Where's the policy Canada?

As a Canadian living in New Zealand, I am currently following the election news of both countries with avid curiosity. Here in NZ one thing that seems to keep popping up over and over (other than Winston’s latest denials) is the National Party’s lack of concrete policy. And it was these accusations that got me wondering. With an election just over a month away what were Canada’s major parties proposing?

So I did what all seekers of info do in this day in age...I went on the internet of course! I went to the websites of 3 of Canada’s major parties (Conservatives, Liberals and NDP...the Bloc I neglected as I’m not from Québec) and what I found, while not wholly surprising, was still more than a little scary.

My first stop was the Conservatives. Upon clicking on their ‘Policy’ link I found oodles of facts on past achievements and, of course, past screw-ups of the other parties. But upon sifting through the “Speech from the Throne” and the 2008 budget I got a fairly clear picture of what they’ve got in mind for the next couple of years. No surprises there. As they are heading up the current government , they had bloody well better know where their headed.

Next up? The Liberals. As the traditional opposition party surely they had something interesting to say. I clicked on the ‘Vision’ link. And what did I find? “The Green Shift”. Eh? That’s it? Surely there had to be more. So I looked. I really did. I found a picture proclaiming they will bring back the “Court Challenges Program”. Well that’s lovely. What about health? Education? Unemployment? The current nightmare that is Canadian telecommunications?

The NDP, much to my surprise, faired a bit better. At least Mr. Layton did more in his opening campaign speech than lambast Mr. Harper. But while it all sounds good there’s not a lot of substance. So you’re going to invest in my kids education? How much and who gets the funding? You plan on fixing healthcare waiting lists by training more doctors and nurses you say? Sorry Mr. Layton but if you did just a tiny bit of homework you’d know that our health care problems are just slightly more complex. And this is, according to the latest polls, Canada’s second choice for PM. Yikes!

I must admit I’ve never been a huge fan of the Conservatives and much less now that they’ve become a cover for the right wing nutters of the old Alliance Party. But the alternatives are absolutely non-existent. Where’s the vision? Where’s the country going and how is it getting there? If this were a job interview these guys would have been thanked politely and asked to leave ages ago. And still they ask us to vote for them.

As all this started with the NZ National Party, I decided to do a quick comparison. Were they really as bad as all that? In short, no. What most have been calling a ‘lack of policy’ turned out to be surprisingly comprehensive compared to their Canadian counterparts. Frankly I’ll take the NZ version of “a lack of policy” over Canada’s any day. Sadly it’s a bit late to expect anything more than shoddy, thrown-together-at-the-last-minute election promises from our Canadian crew. Perhaps next election...AH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!