When it comes to elections, timing is everything
Success of NDP in Alberta should give Tories pause
Canada has turned the corner on summer, and as Canadians across the country fire up their barbecues and pry open their ice chests this Wednesday, they will have ample topics for conversation: President Barack Obama’s stunning eulogy for Reverend Clementa Pickney at the Mother Emanuel Church; the Supreme Court of the United States’ recent game of catch-up with Canada regarding same-sex marriage; the upcoming federal election.
While pundits Canada-wide have speculated as to the date of that election, Andrew Coyne reminded us in January that according to a 2007 amendment to the Canada Elections Act, the election date is actually October 19, 2015. Granted, the prime minister could have called an election at any time before that. Or Parliament could have grown a spine and declared a vote of non-confidence, forcing an election. There were plenty of opportunities for both. But now we are in the season of sweat and storms, staring down the barrel of summer at an election that falls squarely between the painfully bloated policy discussions of Thanksgiving dinner and the tasteless political costumes of Halloween. Then again, the presence of the fixed date election law has never troubled the federal government terribly much. In 2008, the prime minister called an election a whole year ahead of the fixed date established by his own law. “We have all somehow come to accept that it is perfectly normal, even acceptable, for the government — the government! — to disobey the law if it feels like it, as if the laws that are binding upon the rest of us were not binding upon the governments that pass them,” Coyne said.
But as Chantal Hébert pointed out recently, that fixed date election could still come back to bite the federal Conservatives. “Given a choice, no prime minister in his right mind would opt to campaign for a fourth mandate in the current circumstances — with no wind at the back of his party and precious few bright spots on the horizon,” she said, referring to the difficult and precarious position the federal Conservatives now find themselves in.
Consider their position: mired in a Senate overspending scandal; watching former MP Dean Del Mastro start his jail term; preparing for Nigel Wright to testify about Mike Duffy; bidding farewell to Peter MacKay and John Baird as they leave the party for the private sector; mourning the loss of Jim Flaherty, whose wisdom about Canada’s finances looks even more irreplaceable as time passes. What once looked like carefully biding their time now looks like amateur procrastination, as the scandals begin to pile up and former prospects for fresh Conservative leadership jump ship in pursuit of their pensions. It is a perfect storm for failure: a lack of talent in the party combined with a demographic shift among the electorate, set against the backdrop of Harper’s long years in power.
Meanwhile, the surprise success of the NDP in Alberta should have federal Conservative strategists questioning their talking points: are works of Patriot Act fan fiction and the diminishment of Canadian citizenship really the planks upon which to build a persuasive platform? In a year that has seen unprecedented foreign investment in Canadian real estate, is anti-foreign sentiment really the wisest tone to set? A May EKOS poll suggests that the NDP may be prepared to do the impossible: win a federal election, albeit with a minority government. At the very least, they have the potential to split the left, according to a May Nanos poll. All it takes is for a few more Liberal voters to trade their plates of milquetoast for a glass of Orange Crush.