Who should attend the LPC convention free of charge?

December 20th, 2011 by jesse No comments »

Today Stephen Taylor raised a minor ruckus on Twitter about the Liberal Party of Canada's policy on who is able to attend the biennial convention free of charge. In past conventions (2006, 2008 and Canada @ 150), bloggers were able to seek accreditation as media and avoid paying any fees. At the upcoming convention, unless a blogger is sponsored by a media organization, the only way he or she can attend the convention is as an observer ($1,100) or as a delegate (fees vary from $200 to $675). Jeff Jedras has a blog post on the issue that provides a lot of useful background.

While I wouldn't have made this change in policy myself, I think it's fine. And I think people are overreacting to a change to the status quo.

First of all, in practice this policy affects very few people: in past conventions, maybe a dozen or so bloggers have been accredited as media. Of those, a bunch are probably already attending this convention as delegates. So we are literally talking about a handful of people.

Second, blogging is a lot less important now than it was 2.5 years ago. Unlike in previous conventions (2006, 2008) there will likely be at least one hundred people tweeting from the convention floor directly and posting on Facebook. Maybe several hundred. Plus all of the journalists who are now using twitter extensively. Keep in mind that in January 2008 there were eight employees at Twitter; now there are 400 employees. More than 1 billion tweets are posted per week and there are 400 million+ accounts (up from 30 million in early 2009). There will be no shortage of as-it-happens news reported from the convention.

Is there value in having bloggers like Stephen Taylor at the convention? Sure. Is it a really important issue? No.

Think of it this way: if you were to choose a group of people to attend the Liberal Party convention free of charge, would bloggers be at the top of your list? Personally, I'd rather have some non-partisan policy experts who could provide useful insight on policy.

Top 10 reasons Andrew Coyne should run for leader of the Liberal Party of Canada

November 24th, 2011 by jesse 6 comments »

Here are my top ten reasons for supporting Andrew Coyne (@acoyne on Twitter) for leader of the Liberal Party of Canada. Please tweet any of these reasons, or your own reasons, and hashtag the tweet with #Coyne4LPC #cdnpoli #lpc.

  1. Andrew Coyne is a genuine democrat and he could lead democratic reform of our politics and political institutions. As he wrote in April 2011: "What we cannot afford is the continuing slide of Parliament, and parliamentary democracy, into disrepair. Conventions once discarded, habits of self-government once lost, are much harder to regain."
  2. The #lpc has a serious credibility problem and Andrew Coyne has credibility in spades. I'm sure he would resign rather than compromise his integrity.
  3. Andrew Coyne advocates for smart public policy, which will appeal to reasonable people who've supported the #lpc, #cpc and #gpc. Especially environmental policy (carbon tax, road tolls, etc).
  4. Andrew Coyne is a fiscal conservative who is unafraid of confronting sacred cow legacy #lpc policies such as supply management. He would shake things up in #cdnpoli, especially in the West.
  5. Andrew Conyne is a strong federalist and advocate for the liberty of individual Canadians.
  6. Andrew Coyne well understands our history and politics and is an excellent speaker and writer. He would perform well in the House of Commons and communicate well with Canadians.
  7. Andrew Coyne would not be a handmaiden to business, as he believes in unwinding government subsidies to businesses in all their various forms.
  8. Andrew Coyne is well respected for his understanding of both #cdnpoli and economics.
  9. Andrew Coyne would represent Canada well to the world. He's a bilingual patriot who is well informed on international affairs.
  10. It would be very difficult for the #cpc to effectively attack Andrew Coyne.

Comments from Canadians on the idea of Andrew Coyne running for leader of the Liberal Party of Canada.

  • "Coyne as Liberal leader might be the only plausible scenario in which I'd reconsider my own allegiance [to the Conservative Party of Canada]" - a longtime Conservative partisan and organizer
  • "That would be pretty awesome" - Curtis from Muskoka
  • "#Liberals4Coyne? Yes, I can get behind this." - Brian from Ottawa
  • "I highly endorse @jesse_helmer's #Liberals4Coyne campaign, although the Economists' Party hates to lose the guy" - Mike from London
  • "He'd get my vote." Chris from Sudbury
  • "I read your post [about Coyne for leader of the LPC] with interest." Dave from Waterloo
  • "#Liberals4Coyne? Okay! #TeamCoyne" Heather from Ottawa
  • "Hmmmm... that would be VERY interesting." - Matt from London
  • "We should be so lucky." - Rob from Toronto
  • "I'd probably vote for the Coyne Liberals." - Alex from Brantford
  • "I'm serious. If you get Andrew to run, I will become a card carrying Liberal! I love Andrew Coyne (far too much for my hubs' liking... lol)" - Anonymous from London
  • "Amazing choice. Would be a formidable opponent, and I know a lot of disaffected Libs that would come back for him!" Justin from London
  • "It would suck, because I'm a commited Conservative.  I prefer him in the media, where he can hold all parties to account." Tony from Ottawa
  • "I'm liking the sounds of this! he seems to have a very high level of integrity and respect for government and could put up a strong fight in a campaign. Andrew is a bit 'right' on some issues but would certainly be much more compassionate than Harper and his trolls. this could be that 'wow' moment..." - Sean from Niagara Falls
  • "I don't know about others, but I could use a fresh breath and new ideas from outside the traditional avenues of party politics. I would certainly be willing to listen to Mr. Coyne and his concerns and perspective." - Randy from Penatanguishene
  • "Although I think that what the Liberals really need is a coherent policy direction (rather than some grab bag of ideas) and an attitude adjustment, having a leader with credentials and an ability to both analyse and communicate policy would be a tremendous boost. Coyne would help bring back all the "small 'l'" liberals who have been holding their noses and voting CPC because of the perception that the Liberals are too big-government oriented. Liberalism is supposed to be about small government and personal freedom, and I think the Liberal party would do well to get back to those roots." Devin from Saskatoon
  • "As a voice of reason alone I would support his leadership. Lord knows we need some of that in Ottawa." Wes from Vancouver

More thoughts on building a modern Liberal Party

November 17th, 2011 by jesse 2 comments »

Alf App's paper on rebuilding the Liberal Party of Canada is definitely worth reading. On a tactical level, it contains a lot of good ideas. It also provides a unique and informative perspective on the inner-workings of the Liberal Party, especially the extra-parliamentary organization and how it relates to the parliamentary organization.

