone who felt uncomfortable because I stood or sat too close or spoke with them more than they wished to talk with me. Ousted NDP MP Weir
The hope in New Democrat circles was that Singh would resonate in the voter-rich suburban ridings around Toronto and Vancouver, particularly among ethnic voters who had pingponged between Conservatives and Liberals in past elections.
Yet fault lines in the movement emerged even before Singh had been installed as leader. In the closing stages of the campaign, Quebec MP Pierre Nantel warned he and other New Democrats from the province might sit as independents if a non-Quebec candidate took the helm, particularly a turban-wearing Sikh not compatible with the province’s views on secularism. Nantel still sits in the caucus, but his comments about Singh’s electability in Quebec appeared borne out in the Lac-Saint-Jean byelection, where the NDP were reduced from their close second finish in 2015 to a distant fourth in October 2017.
More bad news followed in December, when the NDP saw its share of the vote fall in four more by-elections. Singh was elected leader in the hope that he would set the suburbs alight with enthusiasm for all things orange, as he did in his home-town of Brampton, Ont., where he was a member of the provincial parliament. At a “Jagmeet and Greet” campaign event for Scarborough-Agincourt candidate Brian Chang, held in the next-door riding, Singh talked about how he was born in Scarborough: “It has a nice homecoming feeling,” he said.
The feeling was not reciprocated — the NDP vote in a riding with a large South Asian population dropped from an already disappointing eight per cent in 2015, to five per cent. A similarly disconcerting result was recorded in Surrey, B.C.
Singh shrugged off the losses, saying he is running a marathon, not a sprint.
He tried to rekindle the fascination that had helped get him elected with a colourful photo op to mark his engagement to clothing designer Gurkiran Kaur. But the headlines were soon less vibrant, with allegations of harassment levelled against Weir and former MP Peter Stoffer.
When the NDP grassroots met in Ottawa in February for their biannual policy convention, divisions emerged over resolutions on boycotting Israeli goods; adopting the hard-left LEAP manifesto; and, on the Trans Mountain pipeline from Alberta to B.C.
Singh avoided all divisions in his speech, instead focusing on inequality and taxing web giants. He was given a ringing 90-per-cent endorsement in a leadership vote, but the activist wing, including former leadership candidate Niki Ashton, accused the party of burying the issues.
Friction over Trans Mountain between the duelling NDP governments in Alberta and British Columbia can hardly be laid at Singh’s door — but his response can. He has tried to straddle the issue, so as not to alienate New Democrats in either Alberta or B.C., simultaneously opposing Trans Mountain because the process was not consultative enough, while granting that the federal government does have jurisdiction on pipelines. His suggested solution — punting the issue to the Supreme Court of Canada — delighted no one.
There have been other headwinds: Trudeau’s illfated trip to India was a gift for the Conservatives but Singh was dragged into the quagmire of Sikh separatist politics when video emerged of him attending a rally where violent religious leaders were hailed. It took far longer than it should have for him to denounce the mastermind of the Air India bombing, Talwinder Singh Parmar, and to confirm he won’t attend events featuring people who promote political violence.
Many of these blows have been acts of providence. But others have been selfinflicted, most notably, the decision to punish veteran MP David Christopherson for voting in support of a Conservative motion on the Summer Jobs program.
Christopherson is a longtime supporter of a woman’s right to choose but said he couldn’t support a measure he found unconstitutional, namely the government’s requirement that required churches and other groups to disavow their beliefs to qualify for summer jobs funding. Singh stripped him of his vice-chairmanship of the House affairs committee — a move that sparked a mini-revolt among senior members of caucus. Singh was forced to restore Christopherson to his role and dismiss the issue as an example of “lively and democratic debate.”
But it was symptomatic of a lack of preparation and experience meeting reality.
Singh was elected because he was fun (who else could get away with a matching pink tie and turban?), charismatic and bold. Manitoba MLA Wab Kinew complimented him for being “relentlessly positive and positively relentless.” The viral video where he politely faced down a right-wing heckler received 35 million hits.
But this goodly frame, the Earth, appears for Singh to have become a sterile promontory. The Liberals have stolen his central policy pillar, a universal pharmacare program; he is caught between two NDP premiers on the pipeline; and the support of his caucus is conditional.
Paradoxically, the Weir affair may help. Singh received a standing ovation in caucus after making the announcement that Weir was out — a position that had wide support in the wake of an independent investigation that found the harassment claims were sustained by evidence.
But that still leaves the NDP leader at the helm of a floundering, indebted, distant third party, searching for relevancy in the face of the most leftist government in a generation. No wonder he appears to have misplaced his mirth.