While we’re still a month away from Parliament being summoned and the first major confidence vote – likely on the Address in Reply to the Speech from the Throne – there is going to be no end of talk of some kind of formal governing arrangement between the Liberals and either the Bloc or the NDP. Because that’s what always happens, and we’re predictable like that, but really, there isn’t going to be any arrangement, because nobody actually wants one.
It doesn’t make a ton of sense from outside—their policy goals seem so similar!—but staunch New Democrats see the Liberals as corporate lickspittles who are just lying about their progressivism and Liberals see the NDP as believers in fairytales (and perpetual losers).
— David Reevely (@davidreevely) October 17, 2021
As David Reevely has pointed out, the idea of any kind of supply or confidence agreement with the Bloc is political poison, and won’t happen. Period. And any kind of agreement with the NDP is not saleable politically on either side. And oh, you might say – didn’t they rely on the NDP last year during the pandemic? Well, not really. For the early months, they came to all-party agreements on emergency legislation in the backrooms, and all of it was done behind closed doors and we got next to no debate in the House of Commons over it – just a few speeches about the pandemic, and some back-patting about working together, but nobody was actually going to bring down the government over it. Later on, the NDP and the Bloc joined with the Conservatives in their procedural warfare that largely paralysed legislation for the better part of five months, because they love to embarrass the government, no matter the stripe, and it wasn’t until May when both the Bloc and NDP realized they had bills they wanted to get passed (C-10 for the Bloc, the UNDRIP, the conversion therapy ban, and the National Day of Truth and Reconciliation bills for the NDP) and they finally started to play ball. As for the confidence votes in the interim, the NDP pretended like they were forcing the government’s hand into extending benefits that were going to be extended regardless – this is not a government that is averse to spending money when need be – and they patted themselves on the back for doing such a good job of taking credit for work that happening anyway.
The other fact is that the seat math just isn’t there for a need for a formal agreement of any kind. It’s not marginal enough – as in BC and New Brunswick during their respective hung legislatures, where they had a mere seat or two leeway with the support of the minority partner – whereas that’s not the case here. And as much as everyone is going to handwave about “Canadians want a Parliament that works,” the truth is nobody is in the position to go to an election for at least another 18 months, if not longer. And yes, the Bloc and the NDP will huff and puff and performatively make demands, but in the end, the government will carry on with period bouts of empty drama that the press gallery will dutifully type up as though it did carry much weight, and things will carry on, without need for a formal arrangement once again.
Good reads:
- Chrystia Freeland says the government is “considering” renewing expiring pandemic benefits (which they absolutely will).
- Yes, you will still need a PCR test to return to Canada after travelling to the US.
- The federal government is bracing for an onslaught of passport renewals.
- A 4000-year-old Indigenous knife excavated on Parliament Hill will be shared with two Algonquin First Nations, and eventually be displayed in the Centre Block.
- Governor General Mary May Simon has arrived in Berlin for her first international visit on behalf of Canada.
- Current and former MPs are shaken by the death of UK MP Sir David Amess, who was stabbed to death during a constituency meeting.
- CBC profiles some of the new MPs heading into the new parliament.
- Here is the story of a would-be Bloc MP who lost by 12 votes in the recount, after he already started his new MP orientation sessions.
- Ontario’s municipal affairs minister is using a vaguely-worded law against third-party advertising to shut down groups opposed to building a new prison.
- Susan Delacourt reflects on the anger on display on the campaign trail, and wonders how Justin Trudeau plans to address it, as it can’t simply be dismissed as a fringe.
- Chantal Hébert calls out the deafening silence by all federal parties as more provincial governments keep trying to test their constitutional boundaries.
Odds and ends:
Small towns in Quebec are unable to attract mayoral candidates, as nobody wants to work 24/7 for $6000-$10,000 per year. Imagine that!
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Why would Justin Trudeau even want to talk to Jagmeet Singh about so much as the weather. He let Charlie Angus run wild for a whole year impugning his mother’s character, just to score polling points and dunk on the government during a pandemic. Margaret was way too gracious in her assessment on election night that “Jagmeet is a compassionate man.” Either she didn’t watch the committee hearings either or her son didn’t have the heart to inform her of what the NDP has been doing. As if that wasn’t bad enough, now they’ve got their rank and file swarming social media with Russian disinfo that Chrystia Freeland is a Na zi. Yet say nothing whatsoever about the party that used “Secure the Future” (for white children) as its dog-whistle slogan.
The NDP are a horrible, horrible party who are no better than the Conservatives in their vicious personal attacks against a PM they can’t beat on policy (and the next presumed Liberal PM after him). The only reason they get away with it is because the softball media lets them carry the mantle of self-righteousness as their “brand,” because their right-wing corporate ownership hopes they split the Liberal vote. The PM has no reason to engage the NDP in anything whatsoever. Forget coalitions, if I were him I wouldn’t give Singh the time of day. You don’t attack a man’s ailing mother and call yourself a progressive.