Pierre Poilievre is stepping on a few toes……a lot of them actually, if the comments of journalists and other Conservatives offer clues. I find that he is being attacked by people who should know better. They are twisting his message.
The two main issues of the attacks seem to be Poilievre’s promise to fire the Governor of The Bank of Canada and his assessment of the cause of inflation.
I hear Conservatives and journalists alike accuse Poilievre of wanting to compromise the independence of the central bank by political interference. It’s nonsense. First, it is the PM that appoints the Governor. How is that not political interference? But second, and this is the big one, Poilievre’s lament is that Tiff Macklem compromised the independence of the central bank when he expanded the bank’s assets by the same amount and at the same rate as the Trudeau government was running a deficit. The Trudeau gang wanted an annual deficit of $150,000,000,000, and the Bank of Canada expanded the money supply by that amount to comply. How is that right? The Governor is tasked with avoiding inflation of more than 2% per annum, and he expands the money supply by far more. He knows better, and if he doesn’t, he should not have the job. Either way, he is not fit for the post. Poilievre wants a Bank governor that has a backbone --- someone who will resist political pressure.
People defend Macklem by saying that inflation is a worldwide problem. Effectively, it’s okay that he went along with the crowd instead of doing what’s right. This country now has a lot of hungry people because of that behavior. But NO, inflation is caused by high oil prices, the Ukraine war, disrupted supply chains, and anything else that doesn’t cause it. That’s the silliness being fed to the public now. Do a little thought experiment. If there is a fixed amount of money available, and people are spending more of it on gasoline, then they will have to spend less on other things such as food items. In a more or less free market, prices bring supply and demand into an equilibrium. Almost all food items have substitutes; therefore, demand for any particular food item is elastic. If you have less money to spend on a food item because you filled your gas tank, you will buy less because you have less money with which to make the purchase. Suppliers will tend to drop the price to achieve economic equilibrium. Higher oil prices will tend to make lower movie ticket prices, as a hypothetical example. Inflation is the result of an increased money supply when there is not a corresponding increase in the production of goods and services.
Poilievre is trying to bring reality into the dialogue. I hope he persuades enough people that he can become CPC leader and subsequently PM. Let’s see if he can stick with his principles. If so, this country may have a brighter future than it does under the progressive socialist coup that is based on the principle of sharing the poverty.
