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Tom Bateman - Week Five Grades

Political Parties
B	A	D	B+

Bloc Quebecois

Steady as she goes. It’s all about Quebec’s interests for these, regardless of which of the two other parties wins. The Bloc’s support has softened but this was to be expected since many supporters are non-sovereigntists who need a way to punish the Liberals.

Conservative Party

How about that front page Globe and Mail photo of a prime ministerial Stephen Harper? We have come a long way from the goofy summer 2005 paparazzi photos of fat Stephen with the geeky hat and shirt tails hanging out. Also fawning CBC TV coverage of Conservative candidates in Quebec. A campaign can’t buy flattering coverage like this.

It appears that the plodding policy-heavy drip-a-day announcement technique the Tories used before Christmas has worked. The Conservatives looked prepared to govern, without trumpeting the notion. They have been disciplined and almost gaffe-free. The tying of aboriginal people into the veterans’ assistance policy package is clever. It reframes the issue in a Tory-friendly and unimpeachable direction: as citizens, aboriginal people served their country in war and should be recognized for their expressions of Canadian citizenship. Notice how the Tories are trying to soak up more of the immigrant vote....

Two possible problems for the Tories. One, many Canadians are stilled scared of Stephen Harper. They will be reminded of Harper’s National Citizens Coalition work and his co-authorship of the 2001 Alberta Firewall letter. So the Conservatives are pushing the ceiling up but they probably will not be able to punch through. While the gun crime stuff reinforces the Conservatives’ core constituency, this groups needs no reinforcement. A bit of posturing, to my mind. By the way, would Harper countenance the use of s. 33 to insulate minimum criminal sentences from certain Charter attack?

Two, there is nothing like a couple of good polls in a horse race to make the leading party cocky and the low-number party more diligent and resolute. The Liberals are survivors, after all. The “peak too soon” issue should worry campaign insiders.

That being said, could the Tories want the polls any other way?

Liberal Party

Oh dear, the Big Red Machine sputters. The chow-chow thing in Toronto rivals anything the Alberta Reform Party types could have concocted in the early 1990s. And the Tories will not have lost their taste for the beer and popcorn metaphor.

There may not be much at all about the RCMP investigation of the alleged income trusts leak. But it doesn’t matter. The media are on to it, and this is the hook the opposition parties have needed to remind Canadians of the sponsorship scandal. Nothing like similar fact evidence to sway the jury.

Paul Martin’s reversal on the apology to the Chinese smacks of desperation. One of the big stories in recent years has been the leakage of the immigrant vote away from the Liberals. This announcement suggests the Liberals are worried.

And the announcement on tuition relief for post-secondary students touches the high notes on global competitiveness and human capital formation but it also suffers from two defects. One is that the nobody can keep straight whether this is new money, money already announced, or when exactly it will be disbursed. Liberals and Conservatives have been announcing so much spending that the marginal effect of announcement like these might soon approach zero. The second is that young people do not vote in high numbers. Will this appeal to their parents, who are more likely to vote?

New Democratic Party

For the kingmakers, things are getting interesting. They may be more credible in urging their voters to vote straightforwardly for the party they support – the NDP. Said Layton: "Last time the Liberals hoodwinked people into voting for a party that they said was a little bit like the New Democrats...." On the benefit Canadians enjoyed from NDP strength in 2004: "If those million people had voted Liberal, profitable banks and oil companies would be getting a tax break instead of students getting a break on tuition."

Some traditional NDP rhetoric: "Outside of this election, I didn't see Paul Martin working to keep Canada out of Iraq. I didn't see him working for equality for lesbian and gay people. I don't see him really standing up to George Bush on softwood lumber, in any significant way, to keep jobs here in Canada.”

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