Sid Ryan could be the answer to Liberals’ prayers
Even the darkest of clouds come with a silver lining, or so the saying goes. And just as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been battling a particularly overcast period for his young government, along comes a silvery moment to offer some hope: Sid Ryan may yet decide to run for the leadership of the New Democratic Party.
Oh, please Lord ... Please, please, please. You can almost hear the prayers rising from the Liberal brain trust as they contemplate the benefits to be gained from an NDP leadership race embroiled in a dirty, divisive, muckand- mire wrestling match over the future of the party should the union firebrand decide to make yet another stab at political office.
He’s already failed in five attempts: three provincial campaigns and two federal. His style is so abrasive he voluntarily quit as president of the Ontario Federation of Labour because other union bosses couldn’t work with him. Some OFL unions quit paying dues to protest his leadership. After his departure he sued the federation for tens of thousands of dollars in back pay, accusing it of “stealing six years worth of my banked vacation pay.”
Who better to l ead a party struggling for rebirth after a disappointing election, in which it stumbled from Official Opposition status back into third place? Just what the NDP needs as it debates whether to continue recent efforts to establish itself as a moderate left- of- centre contender for real power, or revert to its more traditional role as a protest party comfortable as Canada’s perennial also-ran.
A website has popped up, sidryanforndp, urging the former union boss to enter the contest to replace Thomas Mulcair at the top of the NDP. Created by “a broad group of activists that would like to see a socialist candidate enter the race,” it professes to have scoured opinion among “indigenous peoples, environmentalists, LGBTQ, feminists, labour unionists, Blacks, Muslims, NDP members and others” and discovered one name kept appearing “from soundings we took across all regions of the country” … Sid Ryan.
No doubt Ryan is tickled by the attention, though he hasn’t formally thrown his hat into the ring. Neither has anyone else, for that matter. With the first leadership debate less than two months away, not a single formal candidate has emerged. B. C. MP Peter Julian has registered as a candidate, but hasn’t announced a final decision. A few other names are being bandied about as potential contestants, but so far no one wants to be the first to jump. Compare that to the Conservative party leadership, which is so crowded with wouldbe successors to Stephen Harper that they can barely fit on a single stage.
It may say something that so many people see the Conservative leadership as a juicy prize, to be hotly contested, while NDP worthies stand around poking the top job with a stick, checking to see whether it has any life left in it. It’s not like there’s nothing for them to talk about: former leader Jack Layton led the party within sniffing distance of power by moving it more towards the centre, only to see Trudeau’s Liberals outflank Mulcair, Layton’s successor, when he pursued a similar strategy. Was it because Canadians had a soft spot for Layton but couldn’t warm to the more prickly Mulcair? Or because left- wingers wanted to vote for a real left-wing party, and not some version of Liberals Lite? Or just bad timing: voters wanted a change from Harper, and the Liberals offered the more cheerful alternative, complete with a chipper young leader from a famous family?
There’s little question that the soul of the NDP is up for grabs. Party elders say they’re not upset at the lack of candidates — surely someone will turn up before the first debate is due. And no doubt someone will; even in its reduced circumstances, the j ob comes with a nice office and decent pay. Which might make it an attractive proposition for a man like Ryan, who likes nothing more than a podium from which he can promote outrage among the various client groups that make up the socialist fringe. One of the skills of which he boasted when quitting the OFL was an ability to organize big protest marches. That’s not usually seen as a key requirement for running a country, but that’s just the point — the NDP has to decide whether it really wants a shot at being elected, or is happier marching around the streets with protest signs. Among Ryan’s other points of pride was his attempt to establish a foreign policy for Ontario union members, promoting a “free Palestine” initiative that may or may not have resonated deeply on the shop floors of the province.
The NDP already has a fringe movement nibbling at its membership. The Leap Manifesto of Toronto celebrity activists Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein also envisions a party guided by socialist dogma and ideological Puritanism. Combined, a Ryan leadership and Leap agenda could cement the NDP as a heady mix of utopian values and disruptive street politics. And permanent irrelevance as a political force at the federal level, in all likelihood.
What more could the Liberals hope for than a future free of any serious rival on the left? The only way it could get better would be for the Conservatives to choose a grating, self- promoting TV personality as their next leader. Could even the most rosy-eyed of Liberal optimists imagine a happier scenario? If you catch Trudeau aide Gerald Butts with a smile on his face, you know what he’s dreaming of.
THERE’S LITTLE QUESTION THAT THE SOUL OF THE NDP IS UP FOR GRABS.