Not Bad For A Minority Government

Governments that are 20 or 30 seats short of the majority usually don't last more than a few months - unless they form a coalition with a minor party. Stephen Harper's minority government had no minor party to form a coalition with. And yet not only the Conservative minority government lasted more than two and a half years, but it also has a lot to show for it.

Most observers mention the GST cut as a major accomplishment of the Conservative government. But there's much more to it. Even when we only mention tax cuts - each of the three budgets (which the Conservatives miraculously managed to pass through a minority parliament) included some tax cuts for Canadians, be that higher personal exemption or new tax breaks for families with children. Business taxes too are now lower than they were during Paul Martin's tenure.

Then let's not forget the anti-crime measures. The government did succeed in passing most of their initiatives - from raising the from raising the age of consent to tougher sentences for gun crimes. It's also worth mentioning the Softwood Lumber dispute (does anyone still remember that?) which had been going on for some 5 years until we finally got a government capable of resolving it...

So it would be easier to name the issues where the Conservative government didn't have much success. Those are - social issues, democratic reform and the environment.

When it comes to social issues - the party's largest achievement is that by defeating the Liberals, it put an end to such Liberal initiatives as enshrining abortion in the Charter or creating a universal McDaycare where kids would be brainwashed into Liberal social views. Not much more could be expected from a party which has "progressive social policy" enshrined in the constitution and where a Quebec lieutenant is a former Liberal who is proud of his socially perverse views. If we want anything to change in this area - we better start organizing, so that we could show some political strength behind us.

As for the democratic reform and the environment - the Conservatives were simply outnumbered by the opposition parties, none of which was interested in changing the status-quo. The left-wing parties didn't want to let go of their "global warming" myth. So they kept blocking real measures against air and water pollution, using every opportunity to push through a private member bill on "climate change" or voting in Kyoto targets and carbon taxes into any Conservative environmental bill which went beyond the second reading.

Same with the democratic reform. Why would the Liberals support Senate elections or term limits if they're looking forward to form the next government and fill all the vacant seats themselves? Why would they let the government legislate more restrictions on loans to political parties when their own Liberal party is drowning in debt? Or - why would the Bloc support a bill to grant more seats to the most populous provinces if Quebec already has more seats than its population warrants?

Even when it came to minor initiatives such as denying film credits to porn movies, disqualifying strippers from getting work permits in Canada as "skilled workers" or demanding voters to show their faces and photo IDs before being allowed to vote - the opposition parties weren't willing to allow that. The lefties need every stripper, every pervert, every Muslim fanatic they can get...

In the end the opposition filibustering brought the Parliament to a near halt, forcing the Prime Minister to seek new mandate from the voters. (If it wasn't for the upcoming by-elections, Stephen Harper could let the opposition defeat one of his bills and trigger an election, but why would we force some 300,000 voters to come to the polls twice in just 10-week time?) Many great initiatives died on the order paper when the Parliament was dissolved. But what has been achieved is certainly not bad for a minority government.