But Alf's analysis misses a few crucial points, some of which I've already discussed in my earlier post on the roadmap recommendations.

First, there is no discussion or acknowledgment of the rise of the Green Party of Canada since 2003. In fact, there is barely any mention of the Green Party at all. In my experience, the Green Party is supported by a wide range of very reasonable people. Remarkably, the GPC increased its popular vote by 800% from 2000 to 2008 before sliding back to just over 540,000 votes in the last election. One of my provisional theories, based mostly on my own dealings with Green supporters, is that they are quite often either disaffected Progressive Conservatives or disaffected Liberals. The Green Party is also quite popular among young people. Understanding why former PCs, former Liberals and younger people vote Green is key to rebuilding our base of supporters.

Second, the paper does not adequately confront a series of uncomfortable truths:

  • Alienation of the West since the Diefenbaker era, reinforced by the National Energy Policy brought in under Trudeau (there are zero mentions of energy policy in the document) and subsequent deficit of talented and experienced Liberal politicians elected in the West (there have been a few)
  • The damage done to the credibility of the Liberal Party by the Chretien/Martin infighting and the sponsorship scandal, especially in Québec
  • The departure of a significant number of successful Liberal politicians with experience in cabinet (Chretien, Rock, Manley, Martin, Copps, Graham, McLellan, Peterson, Robillard, Boudria, Pettigrew, Stewart, Mitchell, Collenette, Caplan, Anderson, Cauchon), including virtually all of the ministers with experience in economic or international portfolios except John McCallum, Ralph Goodale and Reg Alcock (who has since passed away).
  • The disastrous attempt, shortly after the election in 2008, to form a governing coalition with the NDP, supported by the Bloc Québecois
  • The interim-to-ratified-Leader path that Ignatieff followed, and its influence on how he was perceived by Canadians
  • The successive selection of two Leaders (Dion, 2 years; and Ignatieff, 2.5 years) who were not well liked by Canadians and who quit as Leader after leading the party to defeat in one election

This chart from the Pundit's Guide shows the cumulative effect of these events. The decline started showing up after the 2000 election.

The alienation of the West is a huge problem and one that has, in fact, gotten worse in recent years. In 2004, running against the new Conservative Party and Stephen Harper, the Liberal Party received 22% of the vote, won two seats and placed second in every other riding (26). In 2011, the LPC received 9.3% of the vote and only placed second in three ridings. In 2008, local Liberal candidates in Alberta only spent 24% of the spending limit (presumably 2011 was just as bad, or worse). We need to listen to folks in the West and propose policies that reasonable people will support. Exaggerating the danger posed by the Conservatives will be counterproductive for us, especially in the West. Many of the ideas in the roadmap regarding EDAs will apply in the West, especially Alberta.

The sponsorship scandal: any time it comes up, we need to apologize for it happening while we were the government. Paul Martin's address to Canadians was actually very good in this regard:

I want to talk to you directly tonight – about the problems in the sponsorship program; about how I’ve responded to them as your prime minister; and about the timing of the next general election.

Let me speak plainly: what happened with the sponsorship file occurred on the watch of a Liberal government. Those who were in power are to be held responsible. And that includes me.

I was the Minister of Finance. Knowing what I've learned this past year, I am sorry that we weren’t more vigilant - that I wasn't more vigilant. Public money was misdirected and misused. That’s unacceptable.

But the Conservatives love to keep bringing it up and we need to respond responsibly when they do because it was very serious failure of governance. For example, in 2010, in response to David McGuinty's questions in the House of Commons about Rahim Jaffer and Helena Guergis, John Baird said: "Is there a single member in the Liberal caucus who will stand and apologize right now for the Liberal sponsorship scandal? Just one member stand up right now." Rather than continuing on about Jaffer/Guergis, McGuinty should have simply acknowledged that the sponsorship program was a mess and that he was sorry that it happened on the watch of a Liberal government. Beyond being a huge waste of public funds (see the auditor general's report if you've forgotten the details), the sponsorship scandal severely damaged the credibility and morale of Liberal members of parliament, staffers, members and supporters, especially in Québec. We owe them an apology as well.

Unfortunately, there is not much we can do about the retirement of senior Liberal politicians. But we should realize that we no longer have the credibility that these folks provided and that it is up to a younger generation of Liberals to lead the way. There is hope for these aspirants: Stephen Harper was just  34 years old when he was first elected as an MP, 45 when he was Leader of the Opposition and 47 when he became Prime Minister. Rebuilding our party will take a long time, so this younger generation will have to be determined and persistent in the face of adversity.

The attempted coalition, while a perfectly legitimate means of governing, was a terrible idea. Coming as a surprise, in response to a threat to party financing, and in partnership with the NDP and Bloc, this was perhaps the single biggest failure of the Liberal Party since Harper became Prime Minister. I am sure the intentions of those involved were noble, but for the Liberal Party, this one decision tarnished our credibility with voters who do not support the NDP or the Bloc. Here are the main reasons why, in my view:

  • It was too soon after the election, so the move appeared anti-democratic.
  • The economic update threaten public financing of parties, so the moved looked selfish.
  • The person put forward as Prime Minister, Stéphane Dion, had very low personal approval ratings in the polls, so it seemed unjust.
  • The coalition would have to depend on the support of the Bloc, but many of our supporters have a distinct antipathy towards the Bloc.

