The Liberals are in Trouble.

The Liberals are in Trouble.

Summary: In minority governments, campaigns for the next election begins the day after the original election is finished. The Liberals need to rebuild their party but they seem incapable of thinking outside the Toronto Box. The Conservatives, on the other hand, are doing their best to make headway with voters in the rest of the country.


The Liberals are in trouble, but none of them seems to notice. This is because after the most recent election the Liberals retreated to the trenches of Toronto and dug in. Unfortunately they’ve dug in so far they can’t see over the top, let alone set out charging. Not only that, from the looks of things, once they realized they’d be there for a while, one person did a Tims run while someone else brought over a DVD player. From the looks of things, they’re starting to get a bit too comfortable.

Ahh Toronto! Where the sun always shines and things couldn’t look better. That is, of course, if you’re a Liberal. Even though the NDP may have taken two seats, most Liberals see Jack and Olivia’s victories as isolated incidents rather than a serious threat to their hegemonic dominance of the T-Dot. Toronto remains a safe place where Liberals can walk around with their heads held high, confident that the current Conservative victory is a minor setback.

This weekend Liberals got together in Toronto to celebrate Sheila Copps. The event was marked as a moment of reconciliation meant to bring together the former feuding factions of Chretienites and the Martonians. Former MP Dennis Mills and my MP, Paul Zed, came up with the brilliant idea of commemorating one of the most polarizing figures in Grit history, Sheila Copps, a former Chrétien foot-soldier and a woman hated by the supporters of Martin. The same people who stood by silently as Sheila fell victim to Paul Martin’s political genocide of Chrétien supporters now, two years after her embarrassing defeat, decided it was time to place her on a pedestal. Aline Chrétien was there, and so was John Turner, but noticeably absent was Paul Martin and everyone from his inner circle. This event may have worked to heal the rifts between the Chrétienites and the Turnerites, but I hardly think anyone really believes the big red tent is all of a sudden a comfortable place for all Liberal members.

And so while the grits sipped champagne and gossiped over who would lead them into the next election, Stephen Harper was in my part of the country throwing small money around and putting to rest some significant local issues. For starters, Harper offered to pay 1/3rd of the cost of Saint John’s harbour cleanup. For years we Saint Johners have been embarrassed by the sight and smell of raw sewage being dumped into our harbour. The Federal Government seems to have kick started the cleanup and voters in my area are unlikely to forget that come the next election. Harper was then off to Moncton to offer 6 million for a new stadium. He also announced 400 million to help improve New Brunswick highways(spending which was incidentally approved but not announced by the previous Liberal government. Smooth move). All of this comes as good news to New Brunswick, which the conservatives rightly see as fertile ground.

In Saint John, you have to remember, we were one of only two ridings to elect a Conservative during Chrétien’s massive victory over Kim Campbell’s Tories. We stuck with Elsie Wayne throughout the Chrétien years, and only when she retired did we elect a Liberal, former MP Paul Zed. People initially voted for Zed because there was a general feeling that we were isolating ourselves in Saint John by being consistently on the wrong side of the governing benches. Zed won again in the most recent election because people believed him to be a capable MP who was effective at bringing in money for local projects. It also helps to remember that many in Atlantic Canada continue to be suspicious of Harper and resent comments he has made about the region in the past.

By making these small announcements here and there, Harper is hoping to put to rest concerns that he is a bogeyman determined to sever Atlantic Canada from the rest of the country. In a place where people tend to vote more on local issues than national ones, he just might be successful. If we have another close election, minor gains in Atlantic Canada may be what push the Conservatives into majority territory.

You don’t have to go to Toronto to understand the extent to which the fog rolling in off of Lake Ontario blinds Liberals to the state of their party in the rest of the country. The fact is that almost everyone considered a contender for the Liberal leadership comes from there, with the exception of the also-rans Scott Brison, Dennis Coderre, and Stephane Dion. As for the rest of the slate of candidates, most wouldn’t appear to know the difference between Cape Breton from Great Britain. If things continue like this, the Liberals will have no reason to campaign outside of the 416.

We in the rest of Canada are very suspicious of the “Toronto knows what’s best” attitude, and we wont be willing to hand the keys over to a Liberal just because he or she isn’t Stephen Harper. Whoever becomes the next leader will have to out bid the Prime Minister in the Saint Johns and Darmouths of the country.

Right now the Liberals are loosing that race, not only because they’re not in power, but also because they’re so bunkered down in Toronto. After their surprising success in Quebec Conservatives will be looking to make even larger gains there. If Bloc support holds firm, Liberals could be relegated to the third party in Quebec. I suspect now that the Conservatives have held power, more credible candidates will step out of the woods in places like Ontario and British Colombia, and this can only help the Conservative cause.

The simply reality of the situation is this: unless the Conservatives manage to mess up royally, any election held in the next two years will probably produce another Conservative government. All of the Liberal front-runners right now are either unknown in most of the country or have heavy baggage they’ll have to offload (ie. Haven’t lived in the country for 30 years, bad record as Premier, etc). The sooner Liberals realize this the better for them, as they’ll have to once again venture outside of Toronto’s Green belt and build a real alternative the Conservatives. Stephen Harper is already out there, and if they want to avoid making the same mistake twice, they’d do well not to under-estimate him again.