It is time for Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau to make things happen. The challenge is in the federal riding of Whitby-Oshawa in Ontario. It is not because this is about him. It is about how the Liberals will win Ontario next year. It is the first real test of Stephen Harper’s vision for Canada. The ramifications of this bye-election will tell us much about the coming general election of 2015.
This is the first opportunity to pit the needs of Justin’s ‘middle class’ voters with the ‘June Cleaver’ vision of Stephen’s ideal family. It tells us if Canadians will willingly give tax breaks to the wealthy through schemes such as income splitting. These are clear and easy to explain concepts and Whitby-Oshawa is an ideal territory in which to see which way the voters are leaning.
Luckily Prime Minister Harper does not have MPP Christine Elliott running for her late husband Jim Flaherty’s seat. The fact that Flaherty won that seat with 60 per cent of the vote last time just means that Justin has his work cut out for him.
The Liberal candidate Celina Caesar-Chavannes has excellent credentials and is running a strong campaign but without the importing of masses of Liberal workers in the next two weeks, things could be dicey.
Caesar-Chavannes is up against a solid Conservative in the person of former Whitby mayor Pat Perkins. New Democrat Trish McAuliffe is likely not to be a factor.
But it was hardly a coincidence that the Prime Minister was in the riding recently to play up the federal support for the late Jim Flaherty’s favourite charity. It is also not surprising that he was in the Vaughan area the other day announcing government support for rich families with children. It is up to Trudeau and the Liberal team to show the voters the mathematics and realize how picayune the goodies are in real life.
Justin Trudeau hardly needs to match the allure of the Prime Minister’s goodies. He has to prove his impact on voters and show that he can turn out the support from his party. If he can turn out the troops despite his earlier missteps in leadership, it will bode well for next year. A loss for Trudeau at this stage could change the parameters in the province he must win next year.
This is Justin’s chance to show what he can do when everything is not going his way. There is no reason for him to lay back. Whitby-Oshawa does not belong to the Conservatives. It is definitely time for him to live up to the family name.
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Copyright 2014 © Peter Lowry
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