Harper is also rather naïve in thinking that Block support for toppling the Liberals would equate to Block support for Conservative legislation should he eventually win a minority. He has failed to grasp the concept that the Block is in the business of blocking federalism, and could be expected to try to topple his government should he ever form one, and in any event could also be expected to block Conservative legislation because it is a centrist party just as the Liberal party is.
If Harper and the conservatives want to succeed, they should build their party so that it has a broad national appeal, rather than limit themselves to the screeching right and regionalism. Once they build a substantive party that might have a chance at winning a majority, then they should move to defeat the government, but not before, for the only thing that will come out of the Block causing governments to fall, be they Liberal or Conservative governments, is that the Block will be that much closer to breaking up the nation.
As far as Belinda’s defection goes, keep in mind that she reflects the conservatism in which she grew up: Bill Davis’ Conservative Ontario, in which Ontario provincial conservatism then can barely be distinguished from federal liberalism now, and which bears no resemblance to the more recent Mike Harris hard right Ontario Conservatives. The Big Blue Machine’s brand of conservatism of Robarts and Davis is a far cry from the much harder right conservatism that Harris promoted provincially and which Harper has been promoting federally.
What it comes down to is that the western reform movement is too extreme for many traditional Ontario conservatives. Some in Ontario stay with the Conservatives, but are uneasy about it. Others move to the Liberals, as has Belinda. Having failed at trying to move the new Conservatives toward the centre, Belinda had to ask herself which party is more in line with her views. She was getting nowhere in her efforts to steer the Conservatives away from the hard right, and was not able to support the Block in its efforts to weaken federalism, so she jumped ship.
Note that the timing and effect of her crossing the floor has resulted in her now being in a far better position to influence the Liberals than had she meekly crossed over to the back benches at some other date. As someone who ideologically straddles the left of the conservatives and the right of the liberals, she has played her card for maximum practical effect.
Muffin, I do agree right now Harper seems much more focused on the short term and the opportunity to take power, rather than long term sustainability. I’m not sure if that is true naivete, temporary wilfull blindness or seizing the day.
Stepping back from the immediate situation, do you really think Harper is unaware of the importance of party with broad national appeal? It seems to me that the Alliance has been trying to build a truly national party, or at least publicly saying it has been, for a number of years and stretching back into the Reform Party. They merged with the PC party to try to build that national party.
I think the difficulty has been how do they take the roots of a party that wants to hold onto the fiscally and socially conservative ground into the mainstream in Canada? Easier said than done, in my view. And bound to take time. Which, in part, may be leading to Harper’s recent course of action.
Even the Progressive Conservatives of the 80s lead by Mulroney (of the “dead old dad” slip I made earlier in the thread) couldn’t sustain in the long term (i.e. beyond the decade and Mulroney’s tenure) a hold on government. And, how many of those that he cobbled together in Quebec (such as Bouchard) truly didn’t have that political orientation? And Mulroney had the advantage of the deficit/debt problems of the early 80s and the wake left by Trudeau’s departure, leading, in my view to the appeal of a party that was holding forth on the subject of fiscal conservatism.
Today, how does a party like the Conservatives now gain long term popular appeal by holding the fiscally conservative/socially conservative standard in Canada? However he’s performing now, Martin built his reputation as Finance Minister. So they can’t claim exclusive ownership of the financial ground.
Harper could be thinking that he could work with the Bloc long enough, and well enough to allay many Canadians fears about their intent on the social agenda, giving them credibility to carry them into the future. Showing, rather than telling, so to speak. Still, I wouldn’t want to be him.
Let’s put it another way. Neither Progressive-Conservative past-prime minister Joe Clark, nor neophyte Conservative Belinda Stronach were able to sit with the new Conservative party’s hard right ideology.
After the merger of the Progressive-Conservatives with the hard right western Canadian Alliance (a.k.a. Reform a.k.a. Canadian Reform Alliance Party – CRAP), Joe chose to sit as an independent rather than as a new Conservative, and then finding himself ineffectual (“I suppose I could have sat back and clung to office, to no one’s advantage”), bowed out of politics.
After pressing for red conservatism in her losing bid for party leadership in the new Conservative party, Belinda held on for a while, but then moved to the Liberal party at a time to maximize her position, so that she now holds a cabinet seat, and can expect to continue to hold such a position unless the new Conservatives ever come to hold a majority – which is extremely unlikely in the near future given their roots in hard right ideology.
As Joe put it in 1998, “The country does not need another opposition party. The country needs another government.” Belinda had the choice of sitting in the opposition party, with that party having decided to not move in the direction she thought it should if it were to become a government, or instead crossing the floor into a cabinet seat and being in a position of real power from which she can put her ideas into effect.
I ask you, who today and for the foreseeable future will have more effect in guiding our country – Joe or Belinda?
(Joe Who quotes from: http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/clark_joe/ )
I feel compelled to point out that there some issues on which the Tories and the Bloc agree. They both prefer a less powerful federal government, with more power devolved to the provinces. There’s at least some possibility of a Tory minority government holding onto power with the aid of the Bloc with some sort of devolutionary core agenda. Not a strong possibility, perhaps, but it’s not outside the realm of possibility.
Any socially conservative legislation would be a truly uphill battle barring a Tory majority, however. Which is just fine with me.
The problem with a Conservative/Bloq alliance is that, other than the dislike of centralised federal power, their policies are not very close. The Bloq is as left/socialist leaning as their provincial conterparts in the PQ, and can be counted to oppose much of the Conservative platform for this reason.
Oh I agree. But I can vaguely imagine the possibility of a minority Tory govt managing to stay in power for a while by means of decentralizing some stuff to placate the Bloc, bringing down a budget palatable to the Liberals, and bringing a bunch of social issue stuff up for free votes which they’ll lose but announce to their constituents that they tried. It might not even be a bad thing. I’m not in principle opposed to some decentralization, Martin budgets have been conservative in all but name anyways, and the socially conservative stuff will never pass without a Tory majority. Plus it would induce the Liberals to clean house a little, and might defuse the Quebec sovereignty thing a bit.
