As the Canadian economy drifts toward recession, the prime minister and his finance minister are insisting there is nothing to worry about ahead of Friday’s jobs report from Statistics Canada.

Campaigning at the Calgary Stampede over the weekend, Prime Minister Stephen Harper predicted the economy — which shrank by 0.6 per cent in the first quarter of 2015 — will “bounce back” quickly and stuck to his message that the Conservatives alone offer “stable management.”

And Finance Minister Joe Oliver, speaking in Toronto last Friday, dismissed a Bank of America Merrill Lynch report predicting a second consecutive quarter of negative growth — a milestone which would mark Canada’s first recession since 2009.

“We can look around the world, look at some European countries, to see where Liberal and NDP policies would take us.” “We’ve put all our eggs in the same basket. And when the inevitable cycle occurred, everybody was hurt.” “The fact is they’re still trying to pit the environment against the economy, when we know … they need to go together.”

Canada’s sluggish economy is muddling the Conservatives’ self-promotion on this file, and the release of June employment numbers on Friday bodes poorly for the incumbents, says Mario Seccareccia, an economics professor at the University of Ottawa.

“With the slowdown in the growth rate (earlier this year),” Seccareccia predicts, “the unemployment rate will probably continue to inch up perhaps to a seasonally-adjusted rate of 6.9 per cent or even 7.0 per cent.”

Going into the 2011 federal election, with the devastation of the global economy fresh in voters’ minds, Canada’s unemployment rate was higher — 7.5 per cent — but that was comfortably below the U.S. figure of 9 per cent and the Conservatives campaigned on economic competence amid a protracted global economic crisis.

Fast-forward four years band the American economic recovery is moving into high gear. last week, the U.S. Department of Labor Statistics released its June 2015 economic data, posting the unemployment rate at 5.3 per cent — the lowest since April 2008. This statistic is mitigated somewhat by labour-force participation touching a 38-year low, but most indicators south of the border point to a steady rebound.

Meanwhile, unemployment in Canada is now at 6.8 per cent (as of May 2015), only slightly down from May 2011. And many Canadians, while technically employed, are increasingly feeling they are in dead-end, lower-quality jobs.

“The relatively weaker Canadian numbers point to the ‘all-in’ gamble the Conservatives have taken with the oil industry,” says Tyler Chamberlin, a professor at the University of Ottawa. “When the industry was booming, they looked like economic geniuses, but when the industry slumps … then our economy underperforms (and) we end up with relatively higher unemployment, a depressed dollar and overall weaker economic growth.”



Despite a looming recession and a likely rise in the unemployment rate, Harper’s message at the Stampede confirms that the Conservatives are doubling down on the economy ahead of the October election.

“There is no doubt that the Conservatives will campaign as the undisputed champions of national financial management,” says Chamberlin.

Tim Powers, vice-chairman of Summa Strategies, agrees. “The Conservatives will, regardless of economic circumstances, continue to push the argument they have the most experience to lead through any set of conditions.”

But Powers adds that “the economy matters in personal terms” and that voters “compare their own individual pay stubs and tax filings from year to year.”

“If they see and feel loss,” he warns, “that can hurt the government of the day.”