Over way too many years, divisions within my party have made it very difficult for talented leaders to work together, and for all our members to feel at home in their own party.
This dysfunction has put our country in the hands of a prime minister who campaigns instead of governs -- attacking his opponents instead of protecting Canadians. We will rebuild our party into a modern democratic institution in which the finger pointing finally stops. We will make the changes necessary to ensure a party which is once again responsive and relevant to the needs of all Canadians.
Einstein defined insanity as "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." I believe that the disastrous result of May 2, 2011 will end the insanity.
The Liberal Party seems ready to learn the lessons from the past. Many of the difficulties we have experienced, the divisions and the energy we have wasted, have contributed to the success of Harper's tactics. Many now acknowledge that our problems were twofold:
1) We allowed a civil war in our party to foment, with brutal 'take no prisoners' tactics dividing every riding.
2) As the governing party, we did not listen sufficiently to the grassroots of our party. Riding associations in held ridings were often dominated by MPs' offices. As long as we were winning, the grassroots grumbled quietly but still joined and voted for us. However, in the past two elections the Liberal vote diminished by 800,000 votes each time.
But to paraphrase Will Rogers, rumours of our demise have been greatly overstated.
Liberals have finally realized that 'leaderitis' has got us into trouble.
Many had hoped that a 'messiah' unaligned with previous factions would be the cure. Genuine renewal must start with respect for the grassroots of our party. We must begin with debriefing the lessons learned from this campaign, but also make a brutally honest assessment of the weaknesses that left us unable to break through into the hearts and minds of Canadians, and even some life-long Liberals, despite what some thought were a quite reasonable campaign-platform and leader's performance.
All ridings need to be able to grieve and rant and provide constructive advice for the future. The debrief for this election must also deal with the hard feelings of over a decade of the grassroots not feeling listened to, which have led to the entrenched melancholia.
Thankfully we have decided to put off yet another leadership campaign for 18 months or more. I believe that under the leadership of Bob Rae, we will this time undertake a root and branch renewal process that is truly bottom-up.
As we let go of the fantasy that Liberals have to choose an Obama-esque messiah who can single-handedly lead them out of the wilderness, we need to recall that the rebuilding of the Democratic party took time.
Their bottom-up renewal began with Governor Dean's candidacy for the Democratic party presidential nomination with his focus on the Internet, and more importantly his determination to 'walk the talk' of relevance and responsiveness to the grassroots. As president of the party, Gov. Dean was able to effect his 50-state strategy.
The Liberal Party of Canada needs a 308-riding strategy. Finally we will begin a therapeutic journey which will heal the past hurts and put in place the governance, structures and processes to ensure that our next leader will have a healthy and truly democratic party to lead -- a party that is fair, transparent and takes people seriously.
A key part of Obama's success was a more modern infrastructure and an inclusive culture that was able to attract good ideas as well as the commitment of legions of new volunteers.
After our defeat in 2008, Stéphane Dion and Michael Ignatieff supported the creation and work of the Change Commission with the mandate to go out and ask Liberals for their responses to three prompts:
1) I would be proud of a Liberal party that...
2) The greatest challenges facing the Liberal Party of Canada are...
3) The Change Commission will be a success if...
The meaningful grassroots consultations revealed important and sometimes brutal observations and even more important concrete recommendations.
We tabled the report in April 2009 but, unfortunately, the ongoing 'election readiness' preoccupation meant that many of the recommendation have not been implemented.
Re-reading the report and implementing the recommendations that are still necessary but as yet outstanding will be an important starting point for the path forward. A majority government means that Liberals now have time. The removal of the per vote subsidy presents a serious fiscal challenge. People give money when they feel they are being heard, that their story is being told and their values expressed.
Charles Darwin said, "It is not the strongest of the species that survives, not the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change." The Liberal Party has remained one of the strongest brands in Canada because of its ability to adapt to changing needs while holding fast to the core Canadian values of fairness and respect.
Liberals have never been stuck in the ideologies of the left or the right. We rely on our ability to draw on the experience, values and priorities of Liberals and small 'l' liberals in the trenches, whether they are a young volunteer in a food bank or an immigrant settlement worker, an defense counsel or an enlightened CEO.