All of these reasons would motivate blue Liberals to support the Conservatives instead of the Liberals. These are exactly the people the Conservatives needed to peel away from the Liberal Party in order to secure their majority government. We could not have made it any easier for the Conservatives.

The appointment and ratification of Ignatieff as Leader was short-sighted. I say this as someone who supported Ignatieff from the start and who believes that he is a good man who did a good job in very bad circumstances. But we should always rely on the considered judgement of our members to choose our Leader. In addition to alienating many of our members, appointing and then ratifying Ignatieff as Leader played right into the way the Conservatives were framing him as an out-of-touch elitist.

Like many of the points above, our successive selection of Dion and Ignatieff as leaders of the party, and their rather short tenures, has further damaged our credibility with voters. Given the scope of the defeats, and the circumstances after the 2008 and 2011 elections, I can understand why both of them resigned. But it is very harmful to be continually introducing a new person as leader of our party. Since Paul Martin in 2006, we have had four others: Bill Graham, Dion, Ignatieff and Bob Rae. Only Dion was selected by members and none were selected using our new weighted one-member, one-vote system. As we look forward to selecting our next Leader in 2012, we should keep this in mind: we need someone who can survive a defeat, if that happens, and who Canadians can come to know over time as a reasonable and better alternative.

Thoughts on the Roadmap for Renewal

November 12th, 2011 by jesse 4 comments »

The national board of the Liberal Party has put forward some ideas in the Roadmap for Renewal. There are two versions of the document: one endorsed by the national board of directors (8 pages, PDF) and the longer one (79 pages, PDF), which are essentially the views of Alf Apps, president of the party.

While I agree with quite a few of the ideas proposed in the paper (comments are below), and they are certainly worth debating, I think the paper misses a few important points that are crucial to our future success as a political party. We can make all the internal improvements we want, but if we don't get the high level stuff right, we're sunk.

  1. The Liberal Party should be a party of choice for reasonable people.
    1. Treatment of opponents: the corollary of this is that all forms of exaggeration and hyperbole, both positive and negative, should be avoided. The Leader and caucus, who are the public face of the party as represented by the news media, should not engage in doomsaying about our opponents. Every time we attack the Conservatives or NDP with exaggerated claims that make them look as bad as possible, we alienate the reasonable people who have voted Conservative or NDP. This has obvious implications for Question Period and how caucus behaves in the House of Commons. It's as simple as following the golden rule: treat our opponents as we would like them to treat us. Failing to follow this simple rule has led our politics into the sad state it is in now.
    2. Policy development: reasonable people need to be convinced of the merits of policies before they will support them. So we need to be engaged in continuous policy development, seeking good ideas and expertise wherever we can find them. This means that we need to respect and believe that Canadians are experts on their own lives and can help us identify problems that lend themselves to a public solution. It also means that our policies should be based on evidence and refined through consultation to be as good as possible. As a result, we should not have any "surprise" policies or hold back our policy ideas. Our good policy ideas should survive elections, whether we form the government or not.
    3. Fiscal policy: we need to be honest with Canadians about both revenue and expenditure. Federal taxes as a percentage of GDP have never been lower, but we have said nothing about the huge cut to the GST and its relationship to the deficits we are running at the federal level. We must have the courage to talk about tax increases when they are necessary just as we must have the courage to review programs and cut expenditures when they are necessary.
  2. The Liberal Party should be a party for liberty and opportunity.
    1. Reform of existing policy: I don't mean that we need to start dismantling the welfare state as it exists in Canada, but we do need to re-assess a lot of the regulations, laws and institutions that exist (and in many cases were implemented by the Liberal Party) -- are they really necessary? This will mean re-examining and reforming a lot of sacred cows: the Wheat Board, supply management, private delivery of health care, the criminal code & sentencing, federal-provincial jurisdiction and powers, the Senate, immigration, the military, EI, copyright and intellectual property law, review of foreign investment, etc.
    2. Poverty: we should seek to reduce poverty (i.e. the lack of opportunity) as much as possible.
    3. Inter-generational equity: we should keep in mind the impact that our decisions today will have on the liberty of future generations. This has obvious implications for environmental policy, natural resource policy, the federal debt, education and many other areas.
    4. Taxes & spending: prioritizing liberty doesn't mean that we hate taxation, but it does require that we spend tax dollars effectively and continuously review and improve programs.
    5. Openness: we should push for government to be more open, with the default being that government information is open, not secret.
  3. The Liberal Party should be a party of integrity.
    1. Our leader and candidates should be people of great personal integrity.
    2. In the short term, our policy should be consistent, whether we are in opposition or in government. Over the longer term, our policy will likely change as we learn and discover news ways of addressing public problems. We will only succeed in electoral politics if we can gain the trust of reasonable people. Consistency in policy coupled with open-mindedness over the longer term is key to our credibility.
  4. The Liberal Party should stop evaluating elections solely in terms of forming the government or not forming the government.
    1. Hopefully, one positive result of our falling popular vote has been a shift in thinking within the party that "winning the election" only means "forming the government." Obviously, it is easiest to advance our policy agenda if we elect enough MPs to form the government. And surely, we want to elect as many MPs as possible, but we should have other goals as well: what policies did we advance in campaign? How did perceptions of those policies change during the campaign? How good are the candidates we run in each riding? How qualified and effective are the members of our caucus to advance our policy agenda? The members of cabinet or critics? How much support do we have throughout the country? The collapse of the PC Party and the rise of Reform and the Bloc masked our failures in some of these areas for many years.
    2. We should not necessarily demand or expect that our Leader resign if we do not form the government. It takes time for Canadians to get to know and support the leader of a political party. Handling defeat well is something Canadians will respect.
    3. Post-election coalitions or cooperation is a legitimate means of forming a government. But we must be clear with voters in advance if we are willing to enter into such arrangements with other parties. No surprises after the fact. And we must believe that forming the government in a coalition is a better way of advancing our policy agenda than being an effective opposition party.

