Category: Chairman’s Desk

It’s less than two weeks from the Conservative party’s first leadership debate, and Pierre Poilievre has established himself as the clear front-runner.

After recently dazzling over a thousand supporters at a packed Steam Whistle brewery event in downtown Toronto, the extent of his lead is such that his competitors have stopped contesting the popularity of his events.

“We have been spending 100 per cent of our time selling memberships,” Patrick Brown’s national co-chair Michelle Rempel Garner told the Globe. Others say that Maxime Bernier also attracted large numbers without it translating proportionally to membership sales or votes.

Both counter arguments hold some truth — but it also goes without saying that any leadership aspirant would kill for the enthusiasm Poilievre has seen across the country, including in unconventional locations like, say, a downtown Toronto brewery.

The question is not whether he leads the enthusiasm race, but rather what this lead means.

Many have questioned if his online followers or rally attendees will purchase Conservative memberships and ultimately vote. That said, it is easy to believe that Canadians willing to wait in line for an hour to attend a political rally during a cold Canadian winter are as likely as anyone to show up in September. His operations team is second to none, and he will benefit from years of legwork building enduring relationships with local riding associations, campus clubs and industry groups across the country.

Critics have also suggested that the tent he has built, while angry and vocal, is simply too narrow to be competitive in a general election. I am not so sure. I think there is a fundamental change in the attitudes of Canadians that many are missing.

While his criticism of the governing Liberals is often hyperbolic, his message to voters is a familiar one for conservatives, characterized by smaller government, a fundamental belief in personal freedoms and attention to pocketbook concerns.

Rather than ask whether Poilievre is too right-wing to be electable, it’s a more useful exercise to examine the “third rails” that have plagued Conservative candidates in the past.

We know, for example, that the Canadian public doesn’t hold the same anti-immigration sentiments as other western nations. Our skills-based assessment process and labour-market need for more qualified workers make large-scale immigration both necessary and popular. That’s why policies that appear resistant to multiculturalism, like the Harper government’s “barbaric cultural practices” hotline, have unquestionably hurt the Conservatives’ brand as a big-tent party.

However, Poilievre appears to understand Canadians’ attitudes, rolling out a plan to speed up wait times for approving foreign credentials as an initial appeal to new Canadians and those who support their participation in the Canadian economy. Surprising many, he has also been willing to depart from social conservatives on issues like abortion and equal marriage, most recently voting with his caucus colleagues to criminalize conversion therapy.

His small-government ethos will inevitably be attacked by labour advocates as an austerity agenda, but he has been assertive and clear in contrasting his own political philosophy versus the current government’s. He argues that endless dependence on printed money drives up the price of goods, only hurting Canadian workers and families.

On other issues, his path forward is less clear. While many Canadians share his criticism of the government’s public health restrictions and inconsistent guidance, an even greater number watched the Ottawa convoy with horror, perplexed that any parliamentarian would stand with an illegal protest as it lay siege to our nation’s capital.

God willing, the COVID-19 debate will be in the rear-view mirror by our next federal election campaign, but Poilievre must work to ensure he is not defined by his most provocative public positions.

Maintaining party enthusiasm while growing the tent has been an unmanageable balancing act for his two predecessors. But with every jam-packed rally, Pierre Poilievre moves that much closer to getting the keys to Stornoway and setting his sights on a bigger target.

As Canada’s housing crisis deepens, touching more and more families as it does, politicians are becoming desperate in their search for solutions. The balancing act is a tricky one: the interests of existing homeowners compete with the economic outlook and raw anger among younger generations, who have come to feel that owning a home will forever elude them. To date, reconciling these positions has proven to be an impossible task.

Recognizing this growing public policy tsunami, which has quickly become very real to everyday Canadians, the federal government made housing a cornerstone of its budget. The budget sought to provide incentives for people to enter the market through a tax-free first home savings account, along with direct payments to those facing housing affordability challenges. And it went further: the government committed $4 billion over four years, in order to build 100,000 new homes.

