{"id":265169,"date":"2017-05-29T16:00:26","date_gmt":"2017-05-29T20:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/policyoptions.irpp.org\/issues\/a-fresh-or-re-heated-conservative-menu\/"},"modified":"2025-10-07T21:37:53","modified_gmt":"2025-10-08T01:37:53","slug":"a-fresh-or-re-heated-conservative-menu","status":"publish","type":"issues","link":"https:\/\/policyoptions.irpp.org\/fr\/2017\/05\/a-fresh-or-re-heated-conservative-menu\/","title":{"rendered":"A fresh, or re-heated, Conservative menu?"},"content":{"rendered":"

That Andrew Scheer would like to emulate the success of his predecessor at the helm of the Conservative Party makes perfect sense. Whatever you thought of Stephen Harper, he was a shrewd politician. Back before the 2006 election, Harper and his team looked at the Canadian electorate and saw a path to victory that united different groups of voters around promises that appealed to their pocketbooks and their sense of personal security. The coalition included Canadians from minority groups that had voted Liberal in the past as Harper convinced \u201cnon-traditional supporters that their values were conservative values,\u201d as Natalie Pon wrote in Maclean\u2019s<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Can Harper\u2019s approximate voting coalition be replicated, this time with someone who is more of a people person? Perhaps, but probably not if Scheer reheats an old policy playbook from 2006, nor if he takes the policy development approach that Harper instilled. As Harper\u2019s former policy director Rachel Curran recently noted<\/a>, the cautious ideas of the CPC leadership contest \u201cdo not respond to voters\u2019 expectations that a government-in-waiting is anticipating and developing responses to current and upcoming policy challenges.\u201d<\/p>\n

Consider how much has changed since Harper first became prime minister.<\/p>\n

Twitter, Snapchat and Instagram hadn\u2019t infected our lives yet. It was before self-driving cars and artificial intelligence were routine dinner party conversation, and before kids in our neighbourhoods were dying in epidemic numbers from Fentanyl abuse. The United States hadn\u2019t yet elected an isolationist, anti-trade deal president, and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission had yet to sound its wake-up call to Canadians. It was before we had a cabinet where women hold the top jobs, and before a \u201clow carbon\u201d future was something that people of all political stripes began to consider. It was before we began to understand the reality of \u201cprecarious\u201d work and the \u201cgig\u201d economy.<\/p>\n

Scheer\u2019s promises of a boutique tax credit for parents who have their children enrolled in private schools and a GST credit for home heating bills seem quaint when you consider what he\u2019d be dealing with in government \u2013 physician-assisted death legislation, the opioid crisis, the future of NAFTA, the crises in First Nations communities and the rapidly accelerating death of the news media, to name just a few.<\/p>\n

But beyond the actual content of whatever policies he might adopt, what\u2019s also important is how the Conservative Party will approach the formulation of its ideas. Will there be wide-open, evidence-based conversations about policy, or will certain topics and voices remain taboo?<\/p>\n

Recall that for years, there were simply certain topics that could not be raised with the Harper Conservatives \u2013 carbon taxes, safe-injection sites, national child care, marijuana legalization and so on. Stakeholders learned to carefully craft their remarks at parliamentary committee meetings so as not to appear offside with the government (if they were invited to speak in the first place), and inside the bureaucracy there were limitations placed on stakeholder outreach and on public opinion research. Some decisions were taken with no outside policy discussion at all, such as the elimination of the long-form census.<\/p>\n

But in the past two years, the policy conversation has opened up. While the myriad consultations and engagements brought in under the Liberals are often ridiculed as a sign of indecisiveness or \u201cdithering,\u201d they\u2019ve also injected a feeling of energy, innovation and creativity in the greater orbit around the federal government. This orbit includes Conservatives who have landed in the private sector or in various non-governmental roles, and are now working to influence policy from the outside.<\/p>\n

Will the Liberals do anything with all the policy options public servants are gathering on their behalf? Maybe not \u2013 look how they handled the consultation around electoral reform. But opening the channels of input is a positive development that Scheer shouldn\u2019t reverse.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s some indication that Scheer is willing to let in a bit more policy oxygen, telling the National Post\u2019s John Ivison<\/a>, \u201cI don\u2019t like the fact Conservatives have that negative connotation \u2013 that we\u2019re always against things, always \u2018tackling\u2019 something, \u2018cracking down\u2019 on something, or \u2018getting tough\u2019 on something else. We have to have something positive to say on the flipside.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scheer also told Duncan McCue<\/a> of CBC\u2019s Cross-Country Checkup that he would be looking to pick the best of the policies put forward by his rivals in the leadership race.<\/p>\n

Whichever way Scheer develops his policy offerings for the next election, it would make sense for this 38-year-old father of five to shift the party to face the future. And that might mean knocking down some of the policy fences erected by the leader before him.<\/p>\n

Photo:\u00a0Andrew Scheer, right, is congratulated by Maxime Bernier after being elected the new leader of the federal Conservative party at the federal Conservative leadership convention in Toronto on Saturday, May 27, 2017. THE CANADIAN PRESS\/Frank Gunn<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Do you have something to say about the article you just read? Be part of the\u00a0<\/em>Policy Options\u00a0discussion, and send in your own submission.\u00a0Here is a\u00a0<\/em>link<\/em><\/a>\u00a0on how to do it. <\/em>|\u00a0Souhaitez-vous r\u00e9agir \u00e0 cet article ? <\/em>Joignez-vous aux d\u00e9bats d\u2019<\/em>Options politiques\u00a0et soumettez-nous votre texte en suivant ces\u00a0<\/em>directives<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

That Andrew Scheer would like to emulate the success of his predecessor at the helm of the Conservative Party makes perfect sense. Whatever you thought of Stephen Harper, he was a shrewd politician. Back before the 2006 election, Harper and his team looked at the Canadian electorate and saw a path to victory that united […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":253559,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","ep_exclude_from_search":false,"apple_news_api_created_at":"2025-10-08T01:37:55Z","apple_news_api_id":"fd4b702d-7abc-4b3c-b89f-c469a5034a76","apple_news_api_modified_at":"2025-10-08T01:37:56Z","apple_news_api_revision":"AAAAAAAAAAD\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/w==","apple_news_api_share_url":"https:\/\/apple.news\/A_UtwLXq8Szy4n8RppQNKdg","apple_news_cover_media_provider":"image","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_cover_video_id":0,"apple_news_cover_video_url":"","apple_news_cover_embedwebvideo_url":"","apple_news_is_hidden":"","apple_news_is_paid":"","apple_news_is_preview":"","apple_news_is_sponsored":"","apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":[],"apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false},"categories":[9358,9357,9372],"tags":[9133,8511],"article-status":[],"irpp-category":[4295,4251],"section":[],"irpp-tag":[7098],"class_list":["post-265169","issues","type-issues","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politique","category-politiques-sociales","category-recent-stories-fr","tag-federalisme","tag-conservative-party-fr","irpp-category-politique","irpp-category-politique-sociale","irpp-tag-parti-conservateur-du-canada"],"acf":[],"apple_news_notices":[],"yoast_head":"\nA fresh, or re-heated, Conservative menu?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/policyoptions.irpp.org\/fr\/2017\/05\/a-fresh-or-re-heated-conservative-menu\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"fr_FR\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A fresh, or re-heated, Conservative menu?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"That Andrew Scheer would like to emulate the success of his predecessor at the helm of the Conservative Party makes perfect sense. 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