Proposals from the Roadmap for Renewal

  1. Major themes and priorities: obviously, I think these are less important than the four main points that I've made above. The first point about EDAs is probably not accurate: I know from experience that our EDA in London West is doing really well, but we still only came second. The NDP EDA in the riding is not very active, and they did quite well in the election. I believe it had nothing to do with their EDA.
  2. Funding the party: reasonable ideas to raise more money, but nothing revolutionary. I like the idea of axing the Revenue Committee -- what does it do, anyway?
  3. New category of "Supporter". This is basically a shift to free party membership.
    • Cons: it is very likely to increase the costs associated with Leader and nomination contests, as it costs more money to connect with more potential voters. Given existing rules for political fundraising, and expected future revenues of the party, this could be very problematic. For example, Obama raised $23 million for the primaries and caucuses in the USA and Hilary Clinton raised $20 million. Translated to Canadian scale, that would be $2.3 million and $2 million. Also, I'm not sure how this higher threshold for costs would affect the quality and quantity of candidates.
    • It contributes to the perception that the Prime Minister is directly elected by the people instead of serving in the role as first among equals because he or she is leader of the party. I'm not sure I like adopting more aspects of republicanism.
    • It is likely to increase the influence of the Leader relative to the influence of the other elected MPs, possibly leading to less incentive for people to run for election as an MP, less effective MPs and worse decision-making.
    • I'm not so worried about the possibility of a "takeover" by fake supporters, especially if it were done by preferential ballot.
    • Pros: it would encourage identification of supporters outside of election campaigns.
    • It may also further democratize the selection of our Leader and candidates. In conjunction with more open local nominations, this could encourage people who don't have a long history of political involvement to run.
  4. Right now, I'm in favour of trying the weighted one-member, one-vote approach, which we've never used, before switching to this system for selection our leader.

  5. Online and electronic voting: this is a terrible idea. The consequences of a compromised election are very bad and widespread (it affects everyone, not just the people whose votes are compromised), it is very hard to maintain a secure system, and scrutineering/auditing the results is very difficult. This is an idea that people support because very few of them understand the serious risks associated with it.
  6. Mail-in voting: this is a good idea. Much easier to audit and much harder to compromise. Did you know that Oregon has very high voter turnout and they love mail-in voting? It's true.
  7. Open nominations: great idea.
  8. Streamlining of operations (i.e. getting rid of the PTAs, sort of): I don't see a need for any provincial or territorial associations. If anything, I think we should organize the national party by function (policy development, contesting elections) and have geographic representation for cities and other regions (i.e. regional rather than by province/territory) on the national board. For example:
    • if we really want regional representation, instead of the president of each PTA, let's have one representative each for the GTA, Metro Montreal, and Metro Vancouver (the three really big cities) and one each for BC (non-Metro Vancouver), AB, Saskitoba (SK, MB), Ontario (non-GTA), Quebec (non-Montreal), the Atlantic provinces (NS, NB, PEI, NL) and the North (NWT, NU, YK). That's ten representatives instead of 12 and more representative of the population and urban/rural realities.
  9. I'd get rid of all of the commissions -- I don't see the value in dividing people up by gender, age or ancestry and it adds unnecessary complexity.
  10. Director of Digital Operations reporting to the board -- seems strange to have the person report directly to the board instead of to the national director (i.e. CEO of the party). Regardless, not a big deal.
  11. Putting more resources into Liberalist: great idea.
  12. Strategic plan and annual report: yes! Both very good ideas and long overdue.
  13. Council of Presidents: not really sure what this body does or why we need it. With 308 members, it's unwieldy.
  14. "Preparing for Victory": see not exaggerating and what winning the election means, above. Deadlines for election readiness stuff: seems reasonable.

Debunking the taxman myth

June 28th, 2011 by jesse No comments »

The PC Party of Ontario is running a campaign to label Dalton McGuinty as the "taxman." But is it true?

Let's compare the Ontario PCs under Mike Harris and Ernie Eves (1995-2002) and Dalton McGuinty (2003-2010), two eight-year periods (the transition of government occurred part-way through 2002-2003). Please see the notes at the bottom of the post for important caveats about the Education Property Tax and Government Business Enterprises.

Bottom line: No, it's not true. Harris/Eves and McGuinty have taxed Ontarians to roughly the same extent. Tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was 10.57% under Harris/Eves and 10.47% under McGuinty.

Tax revenue generally increases along with GDP, and we can see in Chart 1 that GDP and tax revenue have increased under both the PCPO and the OLP. For this reason, a good measure of the tax burden is tax revenue as a percentage of GDP. As Chart 2 shows, this metric has been very steady over the 16 years in question, through both PCPO and OLP majority governments. If McGuinty is a "taxman," then Mike Harris and Ernie Eves deserve that moniker, too.


So why does this myth of Dalton as a "taxman" exist?

It is an invented marketing message, created by the PCPO, designed to convince voters to turf McGuinty. Although it's inaccurate, there are elements that resonate with voters. Ironically, one true element of the myth is based on a decision by McGuinty that you would expect the PCPO to be in favour of: increased transparency in taxation.

When McGuinty introduced the health premium, he could have chosen to increase personal income tax rates instead. If he had, there would be no "health premium" for PCPO to complain about incessantly. Establishing a new tax specifically for health at least associates the revenue with a particular area of expenditure. It is worth noting that the PCPO isn't proposing to cut or eliminate the health premium.

