Ottawa Sun
Published: Wednesday, October 7, 2009

New thinking needed: Lesson for Liberals is that changing leaders is not enough

Political pundits tell us the thankless job in federal politics is that of the leader of the official Opposition. The recent troubles of Liberal boss Michael Ignatieff -- angling for a fall election, flip flopping on Quebec candidates, and dealing with poor polling numbers and rumoured caucus defections -- only serve to reinforce this truism.

As a former Tory candidate but a democrat as well, I'm somewhat saddened the party that governed Canada for more years in the last century than the communists ruled the Soviet Union is now floundering.

Like my Liberal friends, I too was happy when Ignatieff replaced Stephane Dion earlier this year. Iggy's ascension to the post of opposition leader was supposed to herald a new era of stability and predictability in our minority Parliament. If the government did A, then one could reasonably assume that Iggy's Liberals would do B or C, and for a time this occurred.

However, the Liberals have not been able to square their newfound disdain for the Harper government and lust for an unnecessary election with their previous support of the Conservatives' Economic Action Plan (read: Budget 2009). And their lack of a coherent policy platform or even a list of interesting policies is a big problem. Mom and apple pie platitudes about allegedly Liberal-only values and vacuous slogans about doing better don't cut it with today's electorate.

But Liberals should not lay all of their troubles at the foot of their leader despite his public errors in judgment. For the Liberal Party's diminished status is the result of deeper and more fundamental challenges the party must address.

To start, the party brass squandered the opportunity to seriously discuss policy last May in Vancouver. And it forfeited its chance to promote some of the party's up-and-coming MPs who could be the faces of an Ignatieff cabinet.

In this error the Grits betrayed their own history of the 1991 Aylmer conference where Messrs. Martin, Manley and MacLaren brought in Lester Thurow, former dean of the Sloan School of Management at MIT, to speak on globalization, which in part led to the Chretien Liberals embracing balanced budgets and continental trade: Policies that served them well from 1993 to 2006.

To be fair, key staffing changes in the Liberal party have improved their membership recruitment and fundraising efforts. However, this work appears geared to carving out larger pieces of a shrinking voter pie. Public opinion polling has consistently shown that Liberal support is concentrated in and around the metropolitan regions of Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver with residual brand legacy in Atlantic Canada.

This base alone does not and will not lead Liberals back to government, especially with the Tories continuing their voter outreach into new Canadian communities and the NDP confident -- despite their present polling numbers -- that they will run a campaign similar to their disciplined and professional effort in 2008.

The lesson for Liberals is that changing leaders is not enough; new thinking, new policies and embracing the aspirations of a new generation are essential for political success. My Tories learned this over a difficult 13 years. So, too, did the Democrats south of the border during the Bush presidency. In politics, as in life, patience is a virtue. And impatience never leads to 24 Sussex Drive.