If there were an election today, the polls show that Pierre Poilievre’s Conservative party would probably form the next government. This isn’t what is necessarily going to happen. I like to think of polls as ‘point in time’ snapshots which may be 100% accurate right now, but the situation can be very different tomorrow. 

One of the trends I have noticed on 338Canada, which gleans data from many polls, is that support for the Liberals has been tacking upwards since Trudeau resigned (6 points), while support for the Conservatives and NDP has gone down (4 points each). If the Liberals pick a popular leader, we can expect their popularity to rise even higher in the polls – all of which is just to say that the as yet undeclared election is too far away to be certain.  

Anyway Max Thaysen, one of our thought leaders here on Cortes, has been watching what Donald Trump, a Conservative leader in the United States, is doing and getting anxious about what this latest rendition of Canada’s Conservative Party might be like if it comes to power.   

Max Thaysen: “Watching Donald Trump do his Donald Trump thing in America is pretty scary. There’s a breakdown of the rule of law happening, but also just some really nasty meanness. It’s such a tragedy that America was taken over by these goons, In part because 40% of people didn’t vote. It’s easy and tempting to be cynical.” 

“Yes, the result of checking out the whole political game is that sometimes the bad guys win, and sometimes when the bad guys win, they win for a long time. We actually go very far backwards.” 

“Defunding science and making life dangerous for activists, or including journalists such as yourself in the pool of people considered to be activists by the government. Those are all really dangerous things that are hard to recover from.”  

Cortes Currents: This is all about Donald Trump, a Republican leader who many Republicans are now finding alarming.  What do you see in our Conservative Party that’s alarming? 

Max Thaysen: “Like most Canadians, I read mostly American news.” (Laughter)  

“Yeah, you’re supposed to be quiet while I’m talking! I don’t think anybody knows that much about Pierre Poilievre’s policies because he hasn’t said very much about Pierre Poilievre’s policies. But that’s true of Donald Trump as well, which is one of the reasons why it’s useful to look at what Donald Trump is doing.”

“His policies are being implemented now, whereas before we had some hints, maybe some loud hints from the kinds of people he was planning to work with and what they were saying and stuff like that.  Now the rubber is hitting the road.” 

“I think that’s true of Pierre Poilievre too. He just seems to say one liners over and over again and indicate his cruelty, but not really delivering that much. I think we can just assume the worst because he’s demonstrated a similar style and approach and intention in many issues similar to Donald Trump. That’s what I’m most worried about. What he has said, the nastiness towards journalists who are trying to ask honest questions, tells me that he’s the enemy of most of us in his intentions and whatever policy comes from that. It’s unlikely to be fair, or kind, or honest – based on what I’ve seen so far.  Those are very dangerous anti-values that he’s got.”  

Cortes Currents: One of the things that disturbs me about the Conservative Party is the way they don’t communicate. I’m thinking of communication with journalists in particular.  

Our local Conservative MLA, Anna Kindy, did not grant me an interview during the recent provincial election, but I have enjoyed three conversations with her since then. She has a different set of values than I do, which isn’t to say that hers aren’t valuable. I’m finding some of them are actually very valuable. 

There’s some areas where we don’t meet. Climate change is a big one.  She says that she should pay attention to it because some of her constituents think it’s a necessity, but to her it doesn’t seem to be a reality. And I’m looking at the effects of climate change all the time. I see them in the way some of our trees are reacting to the drier summers. I’m looking at it in our storms, which appear to be getting stronger and more frequent. I’m looking at it in higher average global temperatures. Part of me goes, ‘how can you not see this?’ At the same time, I’ve got to approach it from the point of view that, ‘okay, she doesn’t see it. Some of the things she’s saying are important, and we need dialogue.’ So, it’s complex and challenging. 

Max Thaysen: “A lot of people who are planning to vote Conservative, or have Conservative values, are good and decent people and I suspect that they are also turned off by the nastiness displayed in the leader of the Conservative party. I have been working with the NDP party and yet there’s lots of things that I’m very unhappy with at the leadership level.” 

“I feel like it’s my responsibility to do what I can to make the leadership more reflective of my values. That is part of how democracy works too. That feeds into the other point I was making, we need to get involved because the leaders of all of our parties are not necessarily doing a great job of representing our interests. That’s just as true for Conservatives as it is for the NDP and the Liberals.” 

“One thing that I found interesting in putting the article together, was I looked at what the Liberal Party members were saying at their convention. There were some really strong calls for very ambitious climate action, which we haven’t seen from the Liberal government.

“I’ve noticed this with the BC NDP. What the members are calling for ends up being very different from what the NDP government implemented. That is a source of frustration for a lot of members,  figuring out how to get the government to do the will of the party members. The Liberals have the same problem and some remarkable values and concerns that align with those of us who are concerned about climate change.”

“It’s a similar situation with nationalism. The people on the ground in both Canada and America in this recent round of division have a lot more in common than we have that divides us.  It is Donald Trump who has caused some division, and we need to remember that we have solidarity at the bottom of the power hierarchy, and we need to use that and stand together.”

“That is true for citizens who align with different political parties across Canada as well. We have more in common than not and we need to stand together against the power at the top that seems to not be acting in our best interest. How can we rise above party politics a little bit to prevent a regression in at least social policy, if not climate policy. There’s a couple of interesting tools that I found which try to execute on that intention. For example, getting the NDP and Liberal parties to cooperate rather than compete,  because when they compete, the conservatives will win a lot more ridings and get a majority in this country.”

“If those parties cooperate and decide to pull some of their candidates, then they could have a minority government again and not lose to the Conservatives. All it takes is a recognition of that reality and a willingness to do that cooperation. There’s a link to a grassroots effort to push for that cooperation.”

“People may have heard of vote swapping, which is another way of executing on that cooperation without the participation of party leadership  or candidates.  In our riding, the NDP party is the main contender, based on historical polling against the Conservative party. Currently the Conservative Party is leading in the polls.”

Cortes Currents: If the election had occurred on February 9th, Canada338, projected that in North Island-Powell River, the Conservative Party would get 52% of the vote. The NDP would get 30%, Liberals 10%, and Greens 6%. Once again, the results will undoubtedly be very different on election day, but this riding is currently regarded as a safe Conservative seat.

Max Thaysen: “If Greens or Liberals decide to try to stop a Conservative win in our riding. I believe that they, together, have enough votes to probably do that, based on current polling.”

Cortes Currents: This is true if you are looking at polling data for the election and not projections for individual ridings. The Nanos poll taken on Friday, February 7, for example, shows the Conservatives at 38%, the Liberals at 30%, NDP 16%, Bloc 8%, Green Party 5% and People’s Party of Canada 2%.”

Max Thaysen: “That will be true for a lot of other ridings. In many of them, it will be the Liberal Party that needs to be supported by the less likely parties.” 

Cortes Currents: We don’t know how similar a Poilievre government would be to Trump’s. Too much of Poilievre’s campaign seems to consist of one liners and attack ads. We need more information and until we see it, maybe we should be cautious.

Links of Interest:

• The Danger of Apathy: Why We Must Stay Engaged in Democracy – Max Thaysen
• Cooperate for Canada: The Plan
• Articles from the Climate Action Network
• Articles about the 2025 Canadian election
• Anna Kindy: Waiting for the legislature, the Health Crisis & Being the MLA for North Island.
• Introducing Anna Kindy, MLA for North Island

Top image credit: Donald Trump courtesy the Whitehouse.gov

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