Similarly, the PCPO rails against eco fees, which aren't a tax collected by government but a means for business to organize and fund its own recycling through a non-profit. They also complain constantly about the HST, which is more efficient, better for manufacturers and reduces the paperwork burden on businesses. They don't propose to get rid of the HST.

The PCPO calls Dalton the "taxman," but tax revenue has increased under his government as it did under the PCPO governments of Harris and Eves. They apparently hate the health premium and the HST, but they don't propose to get rid of either tax. Perhaps they should look in the mirror while they are calling McGuinty names.

Or, better yet, propose a credible and better alternative to the tax policy of the current government.

Data

Check out the data for this post in a Google spreadsheet, compiled from the public accounts of Ontario.

Summary metrics

Metric Harris/Eves (1995-2002) McGuinty (2003-2010)
Growth in GDP 45.08% 26.45%
Average annual increase in GDP 5.48% 3.42%
Overall growth in tax revenue 39.37% 19.68%
Average Tax as % of GDP 10.57% 10.47%

Distribution of tax revenue (2010, %)

  • Personal Income Tax (39.4%)
  • Sales Tax (28.8%)
  • Education Property Tax1 (not included)
  • Corporations Tax (9.5%)
  • Employer Health Tax (7.7%)
  • Ontario Health Premium (4.7%)
  • Gasoline Tax (3.9%)
  • Tobacco Tax (1.8%)
  • Land Transfer Tax (1.7%)
  • Fuel Tax (1.1%)
  • Electricity Payments-In-Lieu of Taxes (0.9%)
  • Other Taxes (0.5%)

Note 1: Previous to 2008, the Education Property Tax was netted against school board expenditures and not included in the government revenues in the public accounts. In 2008, the government moved to a simpler means of accounting for this revenue and now reports the tax revenue separately from the expenditures. For purposes of comparison, as the prior public accounts have not been restated, I've excluded it from these figures. The impact should be negligible.

Note 2: The government also receives income from Government Business Enterprises like Hydro One, Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation, Ontario Power Generation and the LCBO. In 2010, net income from these GBEs was $4.2 billion.

What do we mean when we say reform?

May 17th, 2011 by jesse No comments »

Since the election on 2 May, there has been no end of calls to reform, rebuild and/or renew the Liberal Party of Canada, often with associated references to better fundraising and more engagement of the grassroots. Unfortunately, most of these articles and blogs suffer from a severe case of vagueness. What exactly are we talking about when we talk about reform?

It is worth reading the Change Commission report (and other important party documents). The Change Commission has already identified a number of things that we need to improve. While we have made some progress on some of these issues, more work remains to be done.

The party is a complex organization, so an outline will help clarify what we are try to talk about.

Within the extra-parliamentary organization:

  • There are roughly 60,000 members (or 195 per riding association)
  • There are 308 volunteer-driven electoral district associations with varying levels of human and financial resources.
  • There are ten provincial organizations, plus the territorial organizations (PTAs). In the larger provinces, there are layers of volunteer area directors, regional presidents, etc. And of course there are permanent, paid staff in the provincial organizations.
  • There is the national party, governed by the national board of directors, and its various commissions (Aboriginal, Women, Youth, Seniors) plus the full-time staff in the national office, starting with the national director (Ian McKay).
  • There are four major committees (composition described from pages 22-29 of the Constitution):
    • The National Management Committee
    • The National Revenue Committee
    • The National Election Readiness Committee
    • The National Policy and Platform Committee
  • The National Liberal Fund, the fundraising organization for the party (created just last year) under the management of Adam Smith

Within the parliamentary organization:

  • 34 Members of the House of Commons, plus their full-time staff (3-4 people per MP or roughly 120 people) in Ottawa and the local ridings.
  • 54 Senators, plus their full-time staff

And then there is the Leader's Office:

  • The Leader plus a bunch of full-time staff

And then there is the campaign organization, which springs into being for each election.

  • 308 candidates, nominated by local riding associations or appointed by the Leader, plus their volunteer campaign teams
  • Various co-chairs, policy/platform people, etc, many of whom are appointed by the Leader

There are organizational improvements that we should make, and I am in favour of many of the Change Commission recommendations. We certainly do need to improve at the local riding level, especially in areas where we have lost many elections. We need to do these things but we can't stop there.

The Leader, the caucus and especially the actions of Members of Parliament between elections, the resources we have at our disposal to wage the campaign, the platform, and the candidates we have nominated in the ridings are very important electoral factors that are under our control.

We need to reconsider conventional wisdom on some of these things:

  • Conventional wisdom: we should announce the platform during the election and no sooner than necessary in order to prevent our opponents from 1) stealing the ideas they like and implementing them and 2) launching attacks against ideas they aren't inclined to implement.
  • Unconventional: as soon as we come up with a policy that would benefit Canadians, let's advocate for that policy. If our opponents adopt the idea, great! If they attack and resist it, let's use those attacks to refine and sharpen the idea for presentation during the election campaign.
  • Conventional wisdom: we should wait (12, 18, 24 months) to select a Leader because a leadership race would distract from the rebuilding we need to do (a nearly unanimous sentiment, according to Alf Apps).
  • Unconventional?: we need the Leader engaged in the process of rebuilding and the more time he or she has to do so, the better. More time as Leader also means more time for Canadians to get to know him or her. Both Dion and Ignatieff had been leader for roughly two years when the election was called. Why repeat that scenario again against Harper and Layton, both of whom will have been leader for at least 11 years by then?
  • Conventional wisdom: we should use Question Period to embarrass and draw media attention government misdeeds or mistakes in order to erode support for the government, and these questions should be formulated according to recent events in order to maximize negative media coverage of the government. We should respond in kind to heckling, non-answers, etc, in the House of Commons.
  • Unconventional: we should use Question Period to ask legitimate, fair questions of the government. We should formulate a coherent, medium-term strategy that focuses on policy areas that matter to Canadians. For example, we could focus for a week or two on health and fiscal policy, then defence and foreign affairs, then immigration and human resources, then agriculture and fisheries, etc. We should not let events of the day dictate our questions. We can let the media cover the bad news while we advance our policy agenda.
  • Conventional wisdom: we should wait a few years before nominating candidates for 42nd General Election.
  • Unconventional: we should nominate candidates as soon as possible and local ridings should keep engaging with citizens throughout the four years leading up to the election. It's a permanent campaign, not once every four years.
  • Conventional wisdom: we must advocate for the per vote subsidy to maintain our existing party infrastructure and ability to contest the next election.
  • Unconventional: we should agree to get rid of the per vote subsidy as long as the limits on donations are increased to $5,000 per person per year from $1,100. There are already substantial public supports for political parties through the spending rebates (60% of local campaign spending during elections) and generous tax credits for donors (up to 75%). The per vote subsidy is a crutch that impedes the development of successful party fundraising.

