Cast your mind back a few months to the UK's general election. On the eve of the vote, opinion polls were pointing to a too-close-to-call outcome between the Tories and Labour. On polling day, however, the Tories trounced both Labour and the Lib Dems, ending up -- against all expectations -- with a solid majority government. Poring over their latest failure, the pollsters settled on the idea that a lot of people who had been polled had been "shy Tories" -- people fully committed to backing David Cameron, but too embarrassed to admit that to a stranger.
Could we see the same thing when Canada votes on October 19? This columnist seems to think it's a possibility, though not an important one. Opinion polls show the three main parties -- Tories, Liberals and NDP -- each with about 30 percent voter support. Harper's 30 percent , his "base" vote, is certainly very far from being shy. Early in the interminable campaign, a grey-haired gent got international press coverage for screaming abuse at a reporter who had the temerity to ask Prime Minister Harper questions about the ongoing Senate expenses scandal. Among other things he accused her -- and reporters in general -- of being tax evaders.
This kind of anger is a characteristic of Harper's "base", though it's legitimate to ask what they're so angry about. After all, their man has been in office for over a decade, a time in which he has quite deliberately run the country in ways that the remaining 70 percent of the population find abhorrent: strident and blinkered foreign policy, scorn for other levels of government, disregard for the environment, cuts in social programmes. That's what the "base" wanted, and that's what Harper has delivered, so I ask again: what are they so angry about?
Most analysts assume that Harper's real support will never be much more or less than that 30 percent "base". To win the election, or at least to attain a minority government, he needs to shake loose, for one day only, a smattering of wavering souls from the other major parties. Fully 70 percent of Canadian voters are heartily sick of Harper, but at least some of them can be bribed with targeted tax cuts -- a Harper specialty -- or made fretful about terrorist threats.
This ought not to work, but the opposition parties are making it easier for the Tories by shying away from radical proposals. The supposedly socialist NDP has vowed not to run an fiscal deficit, while promising a number of new initiatives that seem sure to be expensive -- a national daycare programme, for example. The Liberals are ready to run deficits to finance infrastructure spending in an effort to jumpstart the economy -- but only small deficits, and only for three years. Ten years of Harperism, echoed at the local level by politicians like former Toronto Mayor Rob Ford, have made the notion of activist government, financed either by a somewhat higher tax burden or through deficits, something almost unmentionable.
Against the odds, then, this election now seem to be taking place on Harper's terms. Given that the other parties aren't promising anything very different, why not stick with good old Stephen and his supposedly firm hand on the tiller, rather than gamble on callow Justin Trudeau or angry Tom Mulcair? It's not a pitch that's going to win my vote, but there may be enough voters -- "one day" Tories rather than "shy" ones -- to make Harper's party the largest in the House of Commons come October 20.
UPDATE, 24 September: Maybe not so shy after all? This poll shows the Tories pulling ahead of their opponents, with almost enough support to form a majority government. And yet in my own discussions with friends and acquaintances in our riding, which is currently Tory, I can't find anyone who's enthusiastic about giving Stephen Harper another term, and a whole lot who are horrified at the prospect.
No comments:
Post a Comment