The biggest, though by no means the smartest or the most coherent, complaint against Conservatives is that they aren’t Liberals. This complaint comes, bizarrely, as often from other conservatives, as it does from the left. Or perhaps it isn’t so bizarre, as Conservatives who want their side to become more like the other side will always be given time by Canada’s monochromatic media, which seems to agree that the only good Conservative is a Liberal.
Throughout the election campaign, this
has dogged Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who has been attacked for not focusing enough on U.S. President Donald Trump, and too much on the Liberals. This, despite the fact that it is Poilievre’s platform that would allow Canada to weather any storm coming from the south. If his policies had been in place for the last 10 years, we wouldn’t even be contemplating a crisis, as the Canadian economy would be vibrant and growing.
Unfortunately, for his efforts, he’s been criticized from all sides.
who ran Ontario Progressive Conservative Premier Doug Ford’s re-election campaign, accused the federal Tories of “campaign malpractice” for the Liberals’ resurgence in the polls, and for failing to refocus their campaign on the threat of tariffs. Ford, who could have chosen to say nothing, instead backed his campaign manager and told his federal Conservative counterparts that
About a week into the campaign, the
reported on more than a dozen Conservatives who were frustrated by what they saw as Poilievre’s “unwillingness to pivot from attacks on the Liberal government record to a laser focus on the trade war launched by U.S. President Donald Trump.”
And when Poilievre didn’t oblige, the Globe ran a headline that read,
Poilievre Continues To Attack Liberals’ Record,
as if the leader of the Opposition, in the middle of an election campaign, was doing something wrong by criticizing his opponent. Much of the coverage of the election has been flavoured like this, assuming Liberal Leader Mark Carney is facing the “crisis” while Poilievre is too busy, uh, attacking the government’s record … during an election.
A lot of the media, in fact, is openly campaigning for Carney, while pretending to be neutral and objective, constantly bringing up bogus issues like implying that Poilievre’s lack of security clearance means he has something to hide, along with unfounded and unsupported comparisons between the Conservative leader and Trump.
On policy, this week, media have tended to ignore the vast differences between the Conservative and Liberal spending plans, suggesting that because the Tories would also run a deficit, they are not much better than the Liberals, which leaves the incumbents off the hook for their much more irresponsible plan, and their record of doubling the federal debt.
Or consider
issues on which many in the media can’t contain their contempt for the fact that the Conservatives think voters want order in the streets. Or the fact that there has been little interest in what Carney was doing before he ran for the Liberal leadership in January, when he was working and advocating to keep natural resources in the ground, which is conveniently ignored to present him as the man who will fix Canada’s economy.
The media hasn’t quite endorsed the Liberals’ accusation that Poilievre would restrict abortion, but we still have four days before election day. Give it time.
As for whether the Conservatives should be focused on the threat of tariffs, it is one thing for Doug Ford to have won re-election in Ontario with a Trump-focused campaign. He was the incumbent in what was, at least at the time, a crisis, and crises almost always favour governments that are already in power. Just think of the popularity boost federal and provincial leaders got during the COVID pandemic.
It also makes sense for the Carney Liberals to focus on Trump, because, to the extent it is still a crisis, it will naturally benefit them as the Liberals are the incumbents. Demanding Poilievre effectively replicate the Liberal campaign is what would be a disaster, not the other way around.
As much as some in the media try to suggest
that there is little difference
between the Liberal and Conservative platforms, except of course the parts where Poilievre is scary, and thereby implying the Liberals deserve another chance, the Tory platform is a genuinely conservative document that offers a clear, and much needed, break with the last 10 years.
Most importantly, the Conservatives would repeal the Impact Assessment Act, the emissions cap on oil and gas, fuel regulations and the electric vehicle mandate, while reforming the government’s regulatory regime and cutting taxes — plans that largely reverse Liberal policies that have discouraged investment and left the country overly reliant on trade with the Americans.
Sure, it would be preferable if the Conservatives also planned to reform labour laws, and weaken union power, and change the age at which seniors are eligible for retirement benefits, but it is important to pick your fights. In a country where the temperament is not particularly conservative, the best approach is to identify those areas where the public is conservative and lean into them. Getting government out of the way to make it easier for people to find well-paid work is the right approach.
Negotiating with Trump, who is inexplicably suspicious of free markets, may be necessary and unavoidable. What should have been avoidable is the weakened state of the Canadian economy. It is Poilievre’s plan, not Carney’s, that corrects this colossal mistake.
National Post
