ONDP's Cultural Divide

On Two Factions, Alike In Nothing

Does the Ontario NDP understand that they’re two different parties sharing a roof?

This is also true of the Federal NDP, who definitely don’t understand this fact, but the Ontario NDP coalition is not that of a cohesive political party. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it is a factually accurate assessment to point out that the NDP are two parties stitched together without a whole lot of similarities.

Imagine you walked into a room of 1000 2022 NDP voters in the now-Green seat of Kitchener Centre and asked them their views on basically any cultural question. Be it parental notification in schools, Israel-Palestine, increasing access to abortion for women, or the Convoy, you’re probably going to get answers that the right would call woke. Ask 1000 2022 NDP voters in Kenora those same questions, you’re not going to get the same answers.

We saw at the last election the PCPO make unprecedented strides into deep NDP terrain for a reason – the NDP are two parties with two entirely different views of what it means to be left wing. I know I never shut up about it, but remember the row over Andrea Horwath defending the Charter rights of unvaccinated teachers on Power and Politics and having to disavow it the next day? It happened because half of the NDP coalition – the working class, economically left part of the party had people of a variety of views on the vaccine, but the urban and suburban part of the party that’s unified on social issues had a shitfit.

The Ontario NDP is a party whose voters encompass cultural conservatives who hate the rich elites and socially progressive rich elites. It’s a party of London and Windsor and of Davenport and Danforth, or “fuck the rich” and the actual rich. It’s a party concerned both with class solidarity that rises above the culture wars and a party that tried to get rid of its leader because of their handling of an MPP’s statements about a war thousands of miles away. It’s a party that doesn’t know itself, and yet claims to want to lead us all.

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Last week, the NDP got into some hot water because of a planned event against the re-introduction of a nuclear power plant to Ontario’s energy grid, because parts of the party were supportive of Ford’s decision to do this and some view nuclear energy with an amount of disdain. (You get no points for guessing which side of the party held which views.) In isolation, it’s the definition of a nothing burger – one downtown Toronto MPP almost held a dumb event and then didn’t. As an exemplar of the NDP’s current malaise it’s everything.

The problem with the NDP is they’ve done a very good job of the basic blocking and tackling of being an opposition. They’re good at asking for inquiries and they’re good at exposing stuff but they’re bad at proposing an alternative government, and it’s clear that whether they realize it or not, the two parties are why.

Marit Stiles did a good job of avoiding a bad quote on the Parental Rights front in the summer, which is a good tactical decision. It’s not a survivable position if this becomes an issue at an election. If all the NDP comes up with at the next election is platitudes about paying public sector workers more and “respecting” them in various platitudinal ways they’re going to get smashed. But that’s also all they can really agree on.

If the NDP really cares about decarbonization, where’s the radical environmental industrial policy that would boost clean energy production, boost nuclear, and rebuild our manufacturing sector? Nowhere – probably because being pro-nuclear pisses off St. Paul’s and because they’re worried their northern and working class voters don’t actually care about climate change. So they stay where they are, not going too far afield or running too fast at any issue.

Take housing, where the party nominated a NIMBY in Kitchener Centre but also proposed a $15B investment in non-market housing. Hands up here, how many of you either forgot the Homes Ontario pitch or never knew they proposed it? They released it so long ago, I can understand how it faded away – I mean, it was released in *checks notes* October 2023. If your 2022 platform commitments to ending exclusionary zoning and ending parking minimums are still your policies, and you’re proposing this massive expansion of non-market housing, why the fuck are you completely irrelevant to the policy fight? Is it because you’re scared to say that suburban and urban homeowners will have to tolerate density nearby?

Most people do not line up every party and make a pro-con list to decide how to vote. Ask the average voter what a right wing party has done in office or will do in office and one of the most common answers is usually cut taxes, because even if they haven’t promised a tax cut people just generally assume that’s a conservative policy. In the UK, we saw in the 2017 election that plenty of Labour voters assumed that the party had “spend more on welfare” in their manifesto when they definitely didn’t because they just assumed a Labour Manifesto would have more welfare spending in it. It’s blithe to say politics is all vibes, but you do have to sell a broader message in addition to an actual policy book.

The elementary school I went to as a child is overflowing with students to the point where entire classes are decamping to port-a-packs. The hospitals in Ottawa are seeing wait times getting worse and worse, to the point where I waited 10 hours to be seen with a dislocated shoulder in ER just under three years ago. Where’s the bold strategy to rebuild our schools and build more hospitals?

Doug Ford is the most resilient politician in this country in large part because of two things; he will admit when he fucks something up, and he gets the privilege of running against Oppositions that do not have their fingers on the pulse. We saw dogshit turnout at the last election because progressive voters didn’t see anything worth fighting and voting for. We now have the Liberals having chosen Bonnie Crombie, who cannot decide what she is for or against at any given moment. There is an opening for the NDP and they’re tilting at fucking windmills because they cannot make a fucking decision.

I like Marit Stiles. I think she can be a good leader and even God willing a good Premier. But the NDP have to make a decision about what they’re going to be. Do they want to be a party of economic radicalism and bold populist economics while allowing for a broad range of cultural and social views? Do they want to be a party of social liberalism and give up on winning back Timmins? I have no idea, but what’s worse is neither do they, clearly.

For their sake, and for the sake of Ontario, they better fucking figure it out.