Opinion: What party leaders can do to fight toxic politics

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How many politicians citing toxicity and violence as the reason for their resignation will it take for party leaders to do what needs to be done to fix this problem before someone gets hurt?

France Bélisle resigned suddenly last winter as mayor of Gatineau because of the toxic climate. We learned, in the wake of her departure, that nearly 800 Quebec municipal politicians had also quit since 2021.

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This month, Maude Marquis-Bissonnette was elected to replace Bélisle. A few days later, Shannon Phillips, an NDP member of the Alberta legislature and a former environment minister, announced she was stepping down July 1. She, too, cited toxicity — specifically, from the extreme right — as a cause.

I spend enough time on social networks to know what she’s talking about, but it would be foolish to think that the problem only comes from the right. There is extremism and toxicity in all parties.

Not too long ago, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly had what must have been a nerve-racking confrontation in Montreal over the number of Palestinian refugees allowed in Canada. Longtime NDP MP Charlie Angus recently saw the trial of a man charged with harassing him and his staff peter out due to lost evidence.

Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, leader of the Parti Québécois, had death threats against him and his family this year. According to the Sûreté du Québec, the number of cases of threats made to politicians in the province is between 200 and almost 400 a year.

In Ottawa, the House of Commons’ sergeant-at-arms recently told a committee that harassment against MPs had grown to well over 500 last year from eight cases in 2019. And it’s not getting better.

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Writing in the Hill Times on June 7, longtime Liberal MP John McKay offered a sample of threatening incidents toward MPs of all parties that took place in the past year: “One MP had his garage burned to the ground; another had all the windows in his home smashed; another had his office firebombed; another has had so many invasions of his riding office that he is moving out of his plaza location to a multi-storey office in order to improve security for his staff; a gay Member had to abandon his home for several weeks due to homophobic threats; a Jewish Member had his car plastered with Nazi stickers; and the Toronto offices of three MPs were vandalized just in the last week.”

It is past time for political leaders to, well, lead on this issue. This month, the National Assembly adopted a law that includes fines up to $1,500 for anyone who intimidates, harasses or “abusively” obstructs the work of a politician. While there are no magic solutions that would instantly bring safety and civility back to our politics, there are other measures leaders can take, right now, to address the problem.

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My one concrete suggestion is for each party leader to regularly denounce excesses on the part of their own partisans. Whenever they are made aware of something egregious done or said by their own supporters, they should be quick to denounce it, going so far as to say something like this, clearly and loudly: “I don’t want your vote, or your support, or your money if you’re going to engage in this sort of behaviour — because while we may vehemently disagree with our adversaries, we respect their right to work in a safe environment, free from violence and toxicity.”

We should demand that leaders bring a solid dose of political hygiene to their own teams, instead of calling out excesses elsewhere while conveniently ignoring what’s coming out of their own ranks.

Robust debate will always be part of politics and that’s fine. I’m not saying we should be unfailingly polite or self-effacing. We can be rough in our arguments and merciless in our sarcasm. And face it, some political insults are very funny. But between that and violence, there is a line that too often gets crossed.

Political leaders need to show us that, under their banner, toxicity and violence are not welcome. Before — not after — someone gets hurt.

Brigitte Pellerin is an Ottawa writer.

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