The NDP is a Fading Force in Quebec

By Henry Srebrnik, [Saint John, NB] Telegraph-Journal

 

The New Democrats are in the final stretch of electing a new leader, following the resignation of Tom Mulcair after their disastrous showing in the 2015 federal election.

Under his leadership, the party dropped from its 2011 total of 103 seats, 59 of them from Quebec, to 44 seats, just 16 from that province.

What caused such a stunning rise, and precipitous decline – one that seems likely to continue? 

In 2011, when Jack Layton, originally a Quebecer, was leader of the New Democratic Party, Quebec nationalists in effect took over the NDP. 

It became a vehicle for them to support Layton’s Sherbrooke Declaration, the NDP document that stated that the party would recognize a “majority decision (50 per cent plus one) of Quebec people in the event of a referendum on the political status of Quebec.”

For that reason, and to help defeat the detested Stephen Harper, they were willing to desert their long-time home, the Bloc Québécois.

But they have no real allegiance to the NDP. Neither under Layton nor another Québécois, Mulcair, did they “convert” to federalism. Their first loyalty is to the Quebec nation, and certainly not to Canadian “multiculturalism.”

Three of the contenders, Charlie Angus, Niki Ashton, and Jagmeet Singh, are all, from the vantage point of Quebec nationalists, “anglophones” or “English Canadians,” regardless of their ethnic background, and they all hold views antithetical to Quebecois nationalists, particularly when it comes to immigration and the politics surrounding Muslims.

The three disapprove of a bill currently under debate in Quebec’s National Assembly that would prevent individuals wearing face coverings from dispensing or receiving public services –which would, especially, impact Muslim women who wear niqabs or burkas.

For “Charter” Canadians elsewhere in the country, it is a question of fundamental religious accommodation and minority rights.

But in Quebec, it’s a different matter. Caught in the middle, the Quebec wing of the party is rapidly disintegrating. 

MP Pierre Nantel told the Montreal newspaper Le Devoir recently that he, as well as others in the caucus, might prefer to sit as independents rather than to serve in the House of Commons under any of these three.

He also remarked at the final NDP debate that he didn't think Singh, a Sikh who represents one of southern Ontario’s most diverse ridings in the provincial assembly, could connect effectively with Quebec voters because he wears a turban.

The only Quebec politician running for the federal leadership, MP Guy Caron, has said that he would respect the will of the National Assembly on the matter, adding that there is a political consensus among leading right- and left-wing parties in the province when it comes to the open display of religion.

He insists that the party must recognize the province’s distinct history and its “authority” to legislate on issues of secularism, or risk becoming irrelevant in francophone ridings outside greater Montreal.

Quebec and Canada remain very far apart when it comes to identity politics. The Québécois as has been the case throughout their history, worry that in an increasingly diverse Canada, they stand to lose their language and culture.

But this is something that other Canadians have been told by their political elites, in no uncertain terms, not to fear, lest they be called out as “racists” and shunned in polite society.

The NDP, stuck in the middle, will probably revert to being what it always was – a left-of-centre party of “progressive” Canadians, of some consequence in the rest of the country but virtually none in Quebec. And the Bloc will welcome many prodigal Québécois back to their political home.