The political crisis and youth, Statement by the YCL-LJC CEC

(CEC Statement of Young Communist League, Communist Party of Canada / la Ligue de la jeunesse communiste)
Tuesday, December 2nd

The coalition emerging between the Liberals and the New Democratic Party, supported by the Bloc Quebecois, is a very important democratic development for all young people. It could stop the Bush-style Conservative government that blocks any possibility of advance for a youth and student agenda. It will shape our struggles against militarism and the war in Afghanistan, bad jobs and poverty wages, and skyrocketing tuition fees.

The 1985 Ontario Liberal-NDP accord government showed the parties internally struggling for public support, creating better terrain for extra-parliamentary struggle. Without any illusions about either parties, lets act on the greater potential for pushing forward a youth and student agenda!

The Conservative’s defeat could set-back neo-liberalism. Youth have suffered greatly from cutbacks, deregulation, privatization, as well as environmental destruction and the drive to war. These same policies helped incubate the current structural crisis of capitalism, and made the crisis’s effect on youth and students much worse.

The real victory will be shaped outside of parliament. Now is the time to creatively, broadly and boldly set-up the fight-back, projecting an immediate alternative agenda to ensure the big corporations – and not our generation – bear the costs of the financial crisis: create hundreds of thousands of good quality jobs for youth; raise minimum wages; get Canada out of Afghanistan and NATO; cut-back the bloated military budget; establish a national childcare system; expand public school funding and universal, accessible public post-secondary education.

Youth and students are right to demand that any back-room deals to maintain Conservative rule be exposed and stopped, and to join the cross-Canada actions demanding an end to the Harper Conservative’s power. The YCL calls on all youth and students to join with that growing movement, and demand a pro-people, pro-youth and student agenda!


DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. What do you think of these recent developments? What are your friends, classmates and co-workers saying? How important do you think it is to get rid of Harper?

2. Many have countered Harper’s claim that the coalition is anti-democratic by pointing out that he has no deep love of democracy, and the majority of Canadians voted against him. What do you think?

3. How is the emerging coalition similar or different from what the Communist Party called for in the election with these slogans: Dump the Tories, block the right, elect a large progressive block of MPs, and put people before profits? Did you think any of these slogans were realizable at the time?

4. Check out the YCL-LJC CEC’s statement on the financial crisis. How is this crisis a reflection of the economic crisis?

5. Why do you think the YCL-LJC CEC chose to put the emphasis on struggle outside of Parliament?