2015 will undoubtedly go down in history as a
disastrous year for Canada’s New Democrats.
A series of events, followed by selective blunders on the part of the
Party, damaged the federal NDP to an extent that it may not be possible to
salvage the Party going forward – at least not as presently constituted.
It all started with Bill C-51. The NDP’s initial hesitancy and waffling saw
it cede the moral high ground on opposing the bill to the Green Party. Ultimately – and likely after being shown the
way by focus groups – the NDP decided to oppose the bill, which proved to be
the right decision with its base, and with a growing number of Canadians. But it was during those dark days when the
Green Party stood alone against Bill C-51 that the NDP’s credibility took a
hit, leaving many of its base scratching their heads with regards to just where
their party stood on important, progressive issues.
This would be a pattern which played itself out again and
again throughout 2015, right up until NDP leader Tom Mulcair took a strong,
principled position on the niqab during the election period – a position with
many have suggested cost him the election.
Personally, I’m not so sure that the niqab was what lost the NDP the election.
Instead, the NDP’s lack of clarity on important issues of the day appeared
to cast a longer shadow with Canadian voters looking for progressive
change. Liberal leader Justin Trudeau
was able to articulate specific promises for action in a way that Mulcair never
did – and on election day, Trudeau was awarded with a majority government,
while Mulcair’s NDP lost more than half their seats and went back to third
party status.
The Victorious Alberta NDP
Things really started to go wrong for the NDP in May, when
Rachel Notley’s provincial NDP won an unexpected victory in Alberta. Yes – you read that correctly: Notley’s
majority government victory will likely prove to be one of the significant
nails in the coffin of the federal NDP, going forward. Here’s why.
Notley’s NDP government probably faces some of the most
significant challenges that any provincial government is facing at this time,
or any other in Canada’s history. After
4 decades of Progressive Conservative rule, Albertans were looking for an
alternative – and a slim majority of them turned to Notely and the NDP. This slim majority – just a little over 40% of 54% of voters who bothered to vote – ended up
handing the NDP a majority government – but one facing incredible economic
challenges unparalleled in Alberta’s history.
To succeed, Notley has the almost impossible task of
steering an economy powered by non-renewable resources, while simultaneously
implementing progressive policies which ought to transform Alberta into a more
progressive society. Much more likely,
Notley's NDP government will enter the pantheon of one-term failures, taking its place
beside Ontario’s NDP government under Bob Rae. As the
Alberta NDP’s failure unfolds in slow motion over the next 3 or 4 years, it is
likely to tank support for the federal NDP, especially if Notley’s ideological soul-mate,
Tom Mulcair, stays at the helm, as he said he will.
NDP In the Back Seat on Climate Change
At the end of 2016, Alberta may be the only jurisdiction in
federation led by a New Democrat. What happens in Alberta matters to Canada,
and to New Democrats in a way that other provincial efforts in Manitoba or Nova
Scotia don’t or never did. Notley’s party is supposed to the play the
role of the shiny new government on the hill – a veritable beacon for
progressivism. It’s already not playing
itself out that way, and by this I’m not referring to the death threats she’s
receiving from idiot right-wing partisans over Notley’s desire to provide
better safety for agricultural workers.
With a growing concern among Canadians about climate
change, and with the Liberals at least starting a discussion about what
Canada is going to do to lower our greenhouse gas emissions, New Democrats are increasingly
taking a back seat. No – change that. The NDP has long taken a back-seat on climate
change, much to its shame and discredit.
Climate change was yet another issue that NDP leader Tom
Mulcair refused to allow himself to be pinned down on during the federal
election. New Democrats in Alberta and
the west were advocating building more pipelines, while those in Quebec
appeared to be against that approach.
Mulcair appeared to be endorsing this confusion during the campaign, by
saying different things in different parts of the country (see: "Thomas Mulcair walking a fine cross-country line on Energy East," the Globe and Mail, July 16, 2015). At the end of the day, though, the NDP’s
evolving policy position landed on tentative support for the Energy East and
Trans Mountain pipeline, as long as the NEB review process was reformed to take
into consideration climate impacts. In
short, the NDP adopted the position which Justin Trudeau had been articulating for
months.
Notley has been a much more enthusiastic supporter of
building pipelines and expanding the tar sands (see: "Notley wows business leaders with pro-oilsands speech," the Calgary Herald, July 8, 2015).
The centrepiece of her so-called climate change initiative, unveiled after the federal general election, and just before COP 21 in Paris, will see
greenhouse gas emissions from the tar sands continue to rise for the next 15 years until they are roughly 43% higher than today (see: "Notley's climate change marketing triumph," the Globe and Mail, November 24, 2015). Simply put, this means that Alberta will
remain on-target to expand the tar sands industrial enterprise, climate be
damned.
Of course, this initiative was
spun as a climate-positive – “Oh look – Alberta is going to put a cap on tar
sands production”, but this cap will do little good to help meet Canada’s short
and medium term emissions targets – and those targets are likely to get even
more stringent under Trudeau and Environment and Climate Change Minister,
Catherine McKenna – especially if the Liberals are as serious as they appear to
be about holding warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius.
