Branding Team Harper

OTTAWA- With abject apologies to Sesame Street, this column is brought to you by the letters "W" and "O." That's "W" as in new and "O" as in neo-conservative.

New is the branding Stephen Harper and his ministers attach to their government in the apparent hope no one will notice how often it behaves like the old. Neo-conservative is the label a lot of nervous big city small-l liberals paste to a party they fear will tilt even further that way if it ever wins a majority.

Repeated with metronome monotony, the new government mantra whiffs too much of focus groups to be much more than annoying. The neo-conservative tag is different.

Loaded with south-of-the-border Republican baggage, the image of neo-conservatives in the citadel, not just at the gate, is unsettling for those still defending the utopian notion of a northern Camelot. And more than a bone of contention with civil society, it's also a worry for a government still struggling to build trust with voters as well as with a civil service notably less optimistic about this administration than on election day.

Of course, this government's philosophical leanings are as debatable as its freshness. While sharing distinctive neo-con characteristics – paternal queasiness with social permissiveness and a willingness to rev up big government machinery – these Conservatives also have other traits – individualism over group responsibility and occasional bouts of ideological purity — that are more common among classical conservatives and even libertarians.

But in politics perception passes for reality. So it's no great surprise that Prime Minister Harper is now trying so hard to convince the country that his government is new and not so much neo-conservative.

It's slow work. A year plus a few weeks in office hasn't dramatically shifted public opinion in Conservative favour and what mandarins see as ideological rigidity is slowly poisoning relations between ministers elected to govern and deputies expected to speak truth to power.

That's a remarkable reversal from relations with the last Liberal regime. Overwhelmed by Paul Martin's Socrates impersonation and the resulting 1,001 priorities, senior bureaucrats welcomed the discipline that came with Harper's managerial persona and limited agenda.

But that was then and the here and now is not so happy. Instead of sous-chefs helping the government prepare the national menu, bureaucrats complain they are being used as short-order cooks.

Why should anyone give a damn if civil servants are dyspeptic? After all, mandarins advise and governments decide. And even if deputies don't like the decisions, the hurt is salved with comfortable salaries, coddling pensions and the local prestige that comes with a chauffeur waiting at the door.

Well, every voter and taxpayer should care because the effectiveness of public policy is proportional to the depth of analysis. Or, as they say around the water cooler: Garbage in, garbage out.

Conservatives put high value on what's now being shovelled into the hopper. That's fair and can be sorted out in the next election. But what's frustrating the public service is that the material isn't being forced through a filter. The result is policies that flunk all but the shrewd-politics test.

The list is long and almost as well known to most Canadians as it is to Harper's inner circle. Still, it's worth a quick review.

Economists don't agree on much, but there's a broad consensus that cutting the GST isn't very progressive. Along with benefiting the rich more than the poor, it's a crude economic tool.

Parents didn't complain when that $100 per child cheque began arriving last year. But the plan isn't a meaningful commitment to early childhood education and doesn't even fill the imperfect void left by Liberals who thought child care would be the next great social policy.

Border guards will soon have guns and fatter paycheques thanks to Conservatives who bowed to union pressure and unfounded public fears. Unfortunately for taxpayers, program costs could rise as high as $1 billion for a hire-and-arm project that successive governments rejected after considering the risks as well as safer alternatives.

Those who want more evidence don't have to look far. More of the same can be found by digging into this administration's hang-'em-high approach to law and order or its abrupt foreign policy shifts.

What they have in common is partisan advantage and a dollop of ideology. Along with being easily faulted, they combine what's politically attractive to Harper with what's emotionally appealing to Conservatives.

All that's missing is the empirical foundation needed to prove that what feels so right to Conservatives is good for the country. But that's quibbling and misses the point.

There's nothing new in playing politics with policy. There is, however, something neo-conservative in those now distancing this government from its predecessors, urban voters and civil service.


James Travers's national affairs column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.


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