The election and beyond

Editorial

If polls are to be believed, Canada may emerge with a minority government in this month's election – the first time in a quarter-century that the governing party has not received half the seats in Parliament.

That could change, of course. The momentum coming out of the leaders' debates this week could tip the scales and, as an old saying goes, a week is an eternity in politics.

But, if we do see a minority government, it will almost certainly usher in an interesting and uncharted period in this country's political history. Like all interesting times, such a period of political change will have particular impacts on Jewish Canadians.

It is not a coincidence that Canadian Zionists reconfigured their institutional bodies last year. The new Canadian Council for Israel and Jewish Advocacy (CIJA) emerged specifically because these are not ordinary times for Canadian Jews. CIJA is a consolidated body whose aim is to present the case for Israel in Canada. It also joins pre-existing Jewish agencies in calling attention to anti-Jewish hate crimes and seeking the sort of social rapprochement that would make such acts a thing of the past.

In case of a minority government, CIJA's role – and that of all pro-Israel Canadians – could become more urgent.

If the federal election proves inconclusive – possibly leading to new elections or unpredictable configurations of parliamentary alliances – the next few years could be dramatic indeed. In times of majority government, the winning party is expected to fulfil its election promises. (Whether they do or not is another matter.) In a minority situation, few election promises tend to be implemented in undiluted form. Minority governments survive by negotiating and compromising to build tentative working majorities on individual issues.

In such situations, the power of a single member of Parliament tends to be magnified. Prime Minister Paul Martin has spoken of closing the "democratic deficit," which includes giving more power to backbenchers. A minority government may prove the best way of achieving that, though Martin surely imagined other methods when he raised the idea.

Though parties enjoy the free hand majority governments give them, minority governments can offer some positive consequences for voters, not least because no party has a four-year lock on government.

The fragility inherent in a minority government can lead to unexpected compromises. A minority government might take a bit of its own platform, graft on a branch from the opposition and nurture it with sweet talk to special interest groups. (In minority governments, political consequences tend to be immediate and long-range planning tends to suffer.)

On contentious issues, extremes tend to be pushed out of the debate. With the necessity of finding a majority of votes on any particular issue, bills must necessarily appeal to the broadest range possible and offend the fewest.

That means, if no party wins half the seats on June 28, we might see a government that looks nothing like any of the parties we have seen campaigning over the past four weeks. Between them, they will cajole and barter for clauses and amendments, leading to hybrid legislation and policy that isn't quite what any of the parties had in mind when they put together their platforms.

For Jewish Canadians and other Zionists, this could have some interesting consequences, for better and for worse. Foreign affairs are rarely hammered out in the cut and thrust of Question Period. But whoever becomes the minister of foreign affairs after June 28 will have to keep a close eye on how supporters and opponents of certain issues are coalescing in the House. For friends of Israel, a minority government could prove a hopeful sign. There are many allies of Israel in the Conservative party, many in the Liberal party and some outspoken supporters, like Pat Martin, in the New Democratic party, as well as in the Bloc Quebecois.

On Israel, as on countless other issues, a minority government means the decisions that form official policy will be made in the House of Commons, reversing a trend over recent decades to consolidate power in the PMO. For proponents of specific policies – be they Kyoto, increased military funding or lower taxes – party labels may become less significant than strategic alliances.

Though the next Parliament, like the last, will no doubt have some strong critics of Israel, support for Israel and other issues of interest to Jewish voters will depend on the hard work of friends inside and outside of Parliament. That could mean fighting vote by vote for support on particular issues. This makes it all the more urgent to have strong, organized and dependable communal bodies working on our behalf in Canada. And all the more important that we give them our support.

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