I remember being invited to lunch with former Trudeau minister Alistair Gillespie during the Chrétien years, at a time when the Liberal Party found itself in turbulent waters. He spoke about the medallion of the historic Beaver Club. On the front was engraved a beaver with the words 'Industry and Perseverance.' On the back was an image of voyageurs in a canoe with all paddles in the water and the words 'Fortitude in Distress.'
It is indeed time for every member of the Liberal Party of Canada to demonstrate both industry and perseverance. Fortitude in distress will require all Liberals to have their paddles in the water -- regardless of who's in the stern!
Follow Hon. Carolyn Bennett on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Carolyn_Bennett
Is the Liberal Party of Canada (LPC) dead? Set to go the way of ...
Liberal Party may be dead already, but Liberals cling to false ...
This is democracy, and we don't need hereditary prime ministers.
Do you not even see how disgusting that is? It sounds almost American with their political oligarchical families!
Ignatieff's dithering on the issue of forming a coalition only added to it.
Probably the most important weapon the Liberals and NDP could wield would be to form a coalition - blend the parties into one just as the current party in power did - to ensure the vote is not split again.
Adapt or die. A good future for Canada depends on it.
2. Conservatives are not financed by corporate donations - that is simply blind prejudice. Its also illegal. We need to block unions from donating money and manpower as well. If business cannot donate, why should labor. As a union member, I almost always am in opposition to where my union donations go. So I get nailed twice - out of my paycheck to support the NDP, and then by donation to the Conservatives.
3. Canadians indicated they Did Not want any chance of a coalition by the Liberals, period. The Liberals are simply the icing in the cookie - they've believed in their right to govern so long, they no longer know what the issues are. The Conservatives believe in fiscal accountability and smaller government, the NDP in total social support from the public purse - where is there room for the liberals?
4. Mr Harper managed, with all the smears, undermining and fear tactics, to give us the most resilient economy in the world, and will probably keep it that way. The excess spending of the past few years were the results compromises in the face of threats to bring down the government by the Liberals in the main, a telltale omen of what they would have done if they actually came to power. Yet they had the audacity to accuse him of squandering the supposed surplus left by the previous administration. There's a word for that -
One more suggestion is that the Liberals need more aggressive PR people to stay ahead of the smear machine run out of the current PMO by unelected officials.
Albertde - your comments really doesn't make a lot of sense. If PET did in fact destroy the Liberals, how did Chretien manage to hold on to power with successive majorities so long after PET left the political scene? I suggest that Martin should have waited for Chretien to go on his own rather than try to push him out, fracturing the party internally. Dion is a really good MP but he lacked the charm to connect with voters and the smear campaign out of the PMO did him in. Just like they did to Dr. Ignatieff. For years, the PMO ran a never ending campaign at the peril of good governance. Sadly, those all up in arms about their $2 vote subsidy didn't seem to mind having millions used and power abused out of the PMO.
My question to you is: do you expect the Grits to regain power without picking up seats in Quebec or the West? I don't.
I wonder if even today the Liberals understand how badly they mishandled the west. Certainly Carolyn Bennett didn't acknowledge it.
NDP take Quebec.
Liberals take Ontario
Tories take the West.
This would mean a LIberal minority government that has to work with the NDP as the left-wing quebec representative party.
Personally I want NDP to win a majority, but the libs do have a possibility if they rally the troops in Ontario and BC or Ontario and the East.
a. The National Energy Policy, which alienated Alberta and later Saskatchewan;
b. Repatriation of the British North America Act without the consent of all the provinces, which alienated Quebec;
c. A disastrous Fiscal Policy, causing huge deficits.
Others would include multiculturalism in the list.
The fragmenting of the PCs into a minuscule PC party, the Bloc and Reform managed to camouflage the disasters he inflicted on the country and the Liberal Party.
Jean Chrétien coped with the fiscal legacy. Thanks to Paul Martin and him, the budget was balanced, the debt started to be reduced and our too-big-to-fail banks didn't get any bigger. Unfortunately, with the looming possibility of Quebec separating, Chrétien panicked, resulting in the Sponsorship Scandal.
This is the legacy the Liberals have today. I frankly don't know how it will be overcome.
It depends on your point of view I suppose.