The road ahead

The CP traces the path of Nova Scotia's NDP from third-party status to the brink of government. And it's worth noting how the strategy compares to the federal NDP's current position:

Now retired from the House of Commons, former federal NDP leader Alexa McDonough remembers a time when trying to get elected as a New Democrat in Nova Scotia was every bit an exercise in frustration that it is elsewhere in the region...

"When I ran in '79 and '80 and only got 14 per cent of the vote, people said, 'Well, you know, I'd vote for you if I ever thought the NDP could win,' " said McDonough.

She recalls "stubbornly" running three times, arguing against the "irrationality" of the position put to her by voters. McDonough now believes it was the beginning of a gradual shift in people's attitudes toward the party.

Subsequently, she said, the NDP has been able to build an understanding with voters based on strategies and platforms that have cast the party as a viable alternative in Nova Scotia...

Smith points to the 1997 federal election, in which the NDP won six of 11 ridings, as one of the key events in the rise of the party provincially.

"Reform was running on a neo-Conservative agenda . . . and the Liberal government was in deficit-slaying mode," said Smith. "There were some reasons that this particular region, which was always anxious about cuts to social programs and had high unemployment then, would consider the NDP."

She sees the collapse of the Liberal vote in the 1998 provincial election as the other key to NDP success. The Liberals went from 40 seats to 19 while the New Democrats went from four seats to 19.

"So federally you had this big boost in '97 and then '98 was a critical election for the NDP in Nova Scotia," said Smith.

She said the party has since consolidated its position, leaving it the contender it is today.

The challenges once faced by McDonough still mirror in large part the (however weak) argument still used to try to justify painting the NDP out of the federal picture. But with the NDP now both steadily gaining in seats and demonstrating its ability to contend in areas once considered to be out of reach, the claim can only look less and less plausible with every passing election cycle. And the focus of the 2008 campaign on Jack Layton as a Prime Minister in waiting can only sow the seeds for a longer-term shift similar to the one that's already taken place in Nova Scotia.

Now, that made for good enough news on its own. But the democratic coalition has both set out another path which leads to the NDP being able to convert its principles into results, and signalled the Libs' agreement that the prospect of New Democrats in government is a positive one. And if the federal party can build off that existing base of electoral support and shifting opinions, then it may not be long before the current story in Nova Scotia is matched on the national scene.