These are just a few suggestions. What do you mean when you say let's reform the Liberal Party?

Liberal leadership

May 9th, 2011 by jesse 1 comment »

In my previous reflection on the Liberal Party, I just briefly touched on the issue of the next leader. First, a couple of items from the Liberal Party of Canada's constitution:

  1. Section 54.3 requires that the national board of directors, in consultation with caucus, select an interim leader within 27 days of Michael Ignatieff's announcement that he intends to resign. It says nothing about whether that interim leader is allowed to run for leader.
  2. The national board of directors also has to set a date for a leadership vote within five months (plus as many as 27 days from the day the leader announced his intention to resign) and fix the amount of the deposit each contestant needs to put forward in order to run for leader ($50K in 2006, $90K in 2008).
  3. Although the constitution provides for an earlier vote, it does not provide for a later vote.

So, that would mean we are looking at a leadership vote around 30 October 2011. This would put the leadership vote immediately after the provincial election in Ontario.

So who's in the running, especially with so many MPs losing their seats?

Interim leader

I'd like to see someone with experience who can be neutral in the actual leadership race as interim leader. Perhaps Ralph Goodale? Or Irwin Cotler? I don't think anyone who is running for leader should be selected as the interim leader. I think it would rude to ask Dion to serve as interim leader.

Leader

Also-rans and recent aspirants to the leadership:

  • Not many previous aspirants to the leadership are left standing: Martha Hall Findlay, Ken Dryden, Gerard Kennedy, and Joe Volpe all lost their seats. Hedy Fry and Carolyn Bennett (both of whom withdrew in 2006) remain but John Godfrey and Maurizio Bevilacqua are gone.
  • The following people still have leadership contest debts outstanding: Volpe, Dryden, Kennedy, Hall Findlay, Dion, Fry, and Bevilacqua.
  • Bob Rae (age 62), Dominic Leblanc (age 43) and Scott Brison (age 43) were re-elected, but Brison has said that he isn't interested in running. I would like to see Brison run for leader, as I think we need to move in the direction of being fiscally conservative and socially liberal.

Considering the tight timeline of a six-month leadership race, I would expect both Rae and Leblanc to run.

Other contenders

  • Frank McKenna (age 63), I'm sure, is very comfortable as deputy chairman of TD Bank. He would be 71 years old eight years from now -- like Manley, I think his opportunity has passed.
  • Allan Rock (age 63) is President of uOttawa. Having done that for three years, is he looking for another challenge?
  • John Manley (age 62) would provide a centre-right alternative to Bob Rae. Not sure if he could muster the organization required on short notice or that he wants to leave his job as CEO of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives (he has only been in the role for just over a year). The opportunity has probably passed him by.
  • John McCallum (age 61) would provide a similar centre-right alternative to Bob Rae. Not sure he has the charisma or the desire to serve as leader for the next eight years, however.
  • Carolyn Bennett (age 60). Supported Bob Rae after she withdrew in 2006. Doubt she would run now.
  • Jane Stewart (age 56). Former minister under Chrétien and former MP for Brant. [added on 10 May after Twitter discussion]
  • Joyce Murray (age 56), has experience as a minister in the BC government and is an environmentalist and entrepreneur.
  • Jim Karygiannis (age 55) is one of the more socially conservative members of the Liberal Party. If he were ever going to run, it might be now.
  • David McGunity (age 51). I can't see him running for the leadership at the same time as his brother, Dalton, is running for re-election as Premier, but stranger things have happened.
  • Denis Coderre (age 47). I hope he runs and loses. I dislike his policy and his approach to politics.
  • George Smitherman (age 47) lost to Rob Ford in the Toronto mayoral race. Not sure that he could muster a national campaign, but he's available and ambitious.
  • Kirsty Duncan (age 44) might run and I could see Bennett supporting her.
  • Mario Silva (age 44) might have been in the running, but he lost his seat in Davenport and received fewer than 11,000 votes. Maybe he can make a comeback, but not right now.
  • Desirée McGraw (age 42) might run. She hasn't served as an MP, but she's very involved in policy and Liberal politics. She was mentioned as a contender back in 2007. [updated on 23 June 2011]
  • Scott Simms (age 41), who, despite his relative youth, has been an MP for almost seven years and won his riding handily with 57% of the vote in 2011 (70% in 2008!).
  • Justin Trudeau (age 39). I hope he does not run. Unfortunately for him, his lineage is a handicap and clouds judgements of his own merit as a politician.
  • Robert Ghiz (age 37) is the Premier of Prince Edward Island. He might run but he would have to resign as Premier to do so -- seems a bit unlikely.

Reforming the Liberal Party

May 5th, 2011 by jesse 2 comments »

A few days after we lost to Ed Holder in London West, here are some reflections on the election and the Liberal Party of Canada.

