Pallister’s obsession with NDP leadership vote

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 20/03/2015 (4136 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For someone who criticized the provincial NDP for spending too much time on a leadership race and ignoring big issues facing the province, Tory Leader Brian Pallister seems obsessed with that same leadership race.

In just over two months, the party has issued a dozen news releases referencing the NDP’s leadership campaign. They ranged from accusing the party of manipulating senior citizens to making the fact-free accusation that some sort of backroom deal was cooked up to assure Premier Greg Selinger’s victory.

Most recently, Pallister called on the NDP to review the final leadership result because Selinger won “not because he was the person his party wanted, but because he manipulated the rules and negotiated backroom deals to make it so.”

As with so many other utterances, dutifully reported by unquestioning media, Pallister offered nary an atom-sized bit of evidence to support his windy charges.

Of course, it’s pretty hard to accept that Pallister actually believes any of this. In the same release he says “Theresa Oswald, and by extension all those who support the NDP, have been denied a fair and just process.” And: “Theresa Oswald deserved an honest shot at leadership and this process denied that chance.”

Really? Oswald is Pallister’s new BFF? Given that Selinger is currently as popular as a pothole, Pallister would rather face Theresa Oswald in the next election? If the NDP did follow Pallister’s advice, he’d be hyperventilating into a paper bag with a defibrillator on standby.

Clear!

Added to this are the new complaints about Selinger’s apparent firing of some close political staff who worked for other candidates during the leadership race.

The Progressive Conservatives are in a lather, demanding the government release the details of severance packages those staffers may have received on their way out the door. Again, they toss out their own figures drawn from their magical hat.

It certainly can be argued that severance payments to those employees or, for example, to the former acting CAO of the City of Winnipeg should be made public. But it is disingenuous to suggest keeping them secret is unusual.

Indeed, for a party that has often suggested government should be run more like a business, you’d think the idea of severance would be accepted operating procedure. When private businesses want to get rid of top employees for no particularly egregious reason, they pay those people to leave. Both sides agree to a figure, keep it all secret and move on. As a businessperson, Pallister knows this is how the game is played — rightly or wrongly.

It avoids wrongful-dismissal suits that could cost businesses or taxpayers much more in the long run. It’s notable that in his news release Pallister doesn’t make any promise that he would disapprove of any severance payments or at least promise to make any of them public.

That’s not surprising. Nowhere in the more than 30 news releases the party has issued during the past few months is there any indication of what a Pallister government would do on any of the big issues that are supposedly being ignored.

According to just a few missives, the deficit is “out of control,” insurance rates are too high, eating disorders “need our attention,” ambulance waits “get longer,” mismanagement is “costing millions.” Yikes, our hair is on fire!

All that’s missing is any indication what a Conservative government would do to solve all these problems and where they would get the water to douse the flames.

OK, Pallister has said he will repeal the NDP’s PST increase in his first term, but doesn’t say where he will find the money to make up for it (kind of like promising to keep property tax increases to the rate of inflation, and then, well you know). Other than that, who really knows where the party stands on anything? It’s all criticism without commitment.

It’s time for Pallister to stop worrying about the NDP leadership race. It’s over, move on; the NDP has. It is time, however, for him to start offering some clear alternatives to the current government. If he has enough information to declare what’s wrong, then there’s enough information to say how he would make things right.

And, it is also time for the media to start asking those questions, rather than simply jot down and report the endless, often baseless, accusations the Opposition makes. We can read the news releases for that.

George Stephenson is a former journalist who once worked for the CBC.