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As Canadians approach the 2019 federal election one factor they will consider is that Green parties are in the ascendancy. What effect will the Greens have in the 338 federal ridings that are up for grabs? Will there be surprises close to home?

The decline in Liberal support might result in even more surprising success for the Greens? And the Conservatives leading the Liberals in the polls will also provide opportunities for the Greens to upset predictions. Ipsos pegs the Conservatives at 36 per cent of decided voters and the Liberals at 32 per cent in early May.

These numbers point to a minority government in the upcoming fall election.

The Greens are poised to win support in tightly contested ridings where the NDP and Liberals are losing ground on the left. It wasn’t always that clear Green parties would rise to any visible level of success at all.

But they have in Canada. The Greens formed their Canadian party in 1983 and in the 36 years since have come out of the political wilderness showing noteworthy success.

Unlike the traditional parties which respond to issues with separate and unconnected policy positions, the Greens are ideological, offering a grand plan that links the economy, the environment, climate change, employment, food security, health care and government. One policy logically begets another and so on in Green ideology.

"Among the policy attractions that have drawn Canadians to consider Green parties is the promise of engaging a "new way of doing politics."" — Jim Guy, Political Insights

Political science students, like myself, in the 1960s would have witnessed the spread of Green ideology with some optimism. Scientists from around the world were reporting environmental damage caused by corporate greed, government neglect and general human ignorance.

We needed to pay attention. Global climate change had to be recognized. It took a long time, and Canada is only now about to declare that we are in a climate emergency. A spring of disastrous floods and a summer of wildfires are powerful persuaders of the need to represent climate change as a political challenge for all political parties.

Since the 1960s each wave of Green Party success in over 90 countries of the world gave Canadians the examples and models they needed to build Green parties at the national, provincial and territorial levels. They now operate competitively throughout the political landscape.

Among the policy attractions that have drawn Canadians to consider Green parties is the promise of engaging a "new way of doing politics." This includes the need for a new cooperative approach among parties in Parliament and a decentralization of national policy-making to include and empower provincial governments. In the current chaotic political environment in Ottawa those new approaches will draw the attention of voters and their support.

The NDP and Liberals are willing to openly pilfer Green policy positions, hoping to arrest the erosion of support they are experiencing. But they are helter-skelter in a world demanding policy coherence and logic.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and NDP leader Jagmeet Singh are worried about those voters seeking to split the vote in tight races. Strategic voting is also their concern in the 2019 federal election. While vote-splitting and strategic voting are difficult to pull off in any election, the Greens have benefited from it in B.C. and Ontario.

Federal Green Party leader Elizabeth May, first elected in 2011, has demonstrated her ability to debate credibly with other national and provincial party leaders. Recent polling shows her gaining general public support. A recent Angus Reid poll tagged her as “the most trusted leader in Canada.”

She is also seeking to attract as many new party members as possible, although two former federal Liberal ministers (Jody Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpot), who were deeply offended by Trudeau's political pinball antics over the SNC Lavalin, declined her invitations to join the Greens.

This is opportunity for the Greens and the NDP to consider a merger. But May would be reluctant to support that as she will also be reluctant to support either Trudeau or Conservative leader Andrew Sheer as prime ministers for very long. Among many others, their policies on electoral reform and climate change are unacceptable to the Greens, not to mention the general public.

More provinces are now fertile ground for spawning support for the Greens. British Colombia - which is ground zero for strategic voting - produced the recent decisive victory of Paul Manly in the riding of Nanaimo-Ladysmith, B.C. is the example that all of the federal leaders want to avoid before the 2019 fall election.

Then there is the example of Prince Edward Island. In its provincial election this spring, the Greens became the Official Opposition for the first-time ever, winning 31 per cent of the vote and supplanting the Liberals. This is becoming a concerning pattern trend with consequences for all other parties. The Greens are the minor party to watch in the next federal election. The ducks are lining up favourably for them in the fall. Unlikely that they will form a government, but they have already become the party to watch across the country.

Dr. Jim Guy, author and professor emeritus of political science, can be reached for comment at jim_guy@cbu.ca.



