(EDITED: Oct 30th 2023 @ 10:30pm CST)
At the moment, Canada's current government is run by a minority Liberal government with an NDP coalition. What this means to those new to multi-party parliamentary systems is that the Liberal party won more seats in Parliament than the other parties, but not more seats than all the other parties combined. Minority governments can open the winning party to vulnerability on unpopular policies; if all the other parties disagree with the minority government about a policy, they can call a vote of non-confidence to unseat the government and trigger a new election. To prevent that situation, Canada's federal Liberal and New Democratic Party formed a confidence and supply coalition; meaning, the NDP will support the Liberal government in confidence votes and in government spending bills to prevent the dissolution of government. This is a pretty common occurrence in multi-party parliamentary systems.
HOWEVER.
This most recent coalition has been particularly damaging to provincial NDP parties across the country. A frequent complaint I run into when talking about the Saskatchewan NDP is that they are "in bed with the Liberals," which is emphatically incorrect; none of the provincial New Democratic Party instances are tied nor beholden to the federal instances, nor to each other. If you donate to a provincial NDP party, that provincial party receives the donation - not the federal NDP, and not any other provincial NDP. Further, NDP parties across the country often disagree on policies or have different ideas about how to enact certain policies.
To put it simply, it's more accurate to treat provincial and federal parties as their own unique party, rather than splinters of a much bigger party.
It's a rather confusing situation. This is part of the reason I wish the Saskatchewan NDP could rebrand. Separating ourselves from the federal NDP could clear up a significant amount of backlash being misdirected at us when the federal NDP does something people don't like. It's not possible because i've oversimplified my explanation of things - the situation is a little more complicated than the parties being outright unrelated to each other - but it's still something I wish we could do.
So, what in particular am I upset about with regards to the federal Liberal/NDP coalition? Well, that's where my hot take comes in.
I think Jagmeet Singh's statement that he will "work with the Liberals," while true, damaged the reputation of provincial NDP parties to otherwise undecided or on-the-fence voters.
The general consensus within Saskatchewan voters in rural areas is that they'll never vote NDP. Some of them point all the way back to the 90's for justification, but many of them point to the federal NDP and Singh's statement. In fact, that is the exact type of statement I received from my aunt when I showed her the new Saskatchewan NDP hat I'd purchased at the convention. "Did you know the NDP is in bed with the Liberals," she asked me with sass.
I wanted to explain to her that the Saskatchewan NDP has no control over the federal, and that her perception of the NDP/Liberal coalition is misled, but I was overridden by my grandma with a simple statement: "No politics, we're changing the subject."
Was Jagmeet Singh's statement untrue? Nope, he kind of has to work with the Liberals to prevent the dissolution of government and to at least have a progressive voice in the policies being put forward by the Liberal government. But the manner in which he said it caused a significant stir in rural Saskatchewan, to the point that many Sask Party voters who were on the fence about voting for Sask NDP were no longer considering it. Is it Jagmeet Singh's responsibility to protect the reputation of provincial NDP parties? also no. He's looking after his party, and the provincial parties need to look after themselves too. The confusion voters have towards the provincial and federal NDP parties is not his responsibility, nor should it be.
I'm not sure that there is a method to solve the confusion beyond trying to educate people about the differences between provincial and federal parties, MLAs and MPs, and what jurisdiction and power provincial legislatures and federal parliament actually holds. It sounds simple enough, but many Sask Party supporters are hard-headed and stubborn. My father is a great example of this; no matter how many times I tell him how this all works, and no matter how much I simplify, he just rolls his eyes and immediately discards all the information I give him. To him, I'm just a bleeding heart Communist supporting a party that's too friendly to the Liberals for his liking, and all my explanations are just "spin" or outright lies.
It's a fucking infuriating situation to be in, but a fantastic example of the gaps in our education system that should be in the mandatory curriculum. This shit should be basic knowledge to anybody who graduated high school, but unfortunately you only learn about these things if you're going to political science classes in University. and since my dad dropped out of high school and is currently in his early 60's, that's probably not happening.
the level of ignorance in voters towards Canada's political systems is kind of terrifying. people don't seem to understand how scary it is that the Sask Party invoked the notwithstanding clause twice in the past five years. people don't seem to understand the difference between provincial and federal governments. people don't seem to understand what the provincial and federal governments have jurisdiction over. people don't seem to understand how governments even work in the first place.
and sure, i'd rather live in a world where that knowledge wasn't necessary, but we don't live in a perfect utopia. we live in a world where we have to be vigilant, intelligent and skeptical 24/7, lest we be taken advantage of and lied to without even recognizing it. even now, im concerned that I may have explained things incorrectly because i myself don't fully understand how everything works. but at the very least, I know the Saskatchewan NDP isn't in a coalition with the federal Liberal party, because that is quite literally impossible.
tl;dr: i think Jagmeet Singh's speech after the federal election about forming a confidence-and-supply coalition between the federal NDP and Liberal parties was damaging to the reputation of Saskatchewan's NDP party just due to the sheer confusion and ignorance surrounding the provincial and federal parties, and it kinda makes me mad tbh.