(The following article is from the December 1-31, 2008, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

People's Voice Editorial, Dec. 1-31, 2008

We can only scratch our heads at the approach of a few on the left who are campaigning to block a proposed Liberal-NDP coalition from taking office. The main argument of these forces (to quote one) seems to be that "The NDP would be unable to campaign against capitalist attacks. Accepting responsibility for the anti-labour measures of such a government could rapidly discredit the NDP and end its ability to continue as the bearer of popular hopes for social change."

     Such logic is astonishing. The NDP itself has at times supported anti-labour legislation, and NDP provincial governments have adopted many neoliberal policies in recent decades.

     More to the point, however, under the Harper Tories, Canada has the most bitterly anti-labour, pro-war, anti-sovereignty government in our country's history. Perhaps the NDP on its own will be able to defeat the Tories and Liberals in some future election, satisfying these occasional partisans of social democracy. But that did not happen on October 14. Today, in the real world, there is only one option to block the Tories from using the economic crisis to tear up the right to strike, privatize big chunks of public assets, attack pay equity, and give more tax cuts for the rich. As delegates to the BC Federation of Labour immediately and almost unanimously grasped on Nov. 27, that option is to replace the minority Harper government with a coalition of opposition parties. Once that immediate goal is accomplished, the working class and its allies should turn to the task of mobilizing to win pro-people policies from a new government. Focusing attacks on the Liberal-NDP coalition while Harper is still in office is a complete diversion from this urgent struggle.