Tagged: NDP
They’re not “Tories,” dammit – updated x 2
Tories knock off Bloc in eastern Quebec – Gazette
Tories, NDP make gains in by-elections – Star
Tories retake former Nova Scotia stronghold – Globe and Mail
Byelection win will boost Tories in Quebec: MP – CBC
This is likely a losing battle, but could the national press corp please stop calling the Harper Conservatives “Tories?” The Conservative Party of Canada is not simply a renamed Progressive Conservative Party. It was borne of a hostile takeover by the Reform Party, thinly disguised as a merry merger.
Headline writers need short substitutes for party names — Grits, NDP, Bloc, etc. — but that’s no excuse for enshrining Reform spin into every story about national politics.
The Harper Conservatives are trying mightily to convince Canadians that they’ve moved to the center. They’ve done a pretty good job of this, except when the curtain slips (as it did in the Fall 2008 Economic Update) and exposes their plans for the country, should we ever give them a majority.
Aiding and abetting a national party’s branding strategy is not in the press gallery’s job description.
I’m curious to know how Tories — real ones, adherents of the Progressive Conservative Party that still exists provincially though not federally — feel about this.
Suggestions for a proper Conservative Party nickname welcome.
[UPDATE] Real Tory, loyal foot soldier, and premier-to-be-maybe Rob Batherson is ready with a smackdown:
Parker, Parker, Parker…
Throughout Canada’s history, Canada’s Conservative Party has taken on many different labels – Liberal Conservative, Conservative, Unionist, National Government, Progressive Conservative and Conservative. Part of that Conservative tradition has also manifested itself in parties such as Social Credit, Reform and Canadian Alliance (particularly in Western Canada). I recommend Bob Plamondon’s book Blue Thunder for anyone interested in a more detailed history of Canada’s Conservatives.
In 2003, both the Canadian Alliance and the Progressive Conservative parties voluntarily and democratically voted in favour of merging the two parties into the Conservative Party of Canada. The leadership selection process for the Conservative Party of Canada was inherited from the Progressive Conservative Party, as were the vast majority of the party’s aims and principles as contained in the Constitution. [*cough* *cough* - Ed.]
As a Progressive Conservative, I feel it is perfectly reasonably and legitimate for the media to describe the federal Conservatives as Tories.
You’re a Tory, Rob, no question. Those guys up there? Not so much.
[UPDATE 2] A Contrarian reader with the nom de post Educhatter disagrees with Rob:
Your post on Party names is contrarianism at its best. Yes, George Grant is rolling in his grave, not to mention old Dief. Might I suggest a 21st century variation for headline writers?
- Cons
- Libs
- ADP (Aging Democratic Party)
- Bloc(heads)
NS Power: the unreal threat of $500,000-a-day fines
Lurking behind Nova Scotia Power’s increasingly frantic efforts to find renewable sources of electrical generation is the threat of a crushing $500,000-a-day fine should it fail to meet legislated targets for 2010. That works out to $183 million per year—half again what NSP earned its shareholders in 2008.
For better or for worse, the threat is symbolic, not real.
Under the Electricity Act, a set of regulations known as the Renewable Energy Standards (RES) requires NSP to purchase at least five percent of its 2010 energy supply from renewable sources owned by third parties and built after 2001. The RES requirement increases to 10 percent in 2013, but may include generation from both third party and NSPI facilities. The Climate Change Action Plan, released last January, would have increased this to 25 percent by 2020, but a little noticed NDP campaign promise trumps that provision, moving the 25 percent deadline up to 2015.
RES regulations stipulate “a daily penalty of no more than $500,000″ for failure to comply.
Paving the way for Tories – another view [cont.]
The indefatigable Wallace J. McLean (note correct spelling; mea culpa) has risen to contrarian‘s challenge, and defended his view that the MacDonald government’s paving proposals were as politically skewed as the Harper government’s selective approvals thereof.
This time he buttresses his case with a map, using traditional party colors in two shades: darker for ridings in which the government proposed paving; lighter for those where it did not.
Turning this map back into numbers, the Rodney government proposed work in two out of six rural Liberal districts (33%); three out of eight rural NDP districts (38%), and 13 out of 21 rural PC districts. That’s 62% of them.
Contrarian concedes that McLean has demonstrated a provincial Tory skew from which many will impute deliberate bias. But the provincial skew does not approach the 4-to-1 edge the Harper-MacKay Reformers Conservatives bestowed upon their own ridings. In either case, the new NDP administration has a chance to banish this ancient and corrupt system by implementing its promise of a five year paving plan to get the politics out of paving..