Sounds good, right? Well, there are a couple of problems. Inflation is threatening to rob people of their purchasing power, and millennials — now the largest generation in Canada — are unable to afford the homes being built.

But never mind that the long-term ramifications of this crisis are a disaster. The short-term consequences may be even worse for our political leaders.

Cleverly, Pierre Poilievre knows this. He has decided to capitalize on this issue and make it a central theme of his Conservative leadership campaign. His latest video features him standing before a clearly overvalued Vancouver house, lamenting inflation and municipal “gatekeepers.”

And so enter another set of players in this drama: Canada’s cities. Or, as the prime minister prefers, “essential partners.” Call them what you will — it is clear that cities have a huge role to play in dealing with this mess. Any federal government will need the help of bold and effective municipal leadership to make tough decisions and fix this issue amidst a foreboding macroeconomic outlook. In short, cities simply need to move faster and more imaginatively than they have before.

And to do that, they need — we need — a housing champion.

With Ontario municipal voters set to go to the polls this fall, their potential champion is waiting in the wings.

The housing crisis is particularly acute in Toronto, and this recent wave of pressure on municipalities serves as an opportunity for Mayor John Tory to cement his political legacy and demonstrate how to solve this national problem from the bottom up.

Presiding over not only the country’s largest municipality but its largest homeless population, Tory can deliver real progress in fixing our housing market. A genuine consensus builder with plenty of political capital and experience working co-operatively with his federal and provincial counterparts, Tory can serve as a model for other municipalities.

Working with council and city staff, he will need to be willing to take risks, sometimes against the wishes of key allies, to help fast-track priority projects. Much of it will be painful in the short term, but the mayor has demonstrated the temperament, experience and judgment needed to advocate for the necessary solutions.

The support of developers has been key to the mayor’s housing initiatives and construction in the city, but there’s not enough elasticity in the market to provide affordable options for everyone. While heeding calls to stop delays, he will also have to surgically ensure that what’s being built is sustainable, affordable and livable, adapting to the needs of modern urban communities.

Tory is a determined and accomplished leader. Now he must get his hands dirty. He must be guided by the proverb “Blessed is the one who plants trees under whose shade they will never sit.”

The housing crisis gives the mayor a chance to plant those trees, to succeed where others have failed, to put his hard-earned reputation on the line to lead on an astonishingly complex issue.

This week’s federal budget was a surprise. What’s more, it was a far cry from the Liberal election platform and the worst fears of critics of the NDP-Liberal agreement. In fact, the 2022 budget displayed, if not restraint, at least a refreshing acknowledgment of the reality around us.

That is not to say this budget isn’t worthy of criticism. It contains no long-term vision for the economy, and allocates major funding to programs that are not fit for purpose. But after years of posturing and using divisive COVID politics as a cudgel, with this budget the government has suggested a return to some kind of normalcy and — dare I say — common sense.

Now, the Opposition must respond in kind. Conservatives need to do a better job of outlining meaningful conservative approaches to major policy proposals. For too long our loudest opposition has been defined by negativity, rather than a serious attempt to address important issues on our own terms.

The policies put forth in the Liberals’ budget are no doubt partisan; they reflect the priorities of the NDP as well. But the issues they address — the cost of living, global security, climate change — are not partisan. They are realities that Canadians face every day of their lives. They are realities they expect their parliamentarians to deal with. Conservatives have strong solutions for these issues, but too often find it easier to simply tear down the Liberal approach.

This isn’t easy to do. The role of the Official Opposition is, after all, to oppose the government and hold it to task. Add to that a leadership campaign where the various contenders are trying to stake out their own defendable turf, and make a compelling case to Canadians on the issues of our time.

But consider this approach.

On housing, the government has maintained its tack of increasing access to funding for homebuyers. This approach is insufficient and will continue to fail in making a difference for Canadians. Instead, we should be advocating for a concerted effort to address supply in the housing market, through regulatory levers and other restrictions.