While Notley’s NDP are proposing to do some good in the
struggle against climate change, by putting a rising price on carbon emissions and eventually closing coal plants - measures which should have been undertaken before now - the overall plan only appears to be progressive in
the context of the woeful efforts made by every other province. Ultimately, Alberta’s NDP has provided the tar
sands with a license to pollute, and the potential environmental cover to lobby for the bitumen pipelines will be needed to ship product from the expanded enterprise. And you
can bet that the NDP will not be revisiting this weak effort for the remainder
of their mandate – unless it’s to backslide in a manner that we’ve seen from
Christy Clark’s Liberals in B.C.
A Pro-Pipeline NDP Has No Future in a Climate-Conscious Canada
I don’t believe that a pro-pipeline, tar sands-expanding NDP
has much of a future in Canada – particularly if the federal Liberals and their
counterparts in Ontario and Quebec really do get serious about tackling climate
change. And although I’m not holding my
breath that the Liberals will actually will do that (see: "Sudbury Column: Trudeau is no climate champion," Steve May, the Sudbury Star, October 24, 2015), it looks like the best
outcome for the NDP would be to find itself on the same page as the Liberals
are with regards to climate change, and that’s hardly the sort of leadership
that progressive Canadians are looking for.
Make no mistake.
Since Harper’s government went down in flames this past October, climate
change has been one of the biggest stories of our times. #COP21 in Paris clearly had a little
something to do with that – but the energy and momentum which has been built up
around this issue over the past few months isn’t likely to dissipate. Throughout 2016, climate change will continue
to make political headlines, as Trudeau and provincial leaders meet to hammer
out a process for an agreement this spring, which will no doubt remain in the
headlines until some of the details get sketched in. Kathleen Wynne’s government will be telling
Ontarians the specifics around their #OnClimate plan, and we can expect the
issue to remain front and centre for other provincial governments as well.
And of course, south of the border, we may very well see
climate change become one of several defining election issues, especially if
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders gets the nod from the Democratic Party. Since most of the Republican Party's front
runners refuse to acknowledge the reality of climate change or outwardly call
it a “hoax” as Donald Trump has (see: "6 of Donald Trump's most outrageous tweets on climate change," EcoWatch, December 19, 2015), we can expect the Democrats, especially under
Sanders, to make hay with the scientific ignorance of the Republican
leadership. I can’t think of any better
way of keeping climate change front and centre in our news media than an
all-out war between Presidential candidates over whether climate change
actually exists. Elsewhere, the war
between the know-nothings and those who believe in reality was fought years ago, with predictable
results. While many Conservatives in
Canada may be keen to use Trump or Cruz to re-fight that war here at home, a
significant majority of Canadians already understand that the climate is
changing, and most of them want our governments to do something about it.
Whither Tom Mulcair on Climate Change?
Which takes us back to the NDP, and Rachel Notley and Tom
Mulcair. Both Notley and Mulcair are
clearly standing in the way of the sort of progressive and aggressive positioning
that the NDP ought to be taking on climate change. As an example, over the past few months,
Green Party Leader Elizabeth May – the leader of a party with but one seat in
the House – was all over the national media, talking about climate change and
equity. Admittedly, May is a bit of a
niche expert on the subject in a way that no other elected MP in the nation
is. But I heard from many progressives,
and couldn’t help but wonder myself – just where was Tom Mulcair? Ultimately, he showed up in Paris with the
multi-party delegation put together by Trudeau – but his and his party’s
contribution to the national dialogue on climate change was missing in action.
Today, Mulcair says that one of the things the NDP will be doing
going forward is to hold Justin Trudeau’s feet to the fire on climate
change (see; "How Tom Mulcair plans on opposing Trudeau's Liberals," Maclean's, December 22, 2015). Just how the NDP plan to do that
when their own party is largely in agreement with where the Liberals are today
is unclear. Going forward, it may very
well be that the Liberals in government end up completely outflanking the NDP
on climate change. The Liberals have a
lot of room to maneuver on climate at this point, as they’ve not even begun to
form a national plan. The NDP, on the
other hand, have very little room to move their party on this issue, thanks to
Rachel Notley’s NDP government sitting on top of what’s been called North
America’s “carbon bomb”.
Any policy changes which the rank and file NDP might be thinking
of calling for which would end up offending the sensibilities of Albertans are
likely to be no-go’s for the federal party. Divesting public sector pension funds of tar
sands stocks? Not likely. Slow down pipeline approvals? Only until climate is built into their
review, but then it’s full steam ahead. A moratorium on tar sands development? No way.
Allocating provincial carbon budgets? Not going to happen.
