Is it time for a Millennial Tory Caucus?

NOT A SINGLE COVID CASE HAS BEEN TRACED TO A GOLF COURSE. — KELLY MCPARLAND

Last week New York Times columnist Ross Douthat wrote that a small group of Republican senators — including Marco Rubio, Mitt Romney, Tom Cotton and Josh Hawley — who’ve been putting forward policy ideas that deviate from typical conservative orthodoxy should come together in a new, semi-formal faction within their party’s congressional ranks.

The Common Good Caucus, as he called it, could assume a collective identity for the purposes of co-ordinating policies, negotiating congressional deals and building support for their post-trump brand of a more populist (or at least more reform-oriented) conservatism. Although Douthat concedes it probably won’t happen because of the individual ambitions of the different players, it’s an interesting idea to elevate conservative policy renewal.

It got me thinking about the possibility of similar policy-oriented factions within the Conservative Party of Canada. There’s nothing stopping individual members of Parliament from organizing themselves into different groups in order to better influence the party’s priorities, messages and policies. They’d still sit in the parliamentary caucus and vote with their colleagues, but they might also co-ordinate on policy research and communications, insist on regular group meetings with the party leader to advance their issues and generally adopt a collective identity around shared values and perspectives.

In theory, one could envision a cohort of libertarians or a group of social conservatives or even an unconventional alliance of Quebec nationalists and western Canadian decentralists working together to develop and promote policy ideas in the name of shaping the Conservative party’s agenda.

But let me suggest another group of Conservative MPS who, if they came together as a faction, could exercise significant influence over the party’s ideas and priorities. Millennial Conservatives aren’t just a growing share of the party’s membership or the overall voting population, they’re also an increasingly significant voice among the party’s parliamentary caucus.

I’ve previously written about how the Conservative parliamentary caucus is undergoing a generational transformation and a growing number of MPS born roughly between 1980 and 1995 are playing a more prominent role. Millennial MPS such as Michael Barrett (b. 1984), Eric Duncan (b. 1987), Garnett Genuis (b. 1987), Raquel Dancho (b. 1990) and Dane Lloyd (b. 1990) have become key players as official opposition critics, parliamentary performers and sources of new and different ideas.

The main obstacle to even greater influence over the direction of the Conservative party is their lack of collective self-awareness as a unique and disparate faction within the caucus. There’s a tendency to overstate differences among them on certain philosophical or political matters that can obscure their commonalities. Although there may be some divergences across ideological or regional lines, their shared experiences in the 21st-century economy and culture ought to bind them together.

One issue, in particular, that would benefit from sustained attention and energy from a Millennial Conservative Caucus is the growing trend of delayed family formation. While it’s no doubt shaped by various dynamics such as evolving social norms, a combination of policy-related factors — including student debt, job precariousness, lack of affordable housing, and exorbitant childcare costs — is contributing to Canadians getting married and starting families later than at any point in the country’s history.

It’s almost as if younger Canadians have come to cram the key milestones of adult life — getting married, settling professionally, buying a home and having kids — into a short window in their late 30s.

This not only puts tremendous pressure on families (which, according to the most recent data, is reflected in an average age for divorce of about 40 years old), but it’s also contributing to lower fertility rates. In 2019, Canada’s total fertility rate reached a record low of 1.47 births per woman.

The net effect is that Canadian families may be having fewer children than they actually want. Demographer (and Mcgill University PHD student) Lyman Stone has documented the gap between ideal and actual family sizes across several jurisdictions.

This gap may be entry point for a Millennial Conservative Caucus to advance a policy agenda that targets the various aspects of modern life that can cause young men and women to put off relationships, marriages and children. It could be a huge political opportunity for the Conservative party to be more responsive to the needs, interests and aspirations of young Canadian families.

A policy agenda targeting delayed family formation would need to address its underlying causes. Take housing affordability for instance. Conservatives should champion tying federal affordable housing transfers to provinces and cities to liberalize land-use regulations and boost housing supply. There would need to be similar policy thinking applied to the various other challenges contributing to narrower pathways into marriage and parenthood.

A Millennial Conservative Caucus could bring expression to these issues, which too often go neglected in our politics, and start to formulate a positive policy agenda to help young Canadians overcome the barriers to family formation. It would be an enormous contribution to Conservative politics and indeed the country.

This depends however on millennial Conservative MPS recognizing their size and potential influence and organizing themselves accordingly. If they adopt a factional identity, they can shape the future of the Conservative party.