Election: More of the Same, and advice to the NDP

So far, the election poll results are suggesting that we'll get a very similar result to the last government (the plot to the right shows the polling results since the lead-up to last election, and the thin horizontal lines show the election results from June 04.) You can plug in the results of your favourite poll to the No More Shall I Roam Election Calculator, but the results so far should be fairly clear.

I've heard several times that the NDP doesn't seem to be sure whether they're running against the Liberals or the Conservatives. This is almost certainly true, but it means the NDP leadership is missing the point. The NDP is having the same problem as the Conservatives -- they can't break through their ceiling of support. (20% in the case of the NDP; 30% in the case of the Conservatives). The NDP is making a mistake in trying to seperate itself in terms of policy from the Liberals and Conservatives, as demonstrated by the leaders of those parties taking turns gushing over the importance of public health care and childcare. The NDP is already on the same side of policy issues as the majority of Canadians. The issue in breaking the 20% mark in voter intention for the NDP is whether or not they would be competent, responsible administrators of Canada's affairs as a significant part of a new minority government. Jack Layton needs to stop pushing particular policies and start speaking reassuringly on basics of governance — reasonable economic policies, the proper role of government and private business, and government programs which are already doing a good job and don't need to be expanded or funding increased. It may well be too late to make a difference in this election, but if in the long term the NDP hopes to be a significant voice in Parliament, it needs to convince Canadians that it can be more than the Liberals' Jiminy Cricket-like external concience and that it could be a trusted actor in Canadian governance.

For the Conservatives, the situation is the opposite; the basic beliefs of the party are anathema to those of most of Canadians, and so you have the bizarre, unconvincing spectacle of Steven Harper absolutely gushing his support for public health care. Here I don't know what the solution is, but some of the ironies should be clear; this election would certainly result in a Progressive Conservative majority had the party not `united' with the Reform party. The Progressive Conservatives, being a long-established, well-trusted, steady hand would have been an obvious alternative to the Liberals, and after 12 years, Mulrooney's many legacies would have been largely forgiven. Short of the Conservatives dumping Harper and reverting to the PC past, it's not clear what could be done to improve the Conservative's chances. If given the current Liberal government the Conservatives can't break 30% in voter intentions, the future looks bleak.

The Liberals, on the other hand, are running against themselves. The obvious strategy for them to take would have been to don the mantle of reform; to bring in lots of visible young new blood, propose new ideas, and distance themselves as much as possible from the Liberals who have been in power for 12 years. This, however, seems structurally impossible for the Liberals, and probably won't happen until they convincingly lose an election — at which point the resulting bloodbath will leave room for a younger faction to take control of the party and take it in new directions.