Federal Feature Posts

On October 21, Canada had an election and our rather mild version of right wing populism lost. Andrew Scheer's Conservatives received 34.4 % of the vote and Maxime Bernier's People's Party 1.6%. That's only 36% of the vote for Canada's right wing, populist parties. Centre-left parties received over 63% of the vote with the Liberals receiving 33.1%, the NDP 15.7%, the Bloc 7.7%, and the Greens 6.6%. In contrast, U.S. President Donald Trump's "favourables" continue...

A consensus is developing that the new Liberal minority government needs to put the implementation of a national pharmacare program at the top of its to-do list. “We need to stop studying this issue,” says Carleton University political economist Marc-Andre Gagnon. “This issue has been studied way more than it should have been. And it is very clear in terms of which model is the most efficient and this is universal pharmacare. The NDP and...

On Wednesday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his government will swear in a new cabinet on Nov. 20 and move ahead with a promised cut to personal income taxes as its first order of business. Monday’s election returned the Liberals to power, but with a minority government. In his first public comments since his Monday night "victory" speech, Mr. Trudeau indicated he will govern on an issue-by-issue basis rather than negotiate a formal arrangement with...

Canada has elected a Liberal minority government. As of this writing on Tuesday morning, the Liberals have 157 seats, the Conservatives 121, the Bloc 32, the NDP 24 and the Greens 3. 170 seats are needed for a majority so the Liberals are 13 short. This is a good outcome for Canada. Minority governments, in fact, have become common-place in this country. They’re certainly nothing to fear and have often been highly productive. It will...

Canada has elected a Liberal minority government and it looks like all Prime Minister Trudeau needs is the co-operation of the NDP to govern. What form that co-operation will take remains to be seen but as of this writing, the Liberals have 160 seats with 170 needed for a majority. The NDP has 25 seats. How did this happen? Pollster Frank Graves and commentator Michael Valpy sees the emergence of two distinct blocks of voters...

With just a week to go until election day, Andrew Scheer's Conservatives appear to be in a dead heat with Justin Trudeau's Liberals. As of Oct. 14, The CBC's Canada Poll Tracker, an aggregation of all publicly available polling data, has the Conservatives slightly ahead with 32.4% of the vote to the Liberal's 31.7%. The Poll Tracker has the New Democrats trailing in third place at 16.5 per cent support. They are pulling away from...

The two hour election debate Monday night marked the first time all six leaders shared a stage and admittedly, at times it devolved into a confusing free-for-all. However,  it also had moments of clarity where the key themes of the election were illuminated. Beneath the battle of the scripted one-liners, the debate revealed that the federal election campaign has come down to two broad themes: making life more affordable and tackling the threat of climate...

The central argument of this post is this: the Conservative Party of Canada and (to varying degrees) conservative provincial parties, are not like the Liberals, NDP or Greens. The Conservative Party is different not because it is more market oriented or because it supports the traditional conservative, small government, low tax policy agenda. Whether one agrees with them or not, such policies constitute an entirely legitimate program for a right-of-centre party. Rather, what separates the...

Something really important happened to President Trump this week - but it was not the Ukraine scandal that convinced the Democrats to begin formal impeachment hearings in the House. No, Donald Trump's big event this week was that his job approval ratings have returned to where they have been pretty much since the day he was elected - recovering from a slight August slump. They sit at 45.3 percent as of Tuesday afternoon. That's right!...

With the 2019 federal election formally underway, Andrew Scheer's Conservatives appear to be in a dead heat  with Justin Trudeau's Liberals in terms of the popular vote. As of September 16, the CBC's Canada Poll Tracker, an aggregation of all publicly available polling data, has the Liberals and Conservatives virtually tied with the Conservatives at 34.3% and the Liberals at 33.6%. The Poll Tracker has the New Democrats trailing in the third place at only...