What’s the Deal with Canadian Politics?

Like an episode of Seinfeld, Canadian politics has become a show about nothing.

As the Parliamentary session winds down, it’s pretty hard to summarize – or, for that matter, see – its accomplishments. With few exceptions, the session was dominated by old or second-rate scandals, procedural wrangling, MPs’ expenses, political staffers, G8 costs, weird outbursts, and a fake lake. As Tom Flanagan refreshingly admitted, for those who want extremely limited government, there was little to complain about. This was anti-government in action.

But for those who believe that we face significant challenges and that government has an important role to play in meeting those challenges, this session underscores just how skilled we are at avoiding any issue that may actually matter to our future.

Much has already been written about why this happens. Some say the problem is minority politics and the perpetual campaigning that comes with it. Some say that all politics has become pathologically partisan and negative because the messaging today has to be in “sound bites” that grab our wandering attention. Some say we are the problem, our lack of leisure, our loss of trust in institutions, our loss of faith that things can be fixed by government or anybody, or simply our indifference and preoccupation with more immediate matters. A few point to the lack of civics courses and the devaluing of the arts and humanities in post secondary education. And everybody worries about the media.

Perhaps part of the answer is that for reasons of history and culture, the costs of tackling big issues in Canada are just too great. We have too many totems and taboos.

Take medicare, for example, truly a Canadian totem that some even say defines our identity. Medicare’s totemic status is well earned having served us exceptionally well for decades. Its history is one of vision, courage and persistence. Even if few of us could recite the principles of medicare in the Canada Health Act, we sure do recognize when their spirit is being violated (witness the backlash against “user fees”). No wonder no politician wants this debate.

But the world has changed since the passage of the CHA, we have changed, medicine has changed, not to mention the looming demographic crunch. We need to reaffirm our commitment to universal access to quality care and we need to ask how this might better be achieved in this changed world. At the federal level some would prefer to leave this issue to the provinces or let the system become more private, so they say nothing. For those who prefer the “public option” and see a federal role, solutions are not easy, quick or cheap, and rather than take on a totem they too say nothing, or only what is safe.

Or take multiculturalism. Canadians are rightly proud that we see immigration as a solution not a problem and that by some combination of good fortune and design, we have understood that cultural diversity is a strength, an extraordinary asset.

But none of that means that we should be afraid of a discussion about how to reconcile that diversity with our common citizenship or how to ensure that the prerequisites are in place for harmony in our diversity. A discussion of mutual accommodation may well unleash some nasty bits of multicultural anxiety but it will also allow us to affirm the core values that make Canada a beacon to others – diversity and inclusion, equality of opportunity, human dignity, social responsibility, peaceful resolution of conflict and gender equality. Avoiding this debate could allow fear or anxiety to shape our policies.

There are huge political risks in taking on our totems. We need to understand the graver risks in failing to do so.

We seem though to have another problem. When we do take on a tough issue – tough because it is contentious or raises thorny jurisdictional issues or is just plain hard to fix – if we get it wrong, if we fail, it becomes a policy taboo for decades. It’s as if we just get one crack at it. The National Energy Program, for example, so alienated the West that today we have no energy strategy. The Green Shift put carbon pricing in “the deep freeze.” Major social issues rekindle past jurisdictional wars and failed promises. We have been afraid to talk about federalism or institutional reform since the failure of Charlottetown and Meech. So with our totems and taboos, plus maybe some indifference and a bit of anti-government ideology, our politics is mostly fake lakes.