At the same time, Conservatives should loudly acknowledge that housing is a very new area for the federal government, which has not historically played a big role in the sector outside of Indigenous communities. Cities and provinces have a crucial role to play in addressing housing supply, and encouraging their involvement is entirely consistent with conservative principles.

Increased defence funding is one line item that will appeal to Tories. However, the provisions of the new budget are nowhere near enough to make a difference. Much of this funding will be used to simply overhaul outdated equipment; it will not meaningfully change Canada’s stature among NATO allies.

For Conservatives, increased defence spending must come with a plan to address failures in procurement and a plan to actually get new military investments done. Likewise, a renewed focus on the Arctic is meaningless without a long-term plan. Like some past prime ministers, Justin Trudeau has committed rhetorically to an Arctic strategy — but that commitment must amount to more than an annual summer trip and photo op in the general direction of the North Pole.

On the question of national dental care, there is a crucial conservative argument to be made that what Canadians really deserve is a means-tested program that targets funding directly at those who need it most. The reality is that a targeted approach can provide more resources to those who need them, without squandering money on those who don’t.

Personally, I would suggest that a means-tested approach on dental care could open the door to a Conservative-backed pharmacare program that actually supports Canadians and our economy. What a thought.

Whatever specifics we choose matters not. What does matter is that we provide conservative answers to these important questions. Otherwise, our vehement opposition will only get us back where we started: the Opposition.

There is a growing groundswell of support for Canada to play a larger role in international security by providing our allies with energy supplies. While many correctly see this as both an opportunity to make a meaningful contribution to the world and as a means to increase our international standing, we must be realistic about what shape that support could feasibly take.

Sadly, after years of underinvestment and political complacency, both our foreign policy credentials and our ability to export Canadian energy have suffered. In practical terms, this means that calls for Canada to step in to displace Europe’s reliance on Russian energy — while politically potent — are misplaced and counterproductive.

We cannot export anywhere near the quantity of energy that Europe needs. The infrastructure required to do so doesn’t exist, and pretending otherwise is irresponsible. Instead, we should be pragmatic and look closer south to make a difference.

Most of the five million barrels of oil we produce daily are sold to the United States; we can’t really send more elsewhere. Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson has moved to modestly increase our U.S. exports by the end of the year, conveying that getting more further afield isn’t happening anytime soon — especially not as the government doubles down on its climate agenda.

And while we are the world’s fourth-biggest producer of natural gas, again, we have no logistical capacity to get it to Europe. So, the government has also increased these exports to the U.S., but ultimately the Americans must ship our resources across the Atlantic.

Our energy industry has long argued that Canada’s near nonparticipation in the global market for liquefied natural gas (LNG) would cost us significantly. Given that EU countries still rely on Russia for 40 per cent of their gas imports, those warnings were tragically prophetic.

Yes, ours is a government committed to a necessary transition away from carbon, but it also claims to be a government committed to our allies and to Canada’s unique role on the world stage. The desire to reduce fossil fuel dependence need not cripple Canada’s ability to help our allies when it matters most.

Vladimir Putin has permanently reshaped energy politics, and if we don’t do our part — by stepping into the LNG market, by increasing our exports to the U.S., by making smart investments now — Canada will dramatically reduce its stature in the new global landscape.

Tumultuous times require pragmatism. The U.S. administration shares our government’s long-term vision for a low-carbon future, but right now they are desperately searching for ways to alleviate high prices at the pumps and wean the world off Russian energy. President Joe Biden has moved to withdraw the largest-ever amount from America’s emergency oil reserves, making our moderately increased exports seem pathetic.

He’s also been forced to turn to oil-rich autocrats like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, who in turn have him quite literally over a barrel. As Premier Jason Kenney chimed in that “Alberta oil is better than dictator oil,” he looked to remind Biden of our energy sector’s commitments to responsible development.

