However baffled Americans might be on occasions about Canada’s political leanings, when it comes to their reliance on oil and natural gas from the Great White North they have generally been able to count on two things — a stable government and security of supply.
Canadians have been equally happy to promote those virtues in lobbying U.S. investors to participate in the development of its petroleum resources, not least the high-cost frontier regions and oil sands.
But the notion of a dependable Canadian government has been turned on its head in recent months, leading to what was variously described as a crisis and a showdown on May 19.
In the words of one Canadian newspaper columnist, politics in the national capital of Ottawa these days is more about “love, hate, betrayal, intrigue and revenge” — all the essential ingredients of a Shakespearean tragicomedy — and nothing to do with building confidence among Canada’s allies.
For the serious-minded in the United States, whether they are stakeholders in the oil and gas sector or merely consumers of those resources, there may be deepening questions about Canada’s ability to engage in rational decision-making on the future of Arctic gas in Alaska and the Northwest Territories.
Liberals not a majority government
Since last June, every issue of importance in Ottawa has become a matter of survival or defeat for Prime Minister Paul Martin’s Liberal government, which doesn’t have enough Members of Parliament to rule by simple majority.
The breaking point arrived on May 19, when the Liberals, their left-wing friends from the New Democratic Party and two MPs who have no political affiliation mustered 152 votes to save an amended federal budget.
They finished deadlocked with the 152 votes mustered by the right-wing Conservatives, the Bloc Quebecois (whose 54 MPs are dedicated to the separation of Quebec from Canada) and one independent MP.
That forced House of Commons Speaker Peter Milliken to make history by casting the first tie-breaking vote in Canada’s 137 years to save the Martin government.
Had the Liberals been defeated Martin would have been forced to call an election for June 27.
Based on the latest polls, an election would have solved little or nothing.
The Liberals and Conservatives are neck-and-neck, indicating another minority government, regardless of who might have collected the most MPs from the ballot box.
The only saving grace for Canadians is that they have likely dodged a summer election campaign.
If the House of Commons can reach its late-June summer recess without another non-confidence vote, politicians will have until September to cool off.
Martin has promised to call an election within 30 days of receiving the findings from a commission probing the alleged transfer of federal advertising money to the Liberal party in Quebec.
That sets the stage for an election early in 2006.
Budget rewrite threatened
But survival for the Liberals raised serious questions about the character and quality of the Martin administration beyond taking whatever steps it deemed necessary to cling to power.
In the first instance, it effectively bribed the 19 New Democratic Party MPs by amending its 2005-06 budget to include an additional C$4.6 billion in social program spending.
Whether that glue will stick is another matter.
The Conservatives and Bloc Quebecois, who hold the balance of power on the Commons finance committee, have threatened to rewrite the budget.
NDP leader Jack Layton, who wants the budget adopted on an “expedited basis,” warned that stalling on the fiscal plan could undermine his agreement to “continue to support the government.”
The Conservatives finance spokesman Monte Solberg, while promising that his party will be “circumspect” about mounting another attempt to topple the Liberals, said the Liberals will not get “carte blanche.”
What has angered the Conservatives is the prospect that Canada will get dragged back into a budget deficit, after more than a decade of wrestling its finances back into shape — largely through the efforts of Martin, who was finance minister through most of the 1990s.
Conservative defects to Liberals
In his final act of desperation before the May 19 vote, Martin enticed a high-profile Conservative — Belinda Stronach — to join the Liberals on May 17 in return for a senior cabinet post.
Stronach, 39, decided to switch during a late night dinner with Martin on May 16 after which she informed her boyfriend Peter MacKay — who also happens to be the deputy leader of the Conservatives.
MacKay, who admitted he “didn’t see it coming,” told reporters on May 20 he was heading home to Nova Scotia for the weekend and “maybe walk my dog … dogs are loyal.”
Amid this swirl “love, hate, betrayal, intrigue and revenge,” there is a curious twist.
Stronach, despite less than a year as an MP, brings some business clout to the Martin government, having served as chief executive officer of Magna International, the auto parts giant created by her father that employs 82,000 people worldwide.
In January last year, when Stronach launched a losing bid for the Conservative leadership, she got encouragement from EnCana Chief Executive Officer Gwyn Morgan, who urged a Calgary Petroleum Club audience to “cut her some slack because she’s got ability.”
How Morgan, no lover of the Liberals, feels these days is not known.
But if Stronach brings some of the business discipline she needed at Magna to the cabinet table she might be able to help solve the paralysis that has stalled progress on the Alaska and Mackenzie pipelines.
The importance of decisive action is important for both projects and vital if Canada is to restore some of the evaporating confidence in a government that has dithered for several months without offering a satisfactory explanation of its inability to bring the matters to a conclusion.
