On minority influence

John Ibbitson's report on the Cons' immigrant recruitment strategy is rightly getting plenty of attention this morning. But let's take a moment to point out the good news behind the Cons' attempts to manipulate the immigration system for their own gain.

First, there's the fact that even among the new immigrants who are seen as more receptive to socon values, there's reason to think that any party willing to defend progressive principles can compete for votes:

A survey of visible minorities and immigrants done by the Canadian Election Study shows both groups tend to be more conservative than the rest of Canada on bedrock Canadian issues. Both groups, for example, are more likely to say it should be possible to pay for medical treatment and that getting an abortion should be more difficult. Visible minorities, a category that’s 84 per cent immigrant, are more likely to support private hospitals, lower taxes and paying parents individually rather than funding daycare.

(I)t’s not all tilting to the right. On most other issues in the survey, such as cutting welfare spending, opposing the death penalty, having troops in Afghanistan or spending more on defence, both immigrants and visible minority groups are to the left of the Canadian population.

What's particularly striking is that a number of the issues where the survey classifies visible minorities and immigrants as falling to the right of the general population are exactly the ones where the Cons most fear to tread. It may be worth seeing what the Cons are telling minority communities about privatizing health care, restricting abortion or revisiting same-sex marriage, but they certainly aren't prepared to take those policies to the general public - and can expect to be torn to shreds if they're trying to sell different messages to immigrant communities.

In contrast, issues like defence spending and military deployment have been front and centre thanks in large part to the Cons' being consistently on the wrong side of both Canadians as a whole, and the minority groups who have even stronger views than the general public. So there's plenty of room to tap into the values of new Canadians to oppose the Cons.

And that's just in the first generation of new arrivals, as Ibbitson notes that subsequent generations don't seem to be taking long to abandon any vestiges of social conservatism:

(T)here is one demographic shift that should keep Mr. Kenney awake at night. However economically and socially conservative new arrivals may be, their children are almost invariably more liberal.

Subir Mann, a 22-year-old student, came to Canada from The Punjab as a child. He says he supports same-sex marriage, even though his more traditional father has trouble with it.

“For me I think it’s important that gay people are considered equal,” he said. “Part of the reason I’m anti-Conservative is that they often mix religious issues with politics. That can be very dangerous.”

And though Helen Poon is giving serious thought to voting Conservative, her 12-year-old son, a proud cadet, has a very different view.

He came home from school one day urging her not to vote Conservative, Ms. Poon said.

So the Cons' much-hyped immigration strategy looks to be little more than a one-off effort with nothing but diminishing returns to follow. After all, the few social issues where they have any hope of persuading new arrivals to join their camp are exactly the ones where second-generation immigrants are joining the younger population at large on the other side.

Of course, the Cons could still do plenty of damage even with a single majority followed by a demographic turn against them . But there's no indication that the Cons are anywhere near achieving that despite their efforts to buy off new arrivals with public money - and there's ample reason for optimism that both new arrivals and their children will see their values better reflected in other parties.