The election

  1. This was an historic ass-kicking: 18.9% of the popular vote nationally is dreadful (14.2% in Quebec!).
  2. This was a rejection of Michael Ignatieff, in particular: whether he deserved it or not, most Canadians did not like him or want him to be Prime Minister. The leadership index from Nanos Research shows him lower at the end of the campaign than before.
  3. With a few exceptions, I liked our 2011 election platform. I thought it was well-suited to the moment and the leader.
  4. Turnout continues to be awful at 61.7%. I believe low turnout is related to the nature of the issues being discussed and the lack of articulated disagreement between the CPC, LPC and NDP. No one advocated raising the GST to deal with the deficit. No one proposed anything radical or interesting on health care. No one proposed anything significant on national defence. A common security perimeter with the United States was barely discussed. No one proposed anything especially significant to address poverty.
  5. The lack of significant differentiation on policy made the personalities of the leaders even more important than they usually are.
  6. The CPC wilfully misrepresented Liberal policy (iPod tax, hiking taxes in general) and ran a concerted negative campaign against Michael Ignatieff, which succeeded. They will do so again and again with every successive Liberal leader until they lose. I find it disgusting and shameful, but there is no denying that it worked.

The next four years

  1. The CPC continues to lower federal revenue by cutting taxes, in line with their long-term plan to shrink the fiscal capacity of the federal government and relatively strengthen the fiscal capacity of the provincial governments. The GST cut and the cuts to corporate taxes both provide more revenue to the provincial governments (potential, in the case of the GST: only NS and QC took the tax points).
  2. As a result of 1), I doubt we will be back to a balanced federal budget by 2015.
  3. I expect the CPC will continue to govern as they have -- that is, like a mean-spirited Liberal government -- and will continue to cut specific programs and funding for specific organizations that they dislike (long-gun registry, Status of Women, Kairos, Court Challenges, etc). They will not introduce government legislation on major social issues like same-sex marriage and abortion (this is because they are chicken-shit cowards; see also point 5, below). They will introduce some legislation in the form of private members' bills on these issues.
  4. We may see some action on Senate reform with the CPC and NDP holding 87.3% of the seats in the House of Commons, although I think it is unlikely, given the constitutional issues involved.
  5. Stephen Harper will appoint two Justices to the Supreme Court of Canada who are staunch Conservatives. Conservatives know that influence on the Supreme Court of Canada is essential to achieving their long-term social policy goals.
  6. Stephen Harper will have a hard time maintaining his iron grip on his MPs, now that there are more of them and they have a majority government.
  7. The CPC will gleefully oversee the shrinkage of the federal public service by attrition, as veteran public servants retire and are not replaced by new hires.
  8. The CPC will do absolutely nothing about the environment.
  9. The CPC will continue to spend more on the military, as part of its 20-year Canada First defence strategy.
  10. The CPC will introduce and pass a number of crime bills that will result in more people being incarcerated for longer periods of time.
  11. The CPC will cut the per vote subsidy to federal parties, which will negatively impact the NDP, LPC and Bloc.

Reforming the Liberal Party of Canada

  1. I am personally committed to reforming the Liberal Party of Canada. I invite you to join me by becoming a member and a monthly donor through the Victory Fund. Don't sit on the sidelines and complain -- get involved and try your best to improve the party from within.
  2. We should not merge with the NDP, but we should have a discussion about doing so.
  3. The most important quality of our next leader must be integrity. We need someone who a skeptical and cynical electorate can believe in.
  4. Related to 2), our next platform should be focused on a limited number of commitments that we can accomplish in short order. We need to restore faith in politicians and the best way of doing so is to repeatedly do what we say we will do.
  5. Forget "centrist," we need to be the party that is fiscally conservative and socially liberal. This doesn't mean that we need to be the party of the continual tax cut (that isn't necessarily fiscally conservative) but it does mean that we need to have the courage to honestly confront issues like the sustainability of funding for health care. We shouldn't live in a fiscal fantasy land. On the socially liberal front, although we have achieved much already, we can do more. There are many laws and regulations on the books that are no longer relevant or necessary. We should be the party of smart government that respects individual freedom. Right now, I would say that party is the Green Party.
  6. We should be the party of an open Internet, increased competition and less restrictive intellectual property law.
  7. The policy conference we had at Canada @ 150 was good, but avoided the question of national defence. Within the Liberal Party we need to debate the role of the Canadian military in the next 25 years or so. In general, we need to make international policy a priority. Let's not pretend the federal government is just a big provincial government.
  8. We need to develop a serious plan for democratic reform. Electoral reform, limits on the power of the Prime Minister, reform of Question Period, mandatory voting, a three-line whip system -- there are lots of ideas that we should discuss and could be part of an effective democratic reform package. I like the Westminster system, but even within that tradition we can improve things substantially.

Liberals and corporate income tax

February 15th, 2011 by jesse 2 comments »

Summary

  1. The LPC is advocating a corporate income tax (CIT) rate increase to fund new ongoing programs like family care.
  2. Even without new programs, given the current state of federal revenues, CIT reductions are ill-advised now and in the medium term.
  3. The LPC is targeting the CIT rate because it is the easiest tax, politically, to increase. Not because of how efficient it is as a tax.
  4. The LPC is talking about reducing the CIT rate "when it is affordable" to keep its options open and to differentiate itself from the NDP, which sees no scenario in the medium term wherein a CIT reduction is reasonable.
  5. It will take quite a while for the federal accounts to return to surplus, with the CIT increase or without. There is no reason to fear a see-saw countercyclical pattern of increasing and decreasing the CIT rate at exactly the wrong moment.

