Can Canadians ever get too much of a good thing?
In this case the subject is democracy, and we’re about to find out.
Our members of Parliament hadn’t even filled their seats in the House of Commons last week, after a long summer break, before there was talk of a federal election.
This minority Liberal government is propped up by the New Democrats, only the NDP said that deal was off the table and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s party would have to fend for itself.
So Canadians are just a lost confidence vote away from a federal election — when we weren’t supposed to get one until the fall of 2025.
The Liberals, way down in the popularity polls, certainly don’t want one.
Jagmeet Singh’s New Democrats don’t appear popular enough to make any substantial gains in an election … but if that’s the case, why kill the deal with Trudeau?
Only Conservative boss Pierre Poilievre seems eager for the vote, sensing Canadians are looking for change and that Trudeau’s popularity has reached new depths.
Poilievre even has his platitudes in place, talking of common sense and a carbon pricing election, as if most Canadians are paying that level of attention as they hustle their children back to school or college or university.
Life is too expensive for average Canadians and it’s Trudeau’s fault, Poilievre says, but he and the Conservatives can fix that.
Well, not from the opposition side of Parliament, so Poilievre needs an election.
(Wonder how Pierre feels about Canada’s new, lean two per cent inflation rate? Surely that can’t be Trudeau’s doing…)
Ontario Premier Doug Ford and his Conservative government don’t need a provincial election, as they have a majority in the legislature, but are looking to send voters to the polls early, nonetheless.
Ford and Co. are working on the premise that getting elected is most important for their MPPs, followed closely by being re-elected. Followed soon afterwards by being re-elected with a majority, so Tory noses can be appropriately thumbed at the opposition benches.
Majority governments can basically do whatever they want, in whatever shape or form.
Ford need not call a vote until spring/early summer of 2026, but Conservative wheels are turning.
Would the Ontario Liberals, even with new leader Bonnie Crombie, be weaker then or the spring of 2025, when rumour has it Ford will call a snap election just before voters head to their cottages?
Better to hammer down that next majority government then, rather than wait until political fortunes could be changed.
And when Trudeau is long gone and there are no Liberals to blame for what ails Ontario.
And when voters are disinterested. Just remember that eligible voter turnout was 43 per cent in the last Ontario election in 2022.
Ford is counting on our apathy to get his next majority at Queen’s Park.
About the only certainty for Barrie voters is they will head to the polls in October 2026 for a municipal/city election.
But if Ford doesn’t get his majority next spring, or (gasp!) has to make do with a minority government, that could signal a shift in the local election — since more than a few Barrie councillors have hitched their political wagons to the Conservatives.
On the plus side, maybe more eligible voters will turn out on Barrie’s Election Day (it was 30.5 per cent in 2022) if a little more partisan politics sneaks into the campaign.
I’ve said it before and I will say it again — politicians are elected first and foremost to govern. Not endlessly scheme against their partisan enemies, not manoeuvre election dates to their advantage, not make governing an afterthought — something to do once the mud has been slung and partisan backs have (figuratively) stabbed.
And if they don’t do that, every four years we can kick them out.
We might have an earlier opportunity with MPs and MPPs.
Bob Bruton covers city hall for BarrieToday. He’d like politicians at all levels to do more governing and less whatever else they pretend to be doing.
