Hugh McFadyen says PC Manitoba will refuse to accept the $1.25/vote in annual political party funding that was passed by the Legislature on Tuesday. For the Tories, this means leaving about $800,000 on the table in the run-up to the 2011 election. Let’s review what this move will accomplish:
- He’ll secure the support of a bunch of die-hard conservative idealogues who were going to vote for him anyway.
- He won’t pick up more than a handful of new votes, because frankly the general public doesn’t give a hoot about this issue.
- He’ll give the NDP and Liberals a significant fundraising advantage.
- He’ll piss of many of his own party’s campaign managers, strategists and fundraisers, who can certainly think of better ways to spend $800,000 than just giving it back to Gary Doer.
- He allows the Premier to call him a hypocrite for continuing to accept provincial rebates of election expenses and tax-deductible donations from individuals (i.e. partial public funding of political parties).
Is it just me, or does it seem like the mild success of The Great Filibuster of ‘08 has gone to someone’s head?
The smart thing to say would have been something like: “We fought hard, but the NDP and Liberals forced this legislation through anyway, and the election would be unfair if all parties weren’t funded using the same model.” Then, as Curtis suggests, use the money to build up your organization and target the potential swing seats.
However, even if the Tories really wanted to make a statement about this issue, there’s more creative solutions available than just saying, “thanks, but no thanks.” Solutions that actually create some value for the party as well.
How about donating the $800,000 to a prominent children’s charity? That would impress a few people. Or better yet, strike up a whole community relations program which allows you to support small non-profit projects across the province and issue dozens of news releases in which you can claim to be “giving Manitobans their money back.” Then promise that when elected you’ll redirect all the political party funding to the Community Places program.
I came up with that in 32 seconds. Surely you guys could have figured out something better in the last four months, no?
Filed under: winnipeg blog | Tagged: PC Manitoba, hugh mcfadyen, bill 37
I’m no Tory fan, but I like it when parties do something that is strategically boneheaded but fits with their party philosophy. Call me and old fashioned small-c conservative, but I think that we fixate too much on strategy and not enough on a discussion of policy. Our politics becomes cheaper when we (myself most definitely included) forget that people actually believe things and are not just plotting for power.
That said, I bet that Hugh wasn’t sitting around saying “What’s the ethical thing to do here that best reflects my political philosophy?” I bet – though I don’t know for certain – that they did this because they thought it was good strategy. And that’s just sad.
Hmmmmmm…… yes he will piss off some people. However one potential element of fallout might be threats to the employment of existing paid party folksies. Their annoyance could probably contribute just enough to advance the demise of the great leader himself ……an outcome, which even though it may be expensive in the short run, is valuable for the long haul.
What is the tipping point? Don’t know but a pleasure to see the process moving along.
I like the idea of having them choose to spend the money on something the NDP has underfunded – then HM could say “when we’re in office, we’ll replace this gift from the PC Party with the real funding this program deserves,” or whatever.
Dunno if the rules would allow it, of course, and knowing the NDP, they’d probably amend the bill to stop such “unacceptable behavior” by the next sitting. Still…
@Cog – Another great idea. Seriously, how is it that the Tories couldn’t come up with anything other than the one-day media hit of “thanks, but no thanks”?
This sounds like this will be a boon to the Manitoba Liberals.
Already that little party has better research and better bill introduced, this will only help them. Doer keeps stealing Dr. Jon’s private member bill idea’s, while the Tories just flail about helplessly…mostly cause 70% of their caucus is useless.
Darin Praznick should come back and lead them.
The whole point is the money is not needed to begin with, so why not do exactly what Hugh suggested to do with the money, and fund me the taxpayer. He said to leave it in general revenue. I’ll take my families $3 thank you very much in tax breaks. Why do all the socialists here just want to give my money away
Doer snapped at a reporter last night on the news, that’s something he normally doesn’t do, so yes its having an effect.
@Mike – Sounds great in theory, but that’s not how it’s going to work. By leaving the money in general revenue, he’s not only shortchanging his own party relative to the others, but he’s essentially giving the Premier another $800K to buy votes with.
Well the good news is that after pulling the “bring back the Jets” at the last election, we will never be able to say this was the dumbest thing he ever did.
Actually the stupid Jets annoucement (I await Proud and Unapologetic Ex-Winnipegger to race in here and defend Baby Hughie at any point) over shadowed the PC’s even stupider election promise to turn Point Douglas into a man made beach and some kind of resort community.
Bring back Darin Praznik for leader! Manitoba needs a compentent PC party again something Hughie the playboy will never provide.
James – good to know someone else was watching. Even if the stupid Lake Point Douglas announcement hadn’t happened, there was still the no-PST on bikes announcement, the horse racing needs bigger subsidies announcement and the charter of rights protection for Manitoba Hydro announcement available to fill the stupid announcement void.
You mean the Manitoba Clean Energy Company?
Touche.
Frog I like your idea. Send it to the PC’s and lets see at least one light bulb glows.