It took a while to find the chinks in Stephen Harper’s armour. But Canadians have done it now.

They are chipping away at the prime minister’s policies on everything from electoral reform to military procurement. Advocacy groups have raised red flags, the media have highlighted the damage he is doing to people’s lives and communities and the courts have reined him in. But the primary thrust is coming from citizens who don’t like what is happening to their country.

The latest manifestation was the July 4 Federal Court ruling striking down the government’s cutbacks to medical care for refugees. Justice Anne Mactavish said the two-year-old policy “shocks the conscience and outrages our standards of decency.” She gave Immigration Minister Chris Alexander four months to bring Ottawa’s treatment of asylum seekers into line with the Constitution, which prohibits cruel and unusual treatment of any person. The doctors, lawyers and children’s activists who brought the case to court were relieved and heartened.

Alexander immediately announced he would appeal the ruling. Although the fight is not over, the Tories lost the first round badly.

That has become the pattern. The government encounters a barrier it can’t bulldoze out of the way. It lashes out at its challengers, vowing to reassert its will. But what follows in most cases is a grudging dilution of the policy.

Each setback emboldens Harper’s critics and weakens his momentum. Last week’s court judgment was the sixth blow to the Tory agenda:

Their plan to the rewrite the Election Act , disenfranchising thousands of voters, ran into a wall of public opposition. The harder Democratic Reform Minister Pierre Poilievre pushed his proposal, the harder Canadians pushed back. Eventually he agreed to amend the controversial bill. The new version is not perfect, but its most contentious elements are gone. It will no longer allow the Tories to restrict the right to vote or withhold ballots from individuals whose identification doesn’t meet their standards. Their plan to flood the labour market with temporary foreign workers worked for six years. But last April it began to unravel. The Royal Bank was caught replacing its information technology staff with temporary foreign workers. (The bank said the arrangement met the letter of the law, but apologized and launched a review of its outsourcing strategy.) Rather than squelching the controversy, that stoked it. Whistle-blowers in other sectors — mining, hospitality, food service — popped up, claiming they too had lost their jobs to temporary foreign workers. Employment Minister Jason Kenney tried to put a lid on the contagion but it was too late. On June 20, he announced a wholesale overhaul of the program, effectively shutting it down. Their plans to shake up Canada’s telecommunications industry have run aground twice. Their first scheme , carving out space in the wireless spectrum for new rivals to compete with Rogers, Bell and Telus fell prey to market forces. None of the startups had the heft to build a substantial subscriber base. Their second foray , designed to lure a large foreign competitor to Canada’s airwaves, failed when Verizon Wireless, the only interested candidate, dropped out of the bidding. Industry Minister James Moore hasn’t given up. He just announced another wireless spectrum auction , to be held within the next nine months, in which newcomers will be favoured. Their plan to purchase a fleet of F-35 fighter jets without seeking competitive bids collapsed in the face of escalating costs, censure from the auditor general and taxpayer anxiety. Harper yanked his defence minister, launched a review and tried to get things back on track. Two years later, the government hasn’t selected a supplier , forcing the military to upgrade its aging Hornets at a cost of $1.8 billion. Their plan to revamp — preferably abolish — the Senate without the agreement of the provinces was rejected out of hand by the Supreme Court of Canada. It delivered a stinging rebuke to the prime minister, pointing out he did not have authority to override the Constitution or change the rules under which Canadians are governed. Harper grudgingly accepted the court’s ruling, but tried to exact revenge six days later. His office issued a statement insinuating that Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin had improperly approached him. The evidence melted under scrutiny.

Their plans to crush prostitution and drive an oil pipeline through British Columbia will probably be next on the list.

The Tories still have 15 months to govern. Harper may regain his dominance. But his iron grip is broken. He is no longer impregnable.

Carol Goar's column appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

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