The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Much has been written about the morality of public financing of political parties. It was a hot topic early in the spring when the war between Elections Canada and the Conservative Party hit the headlines over the ruling partyÕs 2006 election spending and using riding campaign budgets for the national campaign. The party and a lot of observers claim there is nothing wrong with these tactics as most local campaigns depend on how their party is doing nationally and they should be able to help out. Besides, apart from the rebates, the money is raised privately, and Elections Canada should not have a say in how much the parties spend as long as it is raised and spent legally. Opposition parties also insist, and justifiably so, that limits on opposition spending and other restrictions give the ruling party a big edge as a government can advertise and promote their policies virtually without restrictions, as the Liberals did up to their defeat in 2006. After promoting the latest Manitoba budget in newspapers, at no cost to the NDP, Premier Gary Doer unleashed a massive financing proposal on the last day of April without any discussion with the opposition. Bill 37 sets a fixed date every four years for provincial elections Ð June 14, 2009 is the next one Ð which the opposition had been advocating for a long time and which Doer had opposed. Doer claims he changed his mind because of the poor turnout and enumeration problems in the 2007 election. It was really his doing as he called the election late, catching Elections Manitoba off guard. Enumeration was a disaster and a lot of Manitobans were missed. The fixed date will give plenty of time for Elections Manitoba to get ready and hopefully will encourage more Manitobans to cast their ballots. Bill 37 contains a lot more than just fixed election dates. It also includes a wide range of funding and spending restrictions on political parties and their supporters. Parties are going to be publicly financed based on the votes they receive in each election to the tune of $1.25 per vote to a max of $250,000 per year. This will help struggling parties like the Greenies and Liberals, and will give the maximum amount to the NDP. ItÕs supposedly more democratic, but is it? Should tax money be paid to political parties? Some commentators say no, as Manitoba does not index personal taxes against inflation, which has caused working Manitobans to pay more than $100 million in the past 8 years. The $500,000-plus that taxpayers will pay each year to the parties is the same as the total provincial amount paid by over 160 overtaxed middle income workers. By the way, the proposed amount will be adjusted each year for inflation! The bill has a lot of other restrictions. The cap on yearly spending has been raised to $75,000, which sounds like a lot, but advertising is expensive. The Tories are furious and claim it is a violation of free speech for the opposition while the government has free reign to run ads about their programs. Parties will also have restrictions on direct mail as the NDP wants mail-outs to be less partisan, a proposal the opposition claims will restrict them from reaching voters. Direct political mail is very common, particularly at the federal level. We get mail regularly from our local MP, plus Stphane Dion no less, and everything is partisan. The NDP proposal will also restrict third party advertising in campaigns, presumably such as the Manitoba Nurses UnionÕs questionable campaign attacking the PCs and praising the NDP in the last campaign. It will be interesting to see if these restrictions survive expected court challenges. Sage ex-New Democrat and political commentator Sid Green does not agree with the proposed legislation. He believes laws that attempt to control election contributions and expenditures, and which publicly finance political parties, do not improve democracy. ÒThey do no good and probably do a lot of harm,Ó he says. RogerÕs Right Corner runs Wednesdays.
