| With the recent release of a poll on Canadian politics, conducted by the CBC and the Environics Research group, it’s a good time to review the progress of Stephen Harper's Conservative government, that has now been in power for eight months. The poll reveals a lot about the fractured nature of Canada's current political situation.
While 63 per cent of those people asked said they are satisfied with how things are going in the country today, the Conservative Party got 33 per cent of support while the Liberals were dead even with 32 per cent. If the majority of Canadians are happy with the direction of the country then why would so many of them vote against the ruling party? The fear that the Conservatives will look to institute radical conservative changes still scares many Canadians.
That the majority of Canadians said they are satisfied with the direction of the country hardly comes as a surprise. Canada, as a nation, is in a perpetual state of satisfaction. We know we have things pretty good, and we rarely see the need to mess with it. In fact, Canadians don't like tampering with the status quo. It's this part of Canada's political nature that elected the Liberal party to three successive majority governments, and even re-elected them, albeit to a minority, after the sponsorship scandal came to light. Canada's political history is dominated by Liberal and Conservative dynasties, elected and then stuck with until things get bad enough to swing the nation to the other side. It's a very rare event when a party wins the leadership of Canada for only one term, with the 1980 and 1984 flip flops being the only time this has happened since 1930. Canadians, it seems, don't like to mess with a good thing. It's for this reason, more than any other, that the current Conservative government is good for Canada.
The election of the Liberal Party in 1993 saw the party make drastic cuts to the exorbitant budget deficits generated during the Mulroney terms. It was the majority they gained after Mulroney's abuses that allowed the Liberals to slash budgets in the face of much protest. With a balanced budget since 1997, Canada has seen economic growth, job creation and living standard growth that is the envy of the G7 nations. With a strong economy as the eventual result of their early policies, the Liberals could expect to see continual re-election from a Canadian populace that is loathe to make changes when things are going well. Following that sentiment, the Liberal Party made no more major changes, content to ride atop a strong economy, until waste and corruption seemed to get the better of them.
Now as head of the government, the Conservatives, like the Liberals in their first term, are seeking to make some important changes in areas like gun control, the GST and Senate reform. And though the Conservatives and what they might decide to change make many Canadians uneasy, most of these changes are badly needed.
The gun registry instituted by the Liberals seemed like an effort to create a problem and then solve it merely for the sake of winning votes. Gun crime has long been low in Canada and was in steady decline for 15 years before the gun registry was introduced. While the bill garnered a lot of support throughout the country from those who fear guns, the policy made little sense and intuitively seemed doomed to fail. The vast majority of gun deaths in Canada occur by suicide, accident, gang-related crime and domestic dispute — all situations in which a gun registry would make little difference. Gangsters don't register their guns and registered guns won't prevent accidents. Of course, the registry failed. Gang-related killing went up four-fold in the decade following the registry. On top of being ineffective, the gun registry cost orders of magnitude more than anticipated, running up a bill of over one billion dollars. The Liberals had estimated it would cost two million. The Liberals’ unwillingness to admit their mistake while wasting unforgivable sums of money showcased that they had governed with a majority for too long. The Conservatives were right to scrap the registration of long-barrel guns and to start looking for alternative measures to reduce gang-related gun crime.
Another area where the Conservatives have been pushing for change is Canada's senate. The Senate of Canada is an antiquated money pit stemming from the days of British colonialism and the aristocracy. Members appointed to the Senate are not elected and hold their post, with its six-figure salary, until the age of 75. The Senate has long been a subject of East-West strife and constructively impacts government policy far less than it could. Reforming the senate is a messy constitutional issue, and is not at the forefront of issues facing Canada. Yet, the Conservatives are right to take steps to bring Canada's senate out of the 19th century.
The Conservative Party isn't a magical cure for all that ails Canada. Many of their policies have been of questionable motive. Why cut the GST when Canada's economy is performing as well as it is? Winning votes seems a more likely answer than anything else. Also, in the recent poll, Canadians placed the environment as the second most pressing issue coming behind only health care. But, for all the change they are trying to bring about, the Conservatives have been noticeably quiet on environmental policy, constantly stating that Kyoto cannot be met by Canada but announcing nothing to take its place. If Canadians do rank the environment as highly as the poll suggests, it would do The Conservatives well to speak up. Yet, the Conservatives have shown a real willingness to bring about a round of fresh change, something Canada needed after the Liberals sat on their laurels for too long. Like the Liberals, the Conservatives should be given the chance to govern until they show that they aren't doing it effectively. Perhaps, with Canada's historical fear of governmental change, they will. |
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