Almost as soon as Brian Topp announced his candidacy for leader of the federal NDP, he stepped into the Conservative trap regarding electoral re-distribution.
Conservatives have been long advocates of an equal distribution of seats based on one formula. While there’s nothing with that idea in principle, the Conservative governments plan to add federal seats to Ontario, BC, and Alberta’s electoral roll will always trigger the ire of Quebec nationalists. It was first the BQ that barked opposition to this plan as it waters down Quebec’s influence in Ottawa…or so they feel. As soon as Brian Topp declares his candidacy, he too is spouting off against this plan to correct a horrible electoral unfairness that affects BC the most.
So, Brian Topp starts off sounding like a Quebec separatist…I can almost see the negative smear ads against Mr. Topp as leader; calling him the orange version of the BQ and polarizing the west against the NDP.
Brian Topp stepped into this trap with both feet and has no one to blame but himself.
No mention was made by Mr. Topp about the unfair Senate appointments done without scrutiny. Conservatives cannot be taken seriously about electoral reform until they too start talking about some form of proportionality as far as electoral representation goes.
Conservatives have made a career out of campaigning on whatever Canadians like to hear, then doing what they always intended. This is why a party of supposed fiscal conservatism has the largest deficits in recorded history for Canada…this is how this same fiscally responsible party can pretend to be such, then expand the national debt to levels never seen before. They even campaigned to cut the GST, then were enthusiastic supporters of HST expansion deals in Ontario and BC.
Topp ignored what really matters and shoved his foot in his mouth by tap dancing on a spring loaded trap set for them by the Conservatives. Instead of simply opposing adding seats to the nations largest provinces, Topp should have argued for proportionality when it comes to Senate appointments, so that every party can have representation based on popular vote in the upper chamber.
Quebec nationalists demand that their province have 25% of the electoral representation in the House of Commons. Given the population of Quebec, this would happen anyways…but not forever. BC, Ontario and Alberta are growing fast enough that by their population expansion, Quebec’s share would drop…not their fault, but then, why should other provinces be denied representation to protect an artificial number?
But, we’re basically agreeing to a Conservative talking point here. Topp, Mulcair, and others who dare submit their name as candidates for leadership of the federal NDP need to attack the Conservatives AS the BQ. The enemy is regionalism; and regionalism naturally morphs into racism and bigotry. The Reform Party and BQ were born out of regionalist angst, and it naturally flowed to a hatred of each other…which conveniently sustained each other. One could accurately say that the BQ’s best candidates were in the Reform Party and vica versa. This is how you get western conservatives that used to have a national dream, launching electoral ads attacking the notion, “No more Prime Ministers from Quebec”…if that isn’t racist, then what is?
In Quebec, the BQ was more than happy to point out the far right leanings of the Reform party as a rallying cry to their team.
Fast forward from 1993 to 2011 and the NDP who have vaulted to the #2 party in Canada…and now the party has a leadership candidate spouting off some of the rhetoric that enraged the west when it comes to pandering to Quebec nationalists. The only thing this will serve is to drive populist NDP supporters in the west BACK to the Conservatives much in the same way the 1993 NDP collapsed its support to Reform.
Selecting Brian Topp as leader will polarize the nation, trigger a new kind of BQ vs Reform war of hate; only the NDP will be the old BQ and the Reform party is naturally the governing Conservatives. This is not the NDP I want…and its unhealthy for Canada.
