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So. Prime Minister Robert Stanfield, otherwise known as the "best Prime Minister Canada never had."

He was a Progressive Conservative, the last party leader that was a pure Red Tory[1], and almost certainly someone far better able to run Canada than Trudeau.

So let's say he beats Trudeau in the election of 1972 which was quite close. Oddly enough the Progressive Conservatives at the time might well be able to convince the NDP to support them[2], or at least not join the Liberals to overturn the election results.

Like Bill Davis over in Ontario the Progressive Conservatives, and a thoroughly Red Tory PC party at that, is in charge.


What does he do? First priority is to fix Trudeau's screwing up of the budget, I imagine, which at least in 1972 will be nowhere near as painful as when it was finally tackled in the mid '90s.

Next up is inflation and taxes: probably some sort of wage and price controls (milder than Trudeau's a little later, amusingly he denounced the PC Party for wage and price controls during the campaign :) & a 4% tax cut or so.

The various party platforms can be seen at the Wiki.



What about the long-term effects? The likely success of a Red Tory government almost certainly means that ideology will remain a major force in the PC Party, and Trudeau losing hopefully means he gets replaced by someone more competent[3].

Assuming Stanfield wins re-election at some point, with a majority government, what do the Liberals do? We're entering the '80s by now and neo-liberalism is big and "left-wing" governments are adopting that (i.e. New Zealand & the Fourth Labour Government) and I could see the Liberals returning to their more classical liberal roots. Free Trade with the US, for instance.

In some senses that would leave the Liberal Party to the right of the PC Party economically, and arguably to the left on social issues (the PC Party isn't socially conservative, but even being regularly Burkean/Disraeli conservative would leave them right on social issues) for whatever those labels mean.


What's the long-term plan for Canada that Stanfield offers? It's not sexy, but I might argue infrastructure. He'll be in power during the oil crisis and that might bring him to the conclusion that Canada needs a strong non-car infrastructure—rail and public transit, combined with a general updating of basic water/power/sewers/whatever.

If Canada has something approaching Singapore style advanced and quality infrastructure it becomes an incredibly attractive place for business, as well as quality immigrants.



Who's after Stanfield? (David Crombie would be my choice—former Mayor of Toronto, so we might see an early "Urban Agenda", and ideally city empowerment on the issue of taxes and budgets and so forth.)

Who runs the Liberals? Do they win soon (doubt it, myself) or do they take power and go neo-liberal in the '80s for a term or two before losing to Crombie's Tories?

Do the NDP gain seats as the Liberals move right economically and that does result in more common minority governments?

Quebec? I don't think they leave, and they're not nearly as pissed off since there won't be the 1980 Constitution but they will remain a problem. Does the Bloc Quebecois become a force as IOTL?




(I'd link to the one previous thread about this, but in my opinion it got overrun by crazy people who know absolutely nothing about Canadian politics.)

[1] Well…*Joe Clark. But given that Clark has gone off and endorsed the Liberals of all people, I'm not entirely sure he was a Red Tory in the first place. A moderate centre-right figure with better economic ideas than the Liberals, sure, but Red Tory was a pretty specific thing.

[2] I imagine the Tories would trade to the NDP, based on Wiki's party platforms, "elimination of corporate welfare" in order to secure NDP support and both parties wanted to reduce taxes & bring in some sort of wage and price controls.

[3] Trudeau was very smart, sure, but absolutely horrible at running the country (in, of course, my opinion).
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