There is currently a lot of talk about whether Michal Ignatieff, the leader of the opposition Liberal Party, can bring about a realignment of the Liberals, NDP and the Bloc Quebecois in order to unseat Stephen Harper’s Progressive Conservative minority government.
There is a more wide ranging change that could happen, the merger (or something close to it) of the Liberal Party and the more left leaning NDP – which may mean the effective extinction of the Liberal Party and the realignment of Canadian politics into the socialist versus capitalist divide that is usual in Europe. This is not going to be good for business stability in Canada.
The fact is that the Liberals have been ideologically exhausted both as the centre party within Canada and a very long stretch of government. They are a brand name now, and it is the NDP which has the energy and personnel to take over any coalition – no matter what their historic level of support has been.
This is shown by an Angus Reid opinion poll which has shown that a coalition led by Ignatieff would do well to tie even with the Tories, whereas one led by the NDP’s Jack Leyton would beat the Tories by a landslide. The Liberals long for government and the NDP are hardly likely to trade independence for the chance of losing, so any merger between the two parties will be on the NDP’s terms. Of course the NDP may have fewer members, but people do not go into politics to get second place in elections.
It is unlikely that the Liberals will agree a full fledged merger with the NDP, but they are desperate enough for power to agree to quite a lot more than a coalition. For a start an electoral pact could see enough vulnerable Liberal MPs re-elected for this to make sense. Similarly agreeing a popular Prime Minister from the NDP would also make sense from the point of view of re-election and ministerial office. A merger would after these measures become a formality.
What would this mean?
For a start many Canadians do not realise how seriously left wing the NDP are. They’ve never really had the opportunity to prove it. They are backed financially by the unions, and around a quarter of the policy making votes are made by trade unions. Similarly the NDP supports a raft of left wing policies, including tougher environmental controls and higher corporate taxes. So while the Liberals could be said to be more in favour of big business than the small business Tories, the NDP is in favour of a fundamental rebalancing of the public and private sectors.
One of Canada’s attractions has been a fundamentally business friendly environment, at least outside Quebec. Even when the Canadian federal government was letting spending go out of control there was a recognition that in Canada there was a consensus in favour of allowing businesses to get about the business of creating jobs, even if the contrast with the United States did make the Canadians seem a bit of a big government paradise.
Canada may need a bigger state and a greater emphasis on the public sector, but this will not help Canada’s competitiveness or prosperity.
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