The Pyhrric Victory of the New Democratic Party

So, this is my long promised analysis of the NDP coming out of the October 14th election. This will probably conclude my series on issues arising from the election. After this, I will probably turn my attention to Liberal leadership politics and the American election.

To begin with, the NDP accomplishments out of this election should be stated. A net gain of seven seats over the standings at dissolution, and a gain of 0.65% of the vote on top of the 2006 election. The gain of seats is nothing to sneeze at, particularly as they largely represent a new power base for the NDP in Northern Ontario, as the NDP won seven of the ten seats that make up the region, failing to gain only Kenora, Nippising-Timiskaming, and Parry Sound-Muskoka. Of those three, Kenora is within reach for the next election. Also important, is that for the first time ever, the NDP won a seat in Quebec in a general election, and for only the second time ever, the NDP took seats in Alberta and Newfoundland and Labrador. There were also a number of seats where the NDP came very close to making gains: St. John's South - Mt. Pearl, South Shore-St. Margaret's, Gatineau, Oshawa, Beaches-East York, Palliser, Regina-Qu'Appelle and Nunavut. There are also a number seats that the NDP lost control of by a narrow margin that join the forgoing as the low-hanging fruit: Parkdale-High Park (more on this one later), Surrey-North and Vancouver Island North. That makes twelve seats that could reasonably be called low-hanging fruit for the NDP, and if we can take them all and hold what we have in the next election, that would take the NDP to 49 seats, which would be the party's highest ever number of seats.

Another important thing for the NDP is that the party's vote is becoming much more effective. Over the last many elections, the NDP vote has been consistently under-represented in the number of seats won. In the 2004 election, the NDP took 15.68% of the vote, but only got a paltry 6.17% of the seats. It took 111 968 NDP votes to win one seat. In 2006, the NDP took 17.48% of the vote, and garnered 9.41% of the seats. This means 89 296 votes for the NDP to win a single seat. In the 2008 election, the NDP got 18.13% of the vote while taking 12.01% of the seats in the House. This meant it took 67 814 votes for the NDP to win one seat for the party. Between 2004 and 2008, the NDP nearly doubled its vote effectiveness, representing both an increase in the total NDP vote and an increasing concentration of that vote in certain ridings.

This is an important trend for the NDP. In the 2004 election, the winning party took 43.83% of the seats with 36.73% of the vote. It took them 36 579 votes to win one seat. In 2006, the numbers for the winning party were 40.26% of the seats with 36.27% of the vote, and 42 992 votes per seat. In 2008, the numbers were 46.43% of the seats with 37.63% of the vote, and 36 416 votes per seat. The NDP is moving steadily toward a level of vote effectiveness similar to the winning parties in the last three elections. There is an important caveat to this, however. The last three elections have elected minority governments, and minority governments are generally less vote effective than majorities. To take the high water mark of vote effectiveness for a winning party in recent times, in the 1984 election the Progressive Conservatives needed only 29 757 votes to win a seat, and won a massive majority. The low water mark of recent majority governments was the 1997 election, in which it took the Liberals 32 221 votes to win a seat. Clearly, the NDP has a long way to go even to reach that low water mark.

There we have the NDP gains out of the recent election: substantial gains in Northern Ontario; landmark victories in ridings in Quebec, Newfoundland & Labrador and Alberta; substantial low-hanging fruit for the next election; and steadily increasing vote effectiveness. However, there is a reason I have labelled these accomplishments a "Pyrrhic victory". For those unfamiliar with the term, it means a victory that costs is very costly, sometimes to the point of costing you more than you have won. The main reason for my applying this label is that this election seems to have exposed a fairly hard popular vote ceiling for the NDP.

Over the last two elections, the NDP share of the popular vote has grown only marginally, increasing by only 2.45 percentage points over that time. In the election just passed, the NDP share of the popular vote grew by only 0.65 percentage points. A negligible gain. This despite what should have been perfect conditions for the party. A woefully incompetent Liberal leader, at the helm of a disastrously bad campaign. A Conservative Party making gaffe upon gaffe, including Gerry "Death by 1000 Cold Cuts" Ritz, and a strong Anyone But Conservative campaign, led by that masterful politician Danny Williams. The party also spent up to the Elections Canada limit (going deeply into debt to do so), and ran a huge ad campaign in Quebec. I saw more NDP ads on TV than I did Liberals ads. And for all that, the party gained a minuscule percentage of the vote, and due to the low turnout, actually took in a reduced absolute number of votes (as, in fairness, did every one of the parties represented in Parliament - sorry Greenies).

For all of the effort and treasure expended, the NDP gained a net of seven seats, and lost the best rookie MP in Parliament Peggy Nash (defeated by the execrable Gerrard Kennedy), and lost seats that should have been winnable. The high-water mark of votes received in Atlantic Canada (including coming first in the popular vote in Nova Scotia), may not be replicated next election, since the NDP can't expect to see another ABC campaign by Williams, indeed he seems to have given up on that already. Further, the next Liberal leader will not be such a milquetoast as Dion was, and in fact is likely to be either Iggy or Rae, both of whom are political street-fighters.

This was the NDP's golden moment to make the break from fourth-party status. A collection of factors that may never appear together again united to pave the way for the NDP to make a major move, perhaps even to official opposition status, though likely for this to happen the Conservatives would have had to win a majority government and decimate the Liberals completely. That doesn't bear thinking about. None the less, this was the perfect storm for the NDP, and the opportunity was missed, though not for a lack of effort on the part of the party. These results simply suggest that in Canada's four-party reality, the 18-20% range may be a cap on NDP support.

Much of the future prospects for the NDP depend on what happens with the Liberal leadership campaign. If they pick a leader on the right of their party (Iggy, Manley or McKenna), then there may be an opening for the NDP to scoop up left-Liberals, and claim seats in Atlantic Canada, urban Ontario and Vancouver. The NDP could still make a move, and perhaps surpass the BQ, moving into third place. If the Liberals select a leader from the relative-left of their party (Rae, Kennedy), as suggested by Devin Johnston in an excellent discussion of the Liberals after the last election, then the NDP may be in serious trouble. Those leaders would be able to take back recently gained NDP seats in the same areas I've identified above.

Frankly, I have no idea how the NDP should go about breaking this vote ceiling. The NDP has tried just about everything, and nothing has worked. The party polled as high as 22% during the election campaign, but fell back on election night. If I did have the answer to this, I would phone up the NDP and be hired on to win the next election. But such is life. One thing that I can promise you is not the solution is moving the party to the economic right. The party has drifted too much for my socialist comfort as it is, and I don't know how long I could go on supporting an NDP that had become a clone of the Liberals. If the NDP makes itself indistinguishable from the Liberals, leftist New Democrats will leave the party for a new left alternative, and centrist Dippers will return to the Liberals. The party will also shed voters to the Green Party. Only by presenting a distinct policy alternative, and an economic critique, can the NDP hope to succeed, but this is simply a pre-condition of success, not a plan for reaching it.

Whatever happens, the NDP needs to do some soul searching as to while this golden moment yielded minimal gains. And it needs to happen soon.

This wraps up my planned entries on issues I see resulting from the October 14th election. As before, if there is something I haven't addressed that you'd like me too, feel free to leave a comment or e-mail me at ts-blog@live.ca, and I'll look into it.

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