Essential Services

I've said it before, but it's a point I think bears repeating: the Sask Party is an unholy alliance of hard-line Conservatives with a bunch of blue Liberals. Wall is trying very hard to keep the soft and chewy Liberal face on his party for the public's benefit, but after being sidelined for 16 years, the hard, crunchy Conservatives are spoiling for a fight; they want action, dammit, and they want it now.

So, to keep his party from breaking apart before reaching the ultimate goal of kicking the NDP out of power, Wall has had to make some assurances to his hard-line supporters: we'll privatize industry, we'll cut social services, we'll bust those unions. Just give us your vote and relax. And knowing they couldn't win government on that platform, they've had to tuck those hard, crunchy parts away, fooling the public into thinking the Sask Party was soft and chewy all the way through.

Unfortunately, some of those nuts he's hidden are starting to show through.

In a media scrum earlier this week, Rob Norris politely give the answer "I'll have to get back to you on that" to the question, "What groups have you consulted with over this proposed essential services legislation?" Of course we found out later that the answer was none, because, as Norris again so nicely explained, the legislation has been in the works for over a year -- without any kind of stakeholder

I'm sure SUN is going to be pretty happy about this.

So how about another round of applause for Rob Norris, who's too stupid to brief himself on his portfolio and too stupid not to release more of the Sask Party's hidden agenda to the media.

There's a long list of people talking about Wall's and McMorris's backpedaling on this issue, in addition to articles in the Leader-Post, CBC, and the Canadian Press -- hell, even Mandryk chimed in with something negative -- so I don't think I can break any new ground. But communication is clearly lacking in the Sask Party caucus right now -- partly because of inexperience, partly because of incompetence, and partly because there are simply too many secrets they need to keep.