Featur e Lessons from the Colony By Jamie Watt, Lanny Cardow, and Joseph Lavoie
650 years the country has seen the peaceful transition of power from one party to another and back again. Like most parliaments, England’s has had its share of coalition and minority government arrangements. Nevertheless, David Cameron’s recent minority victory and Conser- vative--Liberal Democrat coalition is an anomaly for the UK. Britain has not seen an arrangement of the sort since Labour won 301 of 612 seats in 1974. Canada, on the other hand, has now weathered four full
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years of Harper minorities. Our PM, by most accounts, is successfully handling the unusual alliances of a minor- ity parliament. David Cameron would be well-advised to learn some lessons from this country. Here are five:
1. Define your opponent early In a hung Parliament scenario, you can’t afford to give
your opponent any wiggle room. The landscape could shift at any moment’s notice and if your opponent successfully positions themselves as the Prime Minister “in waiting,” you’ll end up on the other side of the aisle. Five years is a long time, and the honeymoon with Nick Clegg will inevi- tably end. You can hasten that process. Build a campaign around each Labour leadership hope- ful and unleash it as soon as the victor takes the helm. Sure, some will express shock and dismay that you would stoop to such tactics, especially when you’ve promised to usher in a new era of politics at Number 10. Ignore them. As much as people publicly complain about so-called negative campaigns, they work. Canada’s Conservatives have successfully defined their opponent twice, and both of those leaders have been un- able to recover from the onslaught. Newly elected Liberal leader Stéphane Dion was branded as an owly, clumsy and unskilled weakling flustered at the prospect of having to make decisions. A sound bite of Stéphane Dion asking (in his trademark whimper) “Do you think it’s easy to make priorities?” was conveniently taken from video footage of a Liberal leadership debates, and went viral among conserva- tives and the public. Two years later, his replacement was given the same treat-
ment for spending his entire professional life in the United Kingdom and the United States. Conservatives made a point
magine the reaction of a Victorian-era British politi- cian upon hearing that in 2010, England ought to look to one of the colonies for advice on how to successfully govern a minority parliament? Great Britain, we’re often reminded, is the “grand- daddy” of all parliamentary democracies. For over
of highlighting this fact by running a campaign reminding Canadians that Michael Ignatieff is an out-of-touch aca- demic who’s “just visiting.” His polling numbers are now just as bad as Dion’s. If things don’t turn around soon, watch for the knives to come out. Brand your opponents early – before they have a chance
to do the same to you. Brand them with what is already perceived to be their weakness, and it will stick. It will make the next several years much easier for you and harder for your opponents – just ask Canada’s Liberals.
2. Keep them guessing To keep the strategic upper hand, you need to add an ele-
ment of surprise from time to time. Stephen Harper did so early on with the swearing in of his first cabinet. He needed more representation from Quebec at the table, and despite having won a surprising 10 seats in the province, needed
June 2010 | Campaigns & Elections 33
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