NDP looks for needed shot in arm
Leadership race yet to inject fervour
As Parliament resumes sitting Monday after a six-week break, New Democrats will be searching for ways to reignite their lagging brand.
They doubtless hoped to get a boost Sunday from a 90-minute party debate by those running to replace the late Jack Layton.
But it was a mostly uninspiring affair that revealed a surfeit of consensus, and featured only a single question in French.
At one point, the moderator pointedly instructed the eight candidates to cite a specific difference they had with at least one other leadership contender.
The party votes for its new leader March 24 in Toronto. So far the two most impressive debaters have been B.C.’S Nathan Cullen, with a relaxed manner and affable, articulate speaking style, and Quebec’s Thomas Mulcair, increasingly perceived as the contest front-runner.
But the campaign to date has failed to inspire the public the way such races normally do, and the party is suffering for it.
A Jan. 20-21 Angus Reid online survey of 1,000 Canadians put support in Quebec — where the NDP has most of its seats — at 29 per cent, down sharply from the 42.9 per cent support the Layton-led NDP got from Quebecers last May.
And, of course, New Democrats recently suffered the defection of Saint-mauriceChamplain MP Lise St. Denis who, in crossing to the Liberals, noted Quebecers had voted for Layton, who is no more.
On Sunday, Mulcair, who increasingly is looking like the guy to beat, spoke of having worked closely with Layton.
He’s one of two Quebec MPS in the contest, the other being the less well known Romeo Saganash.
Candidate Brian Topp, a former NDP president, has pledged to run for a seat in Quebec.
As of this week, Mulcair’s website claimed support of 36 of the party’s 101 MPS, plus former Manitoba premier Ed Schreyer.
While Mulcair lacks Layton’s sunny disposition and charisma, the former lawyer and university professor is a smart, seasoned politician, seen by many as having the best chance of revitalizing his party.
During the Halifax debate, the candidates all slammed the Harper Conservatives and called for an expansion of national social programs, including Pharmacare and daycare, and the enrichment of the Canada Pension Plan.
They said such initiatives could be paid for by raising taxes or cutting planned spending on prisons and fighter jets.
Cullen, MP for Skeena-bulkley-valley, managing to elicit laughter from the audience when the balding MP spoke of having “a bad hair day.”
More laughter came when Cullen recalled first meeting Mulcair, “a Liberal.”
Mulcair, a one-time cabinet minister in Jean Charest’s provincial government, defended himself by pointing out in Quebec there’s no provincial NDP; Liberals are the sole option for federalists.
Cullen also put Ottawa MP Paul Dewar on the defensive, questioning the wisdom of Dewar naming his proposed deputy leader — another Ontarian, Timmins-james Bay MP Charlie Angus — during the leadership campaign.
Saganash, meanwhile, questioned the political smarts inherent in a proposal by Topp to hike personal income tax for well off Canadians. A better option, Saganash asserted, would be to eliminate so-called boutique tax credits.
In coming weeks in the Commons, New Democrats will try to use the Harper government’s upcoming budget — expected to feature serious cuts to government programs and services — to reconnect with voters. The party has long championed pension reform and recent word of possible cutbacks to Old Age Security gives Ndpers a potent issue to champion.