NDP’S tricky balancing act in the catbird seat

Call 877-ANDREA1 now! A friendly operator is standing by to take your call. In fact, that earnest voice on the tape is NDP Leader Andrea Horwath asking a series of multiple-choice questions. All eyes are on Horwath, but she is all ears these days. She really wants to know what to do — and won’t make a move without you: Bring down the minority Liberal government? Or prop up its budget, replete with progressive NDP proposals? Minority government is a dream come true for the New Democrats because their leverage lets them extract concessions from the governing Liberals. Minority government is also political hell for the NDP because once their wish list is fulfilled it’s hard to renounce a budget that so clearly bears their imprint, if not yet their imprimatur. Which brings us to the paradox of the balance of power: how do you co-operate without being co-opted? How do you hold conversations without sounding converted? The junior party that props up a minority government often pays a price. For all the thrill of dictating policies, beware the chill of being tainted as a Liberal enabler. That explains Horwath’s awkward balancing act. She refused to meet Premier Kathleen Wynne just prior to the budget so as to keep her political distance. Now she won’t rush with indecent haste to endorse a budget that (more or less) meets her conditions. So please. Call her toll-free number (the real one is 877-341-0244) or go to yoursayontario.ca to have your say — so she can have her way with your say-so. In that way, Horwath can use you for political cover to hold her nose and prop up a Liberal government that she claims has the stench of death. Awkward as it is, Horwath has — for reasons of optics, politics and power — surprisingly little room to manoeuvre. First, the optics. Having dictated the terms of the budget, it’s hard for Horwath to renounce her own handiwork. Can she really justify an election over the fine print of a 15-per-cent cut in auto insurance premiums? The truth is that the government is making it up as it goes along, relying on creative ambiguity to smooth over the challenge of cutting premiums in a hurry. The only fail-safe way to reduce rates is to nationalize the industry, and that’s a promise the NDP never fulfilled when in government two decades ago, which could prove hard to explain on the campaign trail. Second, the politics. Opposition leader Tim Hudak’s hard turn to the right has rekindled fears within big labour of a holy Tory terror. Union leaders well remember how they begat the Mike Harris government by turning against the NDP’s Bob Rae in 1995 (wage restraint revenge). Ontario Federation of Labour leader Sid Ryan (a former NDP candidate) is publicly warning Horwath against defeating the budget. As she goes through the motions of public consultations, labour leaders are whispering in her ear that she dare not tune out them or their membership.

Third, the power. That’s the bottom line of this battle. Never mind Horwath’s hand-wringing about doing the right thing. If she knew (as Jack Layton sensed federally in late 2005) that defeating a minority Liberal government would yield exponential gains for her New Democrats, she might jump.

But recent opinion polls tell us everything and nothing about the NDP’s prospects. Some suggest all three parties are statistically tied. Others show the New Democrats trailing again. Some indicate Horwath’s personal popularity remains highest. Others suggest Wynne is catching up to her.

The point is that the polls are contradictory and an election would be unpredictable. Why defeat a progressive budget (and premier) to fight a campaign that might change nothing — or make matters worse for working people? What if the NDP loses the balance of power? Far better to coast through the summer months and hope to scoop up at least one seat in a Windsor byelection at the Liberals’ expense.

The party is sitting pretty these days, wielding maximum leverage with a minority government that is making constructive compromises — precisely what the NDP set out to achieve. Horwath knows that. Labour knows that.

All she really needs is for her own supporters to recognize that. Operators are standing by now. Martin Regg Cohn’s provincial affairs column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. mcohn@thestar.ca, twitter.com/reggcohn.