How many stabs in front can NDP take?

OTTAWA— Under the guise of giving the Liberal campaign a shot in the arm, CAW leader Buzz Hargrove stabbed the NDP in the front last week. Coming as it did on the very first week of the campaign, his kiss of life to Paul Martin felt more like a kiss of death intended for Jack Layton.

While Hargrove says he wants to avoid the election of a Conservative government at all costs, his endorsement of the Liberals came in the absence of clear and imminent danger, at a time when not a single poll has validated the notion of a Harper government, let alone a majority one. Those same polls indicate that the New Democratic Party is better placed to win ground in this campaign than it has been since the 1988 freetrade election.

Fears of a right- wing government have dampened NDP prospects ever since the Reform Party came onto the scene in the late eighties. Layton is hoping to change that this time by arguing that, given a strong presence in the Commons, the NDP would act as a buffer to the policies of any minority government including a Conservative one. But Hargrove is not buying that. Instead, in an interview published in the Toronto Star yesterday, the Canadian Autoworkers union leader gave new life to Martin’s controversial assertion that this election is about national unity and keeping sovereignists in check.

“ We were very, very concerned about the possibilities of a minority Tory government — the Bloc propping up the Tories for all the wrong reasons,” he explained, about his call for another Liberal government.

Yet only a year ago, Hargrove himself wanted more Bloc Québécois influence in the Commons, even suggesting that the NDP abandon the propremier gressive vote in Quebec to its sovereignist counterpart.

At his initiative in the fall of 2004, Gilles Duceppe was the first non- NDP leader to speak at a CAW convention. At the time, Hargrove wrote a column in the French- language edition of the Alternatives, Action and Communication Network for International Development newsletter to expound on his vision of an NDP/ Bloc coalition.

“ The NDP could decide not to run candidates in Quebec . . . . A federalist party, with no historical base in Quebec has no realistic chance of making its mark in that province. Electoral co- operation would be the best approach towards maximizing their influence ( Bloc and NDP) in the House of Commons,” he wrote.

At some point, the federal NDP will have to reflect on its shrinking power of attraction. Its decision to openly seek influence rather than power seems to be driving chunks of its base and some of its highest profile figures into Liberal arms. Bob Rae, the only New Democrat to have ever held power east of Manitoba, preceded Hargrove in the ranks of Liberal sympathizers while a former NDP from B. C. sits in Martin’s cabinet.

But, for now, it is the collateral damage that Hargrove has inflicted on the Conservative party by taking a swipe at the NDP that is bound to be a source of intense speculation. An uncommonly large part of this election is playing itself out on the terrain of guilt or salvation by association. In the psychological battle Stephen Harper is fighting to convince voters that his party is a mainstream moderate one and the Conservative and NDP leaders are strategic allies. Hence, the hit taken by Layton was also one Harper stands to feel, albeit within limits. Identified as he is with big unions, Hargrove is a controversial figure whose constituency is once- or often twice- removed from that the Conservatives are courting. The Liberal tent is big but it may at some point become too small to hold both Hargrove and the small- c conservatives who really hold the key to electoral success in Ontario. Chantal Hébert is a national affairs writer. Her column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. She can be reached at chebert@thestar.ca.