New Brunswick needs more political will

The response to the recent provincial budget, like the federal budget, has been underwhelming. Both documents are long on hope but short on details, and the general consensus is that damnation by faint praise --“It could have been worse.”

The main difference between these budgets is that there is a light at the end of the federal fiscal tunnel, while the hope for a balanced provincial budget remains dim.

No one needs to tell New Brunswickers that we are facing difficult times. Unemployment levels remain persistently high and we are not seeing the economic or job growth that is occurring in other provinces. Our public infrastructure continues to deteriorate, which further hampers economic vitality. Our social infrastructure, whether it is the need for skills upgrading, combating stubborn illiteracy levels or the plan to aggressively combat poverty, continues to suffer from neglect.

Instead of purposeful action with clear goals and resources, the provincial budget again offered the uninspired incrementalism that has become the default position of our political class. It is no wonder that many New Brunswickers have a certain nostalgia for the days of Louis J. Robichaud and Frank McKenna. While many of the measures they implemented were controversial, and remain so today, they were animated by a belief that New Brunswickers deserved leadership in pursuit of a stronger economy and a more inclusive society.

Not only did these leaders have confidence in themselves and their vision for New Brunswick, they had confidence in the people they worked with and in the people they served. They possessed that quality that seems to elude our leaders today – political will.

Several months ago, a number of leading policy thinkers were brought together to discuss the future of the province. Many topics were discussed and many ideas were offered. Over the course of this discussion, these individuals came to the conclusion that the lack of political will, and not the level of federal transfers, lagging business investment or other economic factors, was the main barrier that is holding New Brunswick back. Without effective and purposeful leadership, they concluded, no good solution or idea will ever come to fruition.

Instead of political will, we have a surplus of political ”won’t.”

We have political leadership that won’t confront the difficult reality of our situation, and certainly won’t engage New Brunswickers in the necessary conversation about the opportunities that are there to be seized. Rather than looking to the advantages, fiscal, social and economic, that could be obtained by modernizing our government and public services, our leadership won’t even acknowledge that our problems have solutions.

Our leadership won’t take a hard look in the mirror to see that they have an obligation to offer something beyond divisive populism or scapegoating. And they won’t acknowledge that they need to offer more than crafted phrases and feel-good sentiments to voters who hunger for something more substantive in the upcoming election.

If we needed more proof about the prevalence of political won’t, we need not look very far. It seems that we are all more preoccupied by the things we won’t do then by the things we say we will do. This approach is inherently negative and, by refusing to set out a positive agenda, we are all cheated in this process.

Just as we need to revive our sense of purpose as a province, we need to recover our sense of confidence. We need to talk about the things that we will do as a province, not dwell on the things we won’t, or shouldn’t, do.

As citizens, we need to tell our leaders that we need them to change their approach to public business. We want to know what they will do, not what they won’t. Will you balance the budget? Will you preserve, if not improve, the quality of service to citizens? Will you give us the leadership to deal with illiteracy? Will you get the economy growing again?

If we don’t, we will continue to hear from our leadership that they won’t rise to this occasion. That they won’t deal with the misallocation of government resources; that they won’t change from the half-hearted incrementalism that is the sum of our current budgetary policy.

As previous leaders have shown, there is a certain magic in boldness. If we convinced ourselves that we could achieve better and acted on this belief, wouldn’t our mutual goals be easier to achieve? Instead of political won’t, we need political will. As the saying goes,” When there is a will, there is a way.”

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This article was originally published in the February 26, 2014 edition of the Telegraph-Journal.