Conservatives win majority of Canadian Parliament

The Conservative Party of Canada, which came into existence in 2003 as a merger of the Progressive Conservative Party and the Canadian Alliance, has for the first time won a majority of the seats in the Parliament. According to the AP, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s goal is to “to shatter the image of the Liberals—the party of former Prime Ministers Jean Chretien, Lester Pearson and Pierre Trudeau—as the natural party of government in Canada.” That is wonderful to hear. Modern Canada—with its multiculturalism, its slavish bilingualism, its divided, ambivalent identity, its supine stance toward Quebec, its national heath, and its non-Anglo, Continental-style constitution—was the creation of Trudeau, one of the most unfortunate Western political leaders of modern times. A serious intent on Harper’s part to undo the Trudeau legacy, if that is what he is talking about, is exactly what is needed.

The AP reports:

Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper won his coveted majority government in elections Monday that also marked a shattering defeat for the opposition Liberals, preliminary results showed.

Harper, who took office in 2006, has won two elections but until now had never held a majority of Parliament’s 308 seats, forcing him to rely on the opposition to pass legislation.

While Harper’s hold on the 308-member Parliament has been tenuous during his five-year tenure, he has managed to nudge an instinctively center-left country to the right. He has gradually lowered sales and corporate taxes, avoided climate change legislation, promoted Arctic sovereignty, upped military spending and extended Canada’s military mission in Afghanistan.

Elections Canada reported preliminary results on its website, giving the Conservatives 164 seats, which will give Harper four years of uninterrupted government.

“It’s stunning. We’re elated,” Conservative lawmaker Jason Kenney said in an interview with CBC. “We’ll be a government for all Canadians.”

The leftist New Democratic Party was projected to become the main opposition party for the first time in Canadian history with 106 seats, in a stunning setback for the Liberals who have always been either in power or leading the opposition.

Former colleagues of Harper say his long-term goals are to shatter the image of the Liberals—the party of former Prime Ministers Jean Chretien, Lester Pearson and Pierre Trudeau—as the natural party of government in Canada, and to redefine what it means to be Canadian.

Harper, who comes from the conservative western province of Alberta, took a major step toward that goal on Monday night as the Liberals dropped to 35 seats from 77, according to the preliminary results.

Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff congratulated Harper and New Democrat leader Jack Layton and accepted responsibility for the “historic defeat.”

“I will play any part that the party wishes me to play as we go forward to rebuild,” said Ignatieff, who even lost his own seat in a Toronto suburb.

Stephen Clarkson, a professor of political science at the University of Toronto, said Harper will now be considered a transformative figure in Canadian history.

“It’s a sea change,” Clarkson said.

The New Democrats’ gains are being attributed to Layton’s strong performance in the debates, a folksy, upbeat message, and a desire by the French-speakers in Quebec, the second most populous province, for a new face and a federalist option. Voters indicated they had grown weary with the separatist Bloc Quebecois, which had a shocking drop to three seats from 47 in the last Parliament.

The NDP’s gains marked a remarkable shift in a campaign that started out weeks ago looking like a straight battle between Harper and Ignatieff, with the 60-year-old Layton recovering from prostate cancer and a broken hip.

Harper campaigned on a message that the New Democrats stood for higher taxes, higher spending, higher prices and protectionism. He called the election a choice between “a Conservative majority” and “a ramshackle coalition led by the NDP that will not last but will do a lot of destruction.”

Gerry Nicholls, who worked under Harper at a conservative think tank, has said that having the New Democrats’ as the main opposition party would be ideal for Harper because it would define Canadian politics in clearer terms of left vs. right.

The Conservatives have built support in rural areas and with the “Tim Horton’s crowd”—a reference to a chain of doughnut shops popular with working class Canadians. They also have blitzed the country with TV attack ads, running them even during telecasts of the Academy Awards and the Super Bowl.

Lawrence Martin, a political columnist for The Globe and Mail newspaper and author of “Harperland: The Politics of Control,” calls Harper “the most autocratic and partisan prime minister Canada has ever had.”

But to remain in office through the longest period of minority government in Canadian history, Harper has had to engage in a constant balancing act. He has deliberately avoided sweeping policy changes that could derail his government, but now has an opportunity to pass any legislation he wants with his new majority.

- end of initial entry -

Jeff W. writes:

Yesterday’s election in Canada shows increased ethnic polarization. The Conservatives are now the party of the English-speaking white people. The NDP is the angry party of Everybody Else that wants to plunder the English-speaking white people. Before exulting too much in the victory of Conservatives, I would point out that the Conservatives only got 40 percent of the vote. Various plundering parties got 60 percent.

The Canadian Liberal party used to be the One Big Happy Family party of all Canadians living harmoniously under an enlightened welfare state. They got wiped out yesterday. No more One Big Happy Family.

We are also, of course, seeing increased racial and ethnic polarization in voting patterns in the U.S. Under Obama, black support for Democrats has never been so monolithic.

Gerry Neal, author of Throne, Altar, and Liberty, writes:

You wrote:

According to the AP, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s goal is to “to shatter the image of the Liberals—the party of former Prime Ministers Jean Chretien, Lester Pearson and Pierre Trudeau—as the natural party of government in Canada.” That is wonderful to hear. Modern Canada—with its multiculturalism, its slavish bilingualism, its divided, ambivalent identity, its supine stance toward Quebec, its national heath, and its non-Anglo, Continental-style constitution—was the creation of Trudeau, one of the most unfortunate Western political leaders of modern times. A serious intent on Harper’s part to undo the Trudeau legacy, if that is what he is talking about, is exactly what is needed.

I agree. That “if,” however, is a very big if. [LA replies: agreed.] Kevin Michael Grace wrote an article for VDare last fall about the commitment of Harper and his immigration/multiculturalism minister Jason Kenney to open borders/multiculturalism. Since then, Mr. Kenney has demonstrated his willingness to kowtow to pressure from Muslim groups in his barring Dr. Srdja Trifkovic from entering Canada to speak to the University of British Columbia upon the complaint of a Muslim organization.

These were my thoughts upon the results of the election.

I hope that Harper does intend to undo the Trudeau legacy. I fear that he plans on keeping it intact, only replacing the Liberal Party at the helm with the Conservative Party. Now that he has a majority we will see fairly soon which it is.


Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 03, 2011 08:46 AM | Send
    

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