Federal finance minister Jim Flaherty was calm and reassuring back late November, when he enclosed his annual fiscal update with predictions of a modest budget surplus, and a Canadian economy that would withstand the worst of the unfolding global economic disaster. And it was Mr. Flaherty’s relatively cheerful advice to Canadians that they ought not to worry excessively about their RRSP portfolios, pensions, and savings.
Mr. Flaherty, and his boss, Prime Minister Stephen Harper, hadn’t reckoned on the righteous indignation of the federal opposition parties, who as you’ll recall, threatened to defeat the Conservative government on a confidence motion, and then form a coalition to reinvigorate the economy.
(The real cause of opposition fury, of course, was the Harper/Flaherty proclamation that taxpayer subsidies to all political parties would cease forthwith. In the ordinary course, that might well have been a good move, if only because it would put an end to western and central Canadian financial support for the Bloc Quebecois. But to in effect dare the opposition to react, while presiding over a minority government, was a tactical error of the first magnitude by Messers Flaherty and Harper, and it nearly brought the government down.)
The Prime Minister, of course, bought himself some time by proroguing Parliament, which brings us to today (January 13th) and a portrait of a government retreating, at astonishing speed, from its obdurate bullheadedness of a month ago. Harper and his senior ministers are canvassing far and wide throughout the land, asking for advice from business leaders, provincial politicians, environmentalists (although not Elizabeth May), unions, farm and agriculture folk — and to some extent, from freshly hatched Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff.
Harper himself, though, appears indisposed to speak at any length about this newly-discovered need for consultation. He appeared for 30 minutes of largely innocuous chatter on Calgary talk radio, but was otherwise out of reach for perspiring media who trailed around after the PMs entourage in a futile effort to obtain a word.
That’s hardly surprising for a man whose government cannot escape the real truth of its circumstances. It either misread, or worse, ignored the economic klaxons sounding all over the planet last fall, and was quite prepared to canter blithely onward with its soothing forecasts of a Canada largely immune to international economic turmoil.
But the deepest cut of all is this: Stephen Harper, even though he won’t admit it, is substantially at the beck and call of Michael Ignatieff, and to a lesser extent, the irrelevant ideology of Jack Layton and the NDP. “Consultation,” in the world of Conservative politics, is not exactly a voluntary process, but it’s been forced upon the Prime Minister, just in case….in case….that coalition emerges from hiding.
The result will be a budget, on January 27th, which we are advised will be the biggest in Canadian history. It will drive the nation into deficit, where none was seen by Mr. Flaherty in November, and it will impose on the country a significant diet of Liberal/NDP fiscal policies which run counter to the Prime Minister’s essential beliefs, but will be vital to his political survival.
It’s simple, really: “consultation” is the code word for a Prime Minister who wishes to keep his job. One is reminded of the late Louisiana governor Huey Long, who said more than half a century ago “now is the time for all good men to rise above principle.”