Canadian interest in UK elections used to be the exclusive preserve of political junkies, anglophiles and the kind of people whose nights at the tavern were spent arguing about a return to the Red Ensign. Not exactly the mainstream, but enough in most years to justify CPAC providing tape delayed coverage between 2:00-4:30 am the night after the election. (By the way, I am partial to the union jack, but otherwise we’re talking about my people.)
Until Thursday night, that is. On that night, the British electorate delivered a resounding non-verdict on who should govern their country through its most serious economic crisis in over 30 years. (My colleagues at FH in London have done a remarkable job documenting this at http://insights.fleishman-hillard.co.uk/ — check it out for the most up-to-date analysis.) The ensuing four days and nights have provided enough political intrigue, back biting, second guessing, private and public denunciations from within the ranks of each of the three parties they would put even a Canadian Liberal Party leadership race to shame.
The drama has been irresistible. It has made not just great TV, but generating some amazing social media commentary both in the UK and in Canada. BBC anchors made a particular point of poo-pooing the stream of twitter commentary on election night, but the social media comment wars have been more than entertaining – they have provided unfiltered insight into what is being said by the rank-and-file of party stalwarts.
End of the Canadian System. Really?
But for Canada the significance of the hung Parliament is about much more than the twaddle and tweets of the British political class. It goes to the heart of how we are governed, namely, the future of the first-past-the-post system of Parliamentary democracy. John Ibbitson commented on this at length in an excellent article in Saturday’s Globe and Mail http://tiny.cc/9iz2q. His central argument is that with the Liberal Democrats holding the balance of power in the UK, the cost of their support will be the introduction of proportional representation – and the end of first past the post elections. And what’s good enough for the Mother of Parliaments, well that should be good enough for us in Canada.
But should it? The truth is that Canada is in a strong economic position today largely because of difficult decisions made by majority governments. And these decisions happened because governments could govern and take decisive actions that were required and hope the electorate would forgive them in time to be reelected. Look at a few examples:
- GST: wildly unpopular at the time, but prudent and critical to the revenue generation that ultimately balanced the federal books.
- Deficit reduction: the deep cuts of Program Review, rejigged federal-provincial transfers and the redesign of entitlements would have not seen the light of day in a coalition government or minority Parliament.
- Stable banks: for years Canadian banks chafed at government policy that encouraged them to remain boring and stable rather than big and innovative – a decade later, boring turned out to mean solvent (who knew “innovative” could be a synonym for “a kind of casino”?) and saved Canadian taxpayers the billions that bank bailouts cost every other G8 country.
That is just the beginning of the legacy left by majority governments in Canada. Devolution of ports and airports, privatization of Crown assets that have flourished as private sector enterprises, the list goes on (and in fact includes the repatriation of the Constitution and the creation of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms). None of these initiatives would have been contemplated, much less completed, in a minority Parliament – an environment where special interests and scare tactics exert a seemingly hypnotic power over governments and their advisors.
Getting It Done
I remember attending a meeting with German parliamentarians a few years ago. At the meeting, Canadian participants were talking about what it took to eliminate the federal deficit, return the Canada Pension Plan to solvency and implement other changes of a comparable magnitude at the provincial level – all problems that the Germans themselves were struggling with.
Then the conversation turned to reform of the electoral system and a few of the Canadians glowingly advocated German-style proportional representation as an alternative to the Canadian system and an antidote to the “four year dictatorships” of parliamentary majorities. Without missing a beat, one of the German parliamentarians responded, “Balanced budgets? Solvent pensions? Don’t dream of moving to our system – and if you do, you can forget about ever getting anything like that done in your lifetime!”
The bottom line is that the British Parliamentary system may well have been perfected on the cold tundra above the 49th parallel. While in recent years, Canada has produced a succession of minority governments, even these have chalked up more progress and avoided the drift that has characterized most European democracies during the global economic meltdown.
If Britain turns its back on that system, it needn’t follow that Canada take an identical course. Indeed, if disarray ultimately prevails at Westminster, it may convince Canadians that the time has come to end our five-year dance with minority governments. And you can bet, that whoever secures that majority will be in no hurry to change how we run our elections. And for businesses hungry for governments prepared to take action on longer term priorities that sorely need our attention, that will be welcome news.
