Are McGuinty and Stelmach really the worst premiers in Canada and its provinces today?

Dec 18th, 2009 | By | Category: In Brief
Bollywood actor Vivek Oberoi, right, presents the International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) trophy to Dalton McGuinty, Premier of Ontario, as fellow Bollywood actor Celina Jaitley looks on during a function in Mumbai, India, Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2009.

Bollywood actor Vivek Oberoi, right, presents the International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) trophy to Dalton McGuinty, Premier of Ontario, as fellow Bollywood actor Celina Jaitley looks on during a function in Mumbai, India, Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2009.

Only people like Hitler, George Orwell said (more or less), never change their minds. And I am  now changing my mind about Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty’s current political prospects.

My immediate motivation is the new Angus Reid approval ratings for Canadian provincial premiers. Based on surveys in the nine most populous provinces from November 23—29, 2009, only Premier Ed Stelmach in Alberta has an approval rating lower than Dalton McGuinty’s.

(The percentages of provincial respondents who approved of their premiers were: Danny Williams, Progressive Conservative, Newfoundland and Labrador, 78%; Brad Wall, Saskatchewan Party, Saskatchewan, 58%; Darrell Dexter, New Democratic Party, Nova Scotia, 43%; Greg Selinger, NDP, Manitoba, 29%; Jean Charest, Liberal, Quebec, 25%, Gordon Campbell, L, British Columbia, 21%; Shawn Graham, L, New Brunswick, 20%; Dalton McGuinty, L, Ontario, 18%; Ed Stelmach, PC, Alberta, 14%.)

It is easy to say that Dalton McGuinty’s humble 18% approval rating is no surprise. In the year just about to end Ontario has settled into a new status as Canada’s most wealthy “have-not” province (at least for purposes of federal-provincial equalization payments). There have been spending scandals in the Ministry of Health and the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation. The province’s annual deficit has suddenly ballooned to more than $24 billion (about the size of the total provincial budget 25 years ago). And there has apparently been strong popular resistance to the McGuinty government’s plan to “harmonize” the federal goods and services and provincial sales taxes (regardless of how sensible this may be in the end).

Even so, up to this point I have resisted the conclusion that these woes have taken a serious toll on Premier McGuinty’s essential attraction. In spite of everything, it has seemed to me, Dalton McGuinty has shown himself in the mould of the historic grand old man of Ontario politics (and the Ontario Liberal Party), Oliver Mowat – who “wore the white flower of a blameless life,” and remained premier of Canada’s most populous province without interruption from 1872 to 1896. Now, however, I am starting to have second thoughts.

It still does seem to me that, at the moment, neither of McGuinty’s two opponents appear as strong challengers in a fixed-date election that is still almost two years away. On the latest Angus Reid results, it also seems easier for premiers of less populous provinces to get high approval ratings. (The four most populous provinces are Ontario, Quebec, BC, and Alberta. The four least populous of the nine above are Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland and Labrador. The average premier’s approval rating for the most populous provinces is 19.5%. For the four least populous it’s 49.8%.)

Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach takes questions during a scrum at the Alberta PC party's annual meeting in Red Deer. The Canadian Press.

Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach takes questions during a scrum at the Alberta PC party's annual meeting in Red Deer. The Canadian Press.

Moreover, Dalton McGuinty’s latest Angus Reid disapproval rating (56%) is actually lower than that of three other premiers: Campbell in BC (66%), Graham in New Brunswick (63%), and Stelmach in Alberta (61%)  – and only somewhat higher than Jean Charest’s in Quebec (52%).

Yet in the end the Angus Reid approval and disapproval ratings for late November 2009 have at last convinced me that the McGuinty Liberal regime in Ontario today could be in more longer-term trouble than I have thought so far. If you are among the small but wiry band seriously interested in the government of Ontario, just how this may or may not continue to develop is going to be one of the big political questions of 2010! As an early test: “Voters in Toronto Centre will go to the polls ‘sooner rather than later in the new year’ to elect a successor to MPP George Smitherman, says Premier Dalton McGuinty.”

Tags: , , ,


Leave Comment