Crombie, Crime, And Being Tough On Causes

A Plea For A Saner, Smarter Approach

One of the tricks that Tony Blair’s government used to win the 1997 UK election was a fun rhetorical trick - the need to be both “tough on crime, and tough on the causes of crime.” It was a way to appeal both to anxious suburban parents in traditional marginal seats, but also an effort to show that the government understood that just throwing the book at criminals wasn’t enough, and that there needed to be a comprehensive approach to anti-social behaviour, increasing educational attainment, increasing the number of people who finished school, and the various other social problems that lead to criminality.

Blair tried and failed at plenty of it - he reduced poverty and the number of people sleeping rough, while also introducing fairly nonsensical Anti-Social Behaviour Orders, which most everyone agrees don’t do much to curb anti-social behaviour. It’s a mixed bag as a policy legacy, but what it did do was curb Blair’s political problem, which was a sense that Labour were weak on a key issue that suburbanites in key marginals were focused on.

The Montreal incident, plus the general rise in auto thefts and general disruption, has made disorder a political issue. I agree with Matt Gurney who raised this point in a federal context, and I do think it’s possible that a general sense that things have come undone on Trudeau’s watch - connecting the Convoy and the generally abhorrent behaviour some - not all! Not even a majority! But some - pro-Palestinian supporters have engaged in since October 7th - will hurt him. But Doug Ford is the Premier of Ontario, and is cosplaying as the Mayor of Toronto more often than he should, and it’s high time we turn the tables on him.

It’s time for Bonnie Crombie to be tough on crime and be tough on the causes of it.

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The true Blairite success of “tough on the causes of crime” is that it actualizes a very good policy agenda and sells that agenda to swing voters. “Increasing spending on the poor and marginalized” polls worse than “ensuring people have enough so they don’t go down paths of criminality”. A lot of “being tough on the causes of crime” is just basic economic redistribution - reducing poverty and inequality, shoring up vulnerable communities, spending more on education and supportive housing - but by couching it in the language of “reducing crime”, you can get a lot of conservatives and Conservatives to support it.

It’s clear that there is an appetite for change and for better - the resonance of Canada is broken rhetoric shows that that appetite is real. For some reason, however, Doug Ford is surviving the anti-incumbency wave, mostly because he has some stupid fucking ability to skate on the actual things happening in his province. A large part of that ability is the inability of the opposition to make an active case for their values.

What a crime focus - which Crombie opened the door to by showing up to the Police Association Of Ontario and making a speech defending the police and calling herself a Different Kind Of Liberal - can do is remind people that Doug Ford is actually the Premier and there are real problems he (and the cities he is fine micromanaging when it comes to bike lanes) are ignoring. It would realign the battle from Doug Ford versus the intractable, out of Feds to Bonnie Crombie v Doug Ford, with Doug in the out of touch role.

But it has to be more than a faux adaptation of Conservative principles on tough on crime. One of the problems Crombie is having in general is the fact that plenty of Liberals and progressives still view her warily. A product of the 2023 leadership election and her focus in the first year (no provincial Carbon Tax, a tax cut), Crombie needs to reassure both her left flank and the middle. And this can be something of a skeleton key, allowing her to say the same thing in both St. Paul’s to OLP-ONDP swing voters and to wavering PCPO voters in Oakville or Burlington.

The entire point of the “tough on the causes of crime” language is that it’s entirely amorphous. It can be molded and sculpted to encompass anything from raising ODSP through lowering housing prices through cutting DCs to building more and better schools, because a policy agenda that raises affordability, lowers the dropout rate, or raises health care outcomes can be additionally sold as helping lower crime rates. When you’re in marginal seats trying to sell your vision to voters who voted for Ford in 2018 and 2022, being able to sell progressive ideas as having this other upside matters.

It especially matters in Brampton, Mississauga, and Scarborough, because we saw in BC last month that minority communities swung significantly more right than white communities. Surrey nearly gave the BC Conservatives government in part because of concerns about public safety, crime, and drugs policy. Making sure that all voters, but especially those in places that look something like Surrey, believe that we are serious about crime is crucial to breaking into two cities that currently elect 0 Liberal MPPs.

In Liberal-NDP battles, Bonnie can and should emphasize the need for better poverty reduction measures, highlight potentially extra money for school boards to ensure kids don’t fall through the cracks, and the need to lower ER wait times and increase access to family doctors so that kids in the grips of mental health crises don’t only interact with the health care system if or when they’re at either committing crimes or contemplating self harm. When she’s talking to concerned parents who think we’re anti-police and pro-criminal, we can highlight our support of police and Crombie’s pro-cop record as Mayor of Mississauga. But crucially, we’ll be saying the same thing in both places - that we understand crime is an issue and we are committed to solutions to making communities safer.

I’m not sure how much crime and law and order issues actually resonate in the press, but I’ve always been slow to understand that there is a contingent focused on it. It’s absolutely a blindspot of mine that’s come from living in a very safe suburb for the vast majority of my life where the closest thing to crime I’ve ever seen is pre-legalization pot dealing and my underage ass heading over to Gatineau to buy booze at 16 because they wouldn’t card me. (Which, in fairness, is less a crime on my part than on the SAQs that let me buy it.) That said, in this political climate, and given the constant nature of weak on crime attacks from Pierre Poilievre on the Federal Liberals, it’s hard to imagine this isn’t an issue. And given I’ve been slow to see it, I’d rather overreact than underreact.

Crombie needs to take a page from Tony Blair, embrace being tough on crime and tough on its causes, and position herself as a caring Liberal who won’t let chaos run amok in our communities. It is a way to position liberal economics and redistributive policies to moderates, it enables the party to sell their agenda to everyone, and it’s also morally correct and politically useful to fight against poverty, bad health and education outcomes, and to fight for leveling the playing field.