New Democratic Party

Perhaps the most interesting of the political parties in Canada, the New Democratic Party or NDP is often considered to be the conscience of Canada and is one of Canada’s three left of center parties.  The party has some significant achievements most prominently the creation of Canada’s beloved publicly funded health care system.

The current leader is Jack Layton. Mr. Layton is a clever, charming and seemingly sincere person, who had done a credible job of leading the party in its third place position.  While the NDP is a respected and well liked party, the chances are small that the party will even actually come top power.  The reason is that many Canadians have not yet seen the party run a government, and are suspicious of the wisdom of some of the parties more controversial  policies. Like the hard right Harper Conservatives, the NDP suffers in that it is held hostage to its  more extream left wing elements. Mr. Layton in particular seems afraid to do the things needed for the party to gain the confidence of Canadians.

Until such a time as the general population has shad the opportunity to see that an NDP government could be trusted to run the country Mr. Laytons party will remain in oppostion and most likely in third place. In this regard the party also shares the problem  with Mr. Harper’s hard right party

Of note too, is that Mr. Layton has avoide any kind of power sharing arrangement with other left of center parties. For example, an non aggression pact with the Liberal party, along with a coalition government arrangement would be a more natural fit for the country, and would most likely produce better governance that the present minority government.  Mr. Layton has forgone any opportunities that would have had realistic chance to bring down the Conservatives and to install a left of center collation.  Ultimately Mr. Layton will fail as a leader because of his reluctance to show the NDP in power sharing arrangment.