Tories not extinct

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 25/06/2024 (440 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In the aftermath of the Progressive Conservatives’ defeat in last week’s Tuxedo byelection, some have suggested that the Tories have hit “rock bottom”; that they are doomed to spend the next decade or more on the opposition benches.

Much of the analysis has taken on a “doomsday” tone, but how accurate is the characterization? Is the PC party’s future really that bleak?

No, it’s not. Some pundits have forgotten that we have seen major shifts in support occur before in Manitoba politics, and not that long ago.

In the 2016 provincial election, the New Democrats slid from 37 seats to just 14, while the Progressive Conservatives climbed from 19 seats to 40 seats. After their drubbing in the general election, followed by Greg Selinger’s resignation as leader and MLA, the NDP even lost his St. Boniface seat in a 2018 byelection by almost 1,000 votes.

In the 2019 general election, the NDP won 18 seats (despite again losing in St. Boniface), while the Tories won 36 seats. In the aftermath of that election, there was no narrative that the NDP was likely to lose the next several elections. Rather, the prevalent spin emphasized that the party had won more seats than the previous election.

That narrative was in sharp contrast to the spin we are now hearing regarding the current state and future of the Progressive Conservative Party.

In last fall’s election, the NDP rebounded to win 34 seats, but the Tories won 22 — and that was despite running one of the worst election campaigns in Manitoba history. Those 22 PC seats were much more than the NDP won in the 2016 and 2019 elections, yet the outcome has been painted as a humiliating disaster for the Tories.

Indeed, most of the post-election analysis ignored the fact that, although many PC incumbents chose to not seek re-election, the Tories still came within a total of just 3,131 votes across seven ridings from winning a third straight majority government.

In other words, the NDP win last October wasn’t the landslide victory that, just eight months later, many people now seem to think it was. The Tories returned with a sizable caucus that at least in theory gives them a viable opportunity to win the next election. The loss in Tuxedo last week reduced the PC caucus to 21 seats, but that is still only eight seats away from a majority government.

Some pundits have pointed to the outcome in Tuxedo, combined with the recent Probe Research poll results (which found the NDP with 51 per cent support provincewide and the Tories with 38 per cent), and suggest that a seismic, permanent shift has happened in Manitoba politics, guaranteeing the NDP a long reign in government.

Their analysis ignores the fact, however, that the Tories are currently without a party leader and don’t have a clear set of policies that combine to represent a coherent alternative to the Kinew government’s agenda. Under those circumstances, it is surprising the NDP lead at the moment isn’t even larger.

Many also seem to have forgotten that the NDP and Progressive Conservatives were in opposite polling positions not that long ago. In September of 2018, Probe found that the Tories held a whopping 44-25 provincewide lead over the NDP. In September of 2020, the lead was 43-34.

All of this tells us that voters’ preferences frequently change in Manitoba politics, and often quickly. The Kinew government is enjoying a prolonged honeymoon period, in no small part due to the vacant Tory leadership position, but that won’t last forever.

Indeed, health-care wait times have gotten longer under the NDP, their strategy to balance the budget is based more on dreams than fiscal reality, and they have no plan to address Manitoba Hydro’s looming electricity shortage. Violent crime is up and our infrastructure is crumbling.

By the 2027 election, those and other issues will likely combine to make the NDP’s path to re-election more challenging than it currently appears. If that happens, nobody should be surprised if the Tories, under a new leader, are a viable threat to retake at least eight of the seats they won in 2016 and 2019, but lost in 2023.

If they do that, they form government.

Deveryn Ross is a political commentator living in Brandon. deverynrossletters@gmail.com X: @deverynross