But here is the challenge. The Liberal government is unlikely to risk suggesting that the illegal invasion of Ukraine by Putin will supersede their climate goals. And that means they are unlikely to do enough.

Those conflicting interests require principled compromise. America remains our strongest ally, and this is a critical moment for us to prove our mettle to them and the world. Fine, we cannot supply Europe with energy, but helping where we can will earn Canada a serious role in global security and the energy transition to come.

That means building on carbon capture technology investments together — both government and the private sector. If we are to influence the world toward a cleaner future, we need a seat at the table. And as bombs fall on a European ally and we pledge to do everything we can, now is the time to take it.

This week the prime minister simultaneously took two different risks with two very different opposition parties.

The Liberal “confidence-and-supply” agreement with the New Democrats was a political manoeuvre that provides stability for a minority government, while offering NDP leader Jagmeet Singh reasonable positioning as a conscientious voice in Parliament.

The price? Limiting the government’s flexibility as it copes with a post-COVID world, by locking the prime minister into policies that are both popular and costly.

Notwithstanding those limitations, the decision must have been easy to make with respect to the New Democrats.

In another respect, a gamble has been taken here. The deal presents the Conservative party with a longer runway to develop ideas and campaign tools before the next general election, and provides distinct opportunities for each of the prominent leadership candidates to expand and strengthen their base. Competition to do so will be fierce; it could be the exact environment Conservatives need — if they don’t tear each other apart in the process.

Pierre Poilievre, Jean Charest and Patrick Brown are all licking their chops after the announcement.

As the loudest parliamentary voice against government excess, the deal plays well into Poilievre’s pugilistic strategy. He has amassed an enviable online following and list of caucus endorsements with his harsh criticism of deficits, inflation and incursion on personal freedoms. With this deal, Poilievre can no longer be accused of fighting a fictional bogeyman.

We know that Canadians share his concern for affordability, and many will see Liberal-NDP spending pledges as a bridge too far. When the confidence-and-supply agreement reaches its conclusion, we will no longer be in a pandemic. Our growing debt load, combined with likely increases in interest rates, will be a pain point for governments and taxpayers alike.

Who better to fight against this seemingly inevitable outcome than Canada’s loudest fiscal hawk?

For the seasoned Charest, the deal presents an opportunity to prove he really is “built to win.” His play will be to position himself as the Conservative best able to draw together the progressive wing, through moderate positions on climate change and social issues, as well as a credible appeal to national unity.

With the Liberals drifting away from their traditional centrist positioning — now more than just rhetorically — it stands to reason that progressive conservative voices have an opening.

Charest will have to contrast himself with other candidates, while convincing swing voters and existing party members that his team poses a credible alternative to the current government and is worth investing in.

More than that, Charest needs to convince them that it is worth taking out a membership card and joining. To do so will require not simply a compelling policy platform, but also a ground organization on a scale not seen before in a partisan leadership race.

As for Patrick Brown, he has the chance to cement his base and deploy his urban organizers to attract new members. As mayor of Brampton, he has a diverse coalition of voters to serve as a springboard and a proven ability to win in a Liberal-leaning city — but with a limited profile outside of Ontario, he has considerable ground to make up.

While generally seen as a moderate, Brown did not hesitate to loudly and provocatively decry the new “socialist coalition.” Campaigning against government largesse is hardly a novel strategy in Conservative leadership politics, but the newly formed Liberal-NDP alliance has added fuel to these efforts.

In fact, since the government announcement, Conservative fundraisers have found a real source of excitement and urgency. Hopefully, members will be treated to a much more aspirational debate about the role of the Conservative party — and the role of government — in this changing political ecosystem.

By securing this agreement, Justin Trudeau has made his immediate future as prime minister much more secure, but he has also opened the door for stronger, more coherent opposition in the long-term. The playing field is open for Conservative candidates to take advantage.