This election is the most consequential in the last 50 years. The NDP, Liberal and Green parties all advocate policies dangerous to our well-being and a close election result promises years of economic and political instability at a moment of great global uncertainty and shifting balances of power, a moment that calls for a steady, experienced hand at the head of government.
The most serious threat is the call for proportional representation, a system that is fundamentally undemocratic as it takes power away from we, the electors, and puts it in the hands of the “back-room boys” controlling the parties, and negotiating coalitions or informal agreements (as Justin’s father did in the 1980s with the NDP’s David Lewis).
Some of the world’s most unstable “democracies” use pro rep systems (Greece, Italy, Israel). Do we really want a system that (as in Belgium’s 2014 election) took party negotiators from May to October to form a government? A system that allowed the corrupt Silvio Berlusconi to hang on to power for years through backroom deals?
Just as threatening are the economic policies of both the NDP and Liberals. Justin is following his father’s example of deficit spending us into oblivion (at the insistence then of David Lewis who held the balance of power in a minority government), an economic disaster from which it took Conservative finance minister Michael Wilson (and later Paul Martin, closely following Wilson’s plan, including adoption of the GST) a generation to rescue us — at the insistence of the IMF.
Minority governments inevitably lead to inordinate spending sprees which are difficult to correct.
Mulcair’s NDP plans to increase taxes to pay for all his proposed spending. Increased taxes deter much-needed investment and harm the economy. There are not enough rich to finance all his plans — does the NDP intend to introduce new inheritance taxes on estates greater than $1 million (including on principal residences), and full capital gains taxes, as his patron Jack Layton planned in their 2004 election platform? (I can’t tell because Mulcair erased his party’s policy platform from the NDP website in June. What do they not want us to know?) Such taxes would severely impact the middle class.
His touted $15 per day national day care scheme is disingenuous as well as dishonest and unaffordable: Quebec has been able to implement it solely through transfer payments sourced from the Alberta oil boom.
That spigot is drying up. Moreover, Mulcair expects each province to provide 40 per cent of the cost … several have already said no, and are unlikely to want to raise their own taxes to accommodate him!
In any event recent research shows that while products of the Quebec daycare system may do well academically they have worse outcomes in terms of health, life satisfaction and crime rates than those in other provinces without access to that type of system.
Mulcair, Trudeau and May all claim Harper has “gutted” our environmental protection regime.
Not true — it has been streamlined and made more efficient, reducing unnecessary, costly and wasteful duplication of effort while maintaining high standards of protection. He has also been attacked for his use of omnibus bills — a tactic Pierre Trudeau used routinely. And health care funding has consistently been increased year after year, not cut as the opposition misrepresents. The figures don’t lie.
In David Wilks we have a candidate who may not be charismatic, who doesn’t seek the limelight, instead is a doer and a proud Canadian (unlike Mr. Stetski, who in a YouTube ad stated he was embarrassed to be a Canadian). Even before becoming our elected MP, Wilks has delivered federal funds to our communities (half a million for sports, housing, infrastructure, and environment) etc. … not to mention $400 million for fencing, roads, tunnels and trails in our national parks. Imagine what more he could do for us as our MP in a Conservative government!
Stephen Harper’s government has shown solid economic management throughout. In the early part of his mandate he used his two surpluses to pay down debt which put us in good stead when the recession (and minority governments!) made subsequent deficits necessary. We have the best economic record of any western country, and our trade deals — including the new TPP — position us well for the future.
We are best served by electing David Wilks as part of a Conservative federal government on election day.
John Murray
Nelson