Wolf_ODonnell wrote:I wonder what would happen with a Minority Conservative Government. Will it be equally as ineffective as the Minority Liberal Government, which from what I've heard, wasn't really very liberal to begin with?
Canadian Liberals are just to the right of center--Canada has always had a very plutocratic government, and it was no different with the Liberals. The Tories will need to form an alliance with either the Parti Québecois (also known as the Bloc Québecois, or the PQ or the BQj--but usually just as "the Bloc") or with the New Democrats. The Bloc seems to lie between the Liberals and the Tories, which means right of center, although the Québecois always have an emphasis on social services. The Bloc also respresents separatists, though, and that makes English-speaking Canajuns, especially in Ontario, suspicious. In 1995, there was a vote in Québec on separation, which was very close. The Federal government was then Liberal, and Chrétien's government used their nearly limitless power to pour millions into the province to fight separatism. The idea was to put the money into advertising, but the actual result was that the money got handed around to political cronies of Liberals in the province, and it became known as the sponsorship scandal, which is what brought down Paul Martin's Liberal government, through a no-confidence vote which lead to this election.
So you have a Tory ministry lead by Steven Harper, who is unpopular, who could make an alliance with the New Democratic Party (NDP) who increased their representation from 19 seats to 29; or with the Bloc, which has 51 seats (a loss of four seats) and which is lead by Gilles Duceppe, a very popular politician, even outside the province among English-speakers. A coalition with the NDP would be distasteful to Tories, because the NDP is a true left-wing party, and they would oppose many measures popular with Tories, and propose measures unpopular with Tories. A coalition with the Bloc puts a popular man (Duceppe) in the spotlight, which helps to balance the new PM's personal unpopularity, but it also might alienate true conservatives in English-speaking Canada (the kind who vote Tory even when they don't have a hope in Hell of forming a government).
Although as recently as a few weeks ago, i'd not have thought it, it seems to me more and more likely that Harper will form a coalition with the Bloc--primarily because Duceppe increased his popularity during the election campaign. Any way you look at it, this will be a shakey government. Paul Martin is stepping down from the leadership of the Liberals, so they need to find someone who can lead them effectively, and someone not tainted by the sponsorship scandal. If they do that, and they vigorously challenge the Tories, and political disaster which robs the Tories of Bloc support would spell the end of the government. Tory governments have tended to be short lived since the days of John MacDonald (end of the 19th century) except for the late 20s-early 30s and the 80s. Otherwise, Tory governments are usually short-lived, because they are almost always a minority, coalition government. In 1988, the Tories made an alliance with the Bloc, and the Tories hung on (sometimes just barely) for five years--so it could work.
The big gainers were the NDP, although it's a mixed blessing. They are unlikely to be invited into Harper's government. In 1988, Ed Broadbent lead 44 New Democrats to Ottawa, their biggest electoral success ever--and Mulrooney's Tories allied with the Bloc. It will be interesting to see how all of this falls out.