My friend and economist Mike Moffatt argues at Worthwhile Canadian Initiative against the LPC's proposed reversal and deferral of legislated CIT reductions. It's the deferral that rankles him. First, some basic facts:

  • From 2000 to 2010, the federal corporate income tax rate was reduced from 27% to 18% (-35.6%). As of Jan 2011, it is 16.5% and in 2012 it will fall to 15%.
  • The government reduced the GST from 7% to 6% in 2006 and from 6% to 5% in 2008. The total revenue foregone from the reduction is approx $10.8 billion per year (see Reference Sheet for Revenue Impacts Arising from Tax Adjustments [PDF]).
  • The government also reduced the lowest marginal rate from 16% to 15% (revenue impact of approx $5.5 billion).
  • The cost to the federal government of the reversal of planned reductions in CIT has been pegged at $6 billion, but Stephen Gordon suggests that offsetting effects on wages could make it more like $2-$3 billion.
  • The federal government's revenue is basically distributed as follows: 47% personal income tax; 13.9% corporate income tax; 2.4% non-resident income tax; 18.6% other taxes & duties; 7.7% EI premiums; 9.9% other revenues.

The LPC has proposed some new programs — eg. family care — and the LPC wants to fund these initiatives without increasing the deficit/slowing the return to a balanced budget. The LPC wants to maintain and build on its reputation as a "good fiscal manager," a reputation that was established based on the budgetary surpluses of the Chretien/Martin years.

Now, I believe that restoring the GST from 5% to 7% (join the Facebook group!), thereby raising $10.8 billion or so in revenue, is smarter than raising the CIT from 15% to 18% ($3-$6 billion in revenue). But a GST increase is a loser politically, especially at a time when voters are very concerned with their own financial security. This shouldn't matter much to bureaucrats or economists with a long-term view, but it certainly matters to politicians. Political parties must choose policy options within certain constraints. Chief among these constraints is support of a given policy by citizens at a particular moment in time. Of the various sources of revenue available to the federal government, CIT is the easiest one, politically, to increase. Of course this is obvious to economists who spend a lot of time looking at incentives and behaviour.

The LPC is proposing an increase from the current rate of 16.5% to 18% rather than a reduction to 15% by 2012, as legislated (net difference 3%). Ignatieff often vaguely refers to reducing the CIT rate "when we can afford to." His most recent comment was "This party understands the benefit of competitive corporate tax. We’re not the NDP here. You can cut corporate tax in a surplus, but it’s irresponsible to cut it when you have a $56-billion deficit." Presumably the earliest that the CIT cuts would be "affordable" is after the federal deficit is eliminated. Scott Brison has said similar things about reducing CIT once the federal accounts are back in surplus.

Now Mike, being a rather smart fellow, points out that cutting CIT during fiscal surpluses (presumably growth years for the economy as a whole) and increasing during deficits (presumably low growth/contractions) is counterproductive in terms of stimulating the economy. This is a bit of a red herring, as Mike knows very well: the CIT rate shouldn't be used in the short-term to stimulate the economy and nor should it be alternately increased/decreased. The CIT should 1) raise revenue for government and 2) provide a relatively stable and attractive environment that encourages businesses to allocate capital to Canada. I doubt the proposed CIT increases would have much effect on the economy in the short-term anyway.

The LPC policy of deferring CIT cuts bothers Mike. As he points out, if the CIT rate is reduced during years of surplus, when the business cycle turns again, the federal accounts may be thrown back into deficit. For a CIT cut to be affordable, then, it should be able, at least, to withstand a full business cycle. It's a good point, one that a prudent LPC government should take into consideration when the federal accounts are in surplus. Surely no one is suggesting, or implying, that some future LPC government will immediately cut the CIT as soon as the federal budget shows a modest surplus? I would expect them to at least restore the contingency reserve first.

The CPC cut the GST by 28.5% (2006 & 2008) and the CIT by 11.8% (2008) while in surplus. They proceeded to cut the CIT by 15.3% (2008-2011) while in deficit. They also introduced tax free savings accounts and reduced the lowest marginal rate from 16% to 15% (revenue impact of approx $5.5 billion). As a result of these cuts, the federal accounts are not returning to surplus any time soon. With tax revenues reduced, contingency budgeting eliminated, and both interest payments on the debt and program spending increasing annually, the PBO is projecting deficits of $43.1, $27.9, $23.2 and $19 billion for years 2010-2011 to 2013-2014, inclusive (see Estimating Potential GDP and Government's Structural Budget Balance). Importantly, in 2013-2014, 99.5% of the projected $19 billion deficit is attributable to structural, rather than cyclical, factors. A major driver of this structural deficit is lower federal revenues.

I haven't seen projections beyond 2014, but the picture doesn't get any prettier: our aging population will likely drive down major revenue sources like PIT while driving up major federal spending such as transfers to the provinces for health care.

Given the status quo, it will be quite some time before the federal accounts are back in surplus (seven years?). With the reversal of the CIT from 15% to 18%, we will reach this point a bit sooner (five years?). But even under the latter scenario, the LPC would not be reducing the CIT rate for at least five years, and probably more. We have little to fear from a strawman LPC government that would raise the CIT rate only to reduce it, then raise it, then reduce it, ad nauseum.

HOWTO: extract hyperlink contents in Excel for Mac

January 16th, 2011 by jesse 7 comments »

You have a series of hyperlinks from which you want to extract the URLs. You want to keep the hyperlink display text as well.

  1. Copy the hyperlinks into a column in Excel (column A).
  2. Copy the hyperlinks into the adjacent column as well (column B).
  3. Select column B and right-click on the selected cells. Choose "Edit Hyperlink"
  4. In "Display" the value will be "multiple cells". Delete this text and save. Just the URLs will remain in column B.
  5. Select column A and right-click on the selected cells. Choose "Remove Hyperlink". Just the display text will remain in column A.