At one time, the NDP occupied the moral high ground on
climate change. The Climate ChangeAccountability Act, first introduced by the NDP in 2006, would have established
what were at that time considered to be very aggressive emissions reductions
targets. Unfortunately, the NDP hasn’t moved at all since then, and has failed
to develop anything resembling a plan on how Canada can achieve those targets. By sitting still on climate change, they’ve
been overtaken by the Liberals. And like
World War II convoys, since the NDP can only move as quickly as its slowest
component – in this case, Rachel Notley – it’s not likely at all that they’ll
be able to play catch up.
That is unless the NDP takes drastic action. And they might just do that.
Time for the NDP to Get Serious About Climate Change
Already, discussions inside the Party have percolated out to
the public. One of the matters being
raised as a concern for the federal Party is just how closely the federal and
provincial parties are tied to one another.
The NDP is the only political party in Canada which requires its members
to join both the federal and provincial parties when they’re buying a
membership. If you want to be a New
Democrat in Alberta, you’re going to have to be a federal member too. And although the various parties like to
claim that they are independent from one another, this multiple membership
practice really does bring the provincial and federal elements of the NDP
together in such a way that it stretches credibility to suggest that true
independence exists.
For the federal NDP to regain the moral high ground on
climate change, and to reduce the future impacts of guilt by association, they’re
going to need to sever their ties with Notley’s sinking ship. Severance itself might not go far enough –
outright repudiation may be necessary.
Repudiation is, in fact, just what Canada needs right now, because
Canada’s largest emitter, the province of Alberta, has locked itself in to an emissions "reduction" strategy which continues to condemn Canada to rising
emissions, or forces the other provinces to pick up the slack in a way that may
seriously damage their economies.
Purging Tony Blair
Jettisoning Notley will give the federal NDP the room that
it needs to get serious about embracing a carbon neutral economy. But
she’s not the only one that will have to go: NDP Leader Tom Mulcair is clearly
not cut out for the job of leading the NDP away from it’s mush-middle,
focus-grouped populism. Under Mulcair,
the NDP has lost its principles. This
was entirely evident throughout the recent election: Mulciar ran on a platform of not running deficits,
effectively eliminating opportunities for fiscal flexibility and setting his
government up for Jean Chretien-style cuts.
The non-position on climate change, coupled with lacklustre opposition
to the Trans Pacific Partnership found voters scratching their heads in
wonderment about just what the NDP actually stood for. And of course, who can forget the Party sinking
its own candidates because they had dared question Canada’s unwavering support
for Israel, or spoke about the reality
of having to leave fossil resources in the ground?
To a significant degree, Margaret Thatcher-loving Tom
Mulcair owns these mistakes, from which he can’t escape. As long as he leads his Party, he holds it
hostage. Mulcair remains more Tony
Blair than Bernie Sanders – and it’s the latter that Canada needs a lot more
of, and the former we could use a little less of (after all, we already have one Justin
Trudeau!).
Why Should Orange Listen to a Partisan Green?
It may be easy for readers to brush this critique
aside. After all, I’m not a New
Democrat, and I am instead invested in another political party. Further, I have always been tough on the NDP
in a way that I have not been on the Liberals – although I have always
acknowledged that toughness and explained to my readers that it’s because I
have largely given up hope on the Liberals and can’t be bothered wasting much
time with them, whereas I continue to believe that a strong NDP is in Canada’s
interests – if the NDP could become more like the Green Party.
Partisanship aside, it’s hard to deny where the future is
heading – and I am certain than many of my New Democratic friends experience some unease with the direction that their Party has been taking lately. Just as other left-wing political parties are
starting to find the courage to denounce Blair-ism (see: Jeremy Corbynn in the
UK, and Bernie Sanders in the US), Tom Mulcair’s vow to stay the course and
lead the NDP into the 2019 election must create a feeling of unease – one which
will assuredly grow as Notley’s New Democrats continue to wither.
B.C. and Ontario may offer some optimism, but again
provincial NDP leaders in those two provinces may find that they are unable to
offer voters a principled, progressive vision.
Ontario might be the better bet for New Democrats, as Kathleen Wynne’s
Liberals are doing everything that they can to make themselves the most hated
government in Canada. But if NDP leader
Andrea Horwarth fails again to articulate a cohesive vision to voters, Ontario
could find itself with a new PC government in 2018.
In British Columbia, the NDP will be face a minor challenge
from the BC Green Party on its flank – a position that will undoubtedly make BC
NDP leader John Horgan contort like a pretzel, which could sink his chances for
the Premier’s chair just as Adrian Dix before him was sunk. Horgan
and Horwarth are part of the NDP old guard anyway – they’re browns at a time
when greens are coming into style.
I believe, though, that unless the federal NDP ditches Tom
Mulcair and opts for a new, progressive voice – say a Linda McQuaig or a Naomi
Klein – come 2020, New Democrats will look back at 2015 in order to pinpoint
when everything went wrong for their party.
In 2016, however, rank and file NDP will have a chance to right their
sinking ship through a leadership review.
Let’s hope they’re up to the challenge, because Canada needs a
principled New Democratic Party at this time in our history.
(opinions expressed in this blog are my own and should not be interpreted as being consistent with the Green Parties of Ontario and Canada)
