BC election, Ontario budget show failure of NDP ‘moderation’
2013Barry Weisleder 2013-06Read it in the scan (PDF at ETOL), page 11 →
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The obvious lesson from the May 27 British Colum bia provincial election is “don’t trust opinion polls.” But what can we learn from the NDP campaign* be sides the fact that the Toronto Maple Leafs is not the only team capable of blowing a lead late in the game?
Consider the observation of Tara Ehrcke, president of the Victoria Teachers’ Association (affiliate of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation): “My greatest disappoint ment about this election was not the outcome, but the fact that not a single party stood up and spoke out for a radical re-evaluation of the massive inequity in our society. No political party really spoke to the need to tax the wealthy and to reinvest that money in services that benefit everyone, collectively. Like every elec tion in my adult memory ... the debate was between a neo-liberal party of the right, and an NDP trying to be a Blairite party of the centre who speaks left to a left audience, right to a right audience, and promises nothing to anyone for fear someone might not like it.”
Reporter Justine Hunter wrote in the May 16 Globe and Mail (BC edition): “Over his two years as leader, Mr. Dix developed an agenda that was designed not to spook voters. The slogan was change, ‘one practical step at a time.’” He courted business interests with the promise that he would not try to move too fast.
Thomas Walkom, Toronto Star columnist, put it best on May 16, pointing out that British Columbia’s elec tion was “a test run for the new, moderate, incremen talist NDP. ...
“It was at its core a strangely defensive campaign, as if the NDP were saying to voters: ‘We know you’re sick of the Liberals and wary of us. But don’t be frightened. You can vote for us without fear of our doing much.’
“The strategy didn’t work. First, the NDP can’t escape its own past. By any reasonable standard, it ceased to be a socialist party long ago. But no matter how many times it tries to purge its constitution of anti-capitalist language, a good many voters still view it as a party of the left.
“Christy Clark’s Liberals seized on this. ... My guess is that the New Democrats nationally will run into the same problem during the 2015 federal election cam paign. It will be difficult to convince those who mis trust left-wing parties that the new, moderate NDP has changed its spots. … “Andrea Horwath’s Ontario New Democrats, who prefer equally bite-size pieces of practical policy to broad vision might want to reflect on Dix’s failure here.”
That brings us to the budget of the Ontario Liberal minority government, which Ontario NDP Leader An drea Horwath decided to support in the third week of May. Let’s be clear. Premier Kathryn Wynne’s budget is a capitalist austerity budget. There is a 1% cap in annual programme spending; a 3% allowable annual rise in tuition fees; zero growth in hospital base fund ing; 2% growth in annual health care spending; $100 increase in the monthly Ontario Child Benefit (instead of the $200 promised in the Liberal poverty reduc tion plan), and income testing of seniors’ drug costs. A 1% hike in social assistance rates; 0% increase in the minimum wage.
And, of course, all of this is built on a two-year wage freeze across the public service, and on the imposi tion of unjust terms and conditions forced on Ontario education workers, including suspension of collective bargaining and the right to strike. A working-class party that supports such an agenda ends up paying a big political price. Just ask Bob Rae.
For what they’re worth, the latest opinion polls, fol lowing NDP endorsement of the budget, show the Lib erals up, and the NDP dropping into third place, well behind the Tories. The NDP Socialist Caucus slogan sums it up best: To survive, the NDP must turn left. n *If the judicial recount confirms the NDP win in Coquitlam-Mail lardville, the B.C. Liberals will end up with 49 seats in the legislature, the NDP 34, the Greens and independent Vicki Huntington one each.
happening this time around.
This shows that rather than moving towards a stronger, more influential and democratic organization, what is emerg ing is one big unaccountable, self-per petuating, privileged bureaucracy, over which the rank and file will have very little control.
Despite this generally bleak picture, some hope lies in the fact that the bu reaucracies of the two unions have left huge issues unresolved. Foremost among these is the question of political action, which centres on the future relationship to the NDP. They have no answer for this, and it is certain to spark intense debate.
I am hoping this debate will lead to what veteran CAW and socialist militant Joe Flexer used to call “an outbreak of democracy.” The task then will be to pour gasoline on the fire and break things wide open. That opening should include chal lenging the longstanding embrace of con tract concessions by both organizations, and the tepid, selective support given to social movements resisting the austerity agenda. Only if these things are done will the merger constitute a historic step for ward for the labour movement. n SOCIALIST ACTION JUNE 2013 11