New Brunswick PC youth want ‘Progressive’ removed from name

As Stephen Harper once said, “the term Progressive Conservative will immediately raise suspicions in all of your minds. It should. It's obviously kind of an oxymoron.” Here in New Brunswick the youth wing of the PC Party want to rectify that problem, by removing the word “progressive” from the party's name.

The reason they gave for wanting to change the name is that The Progressive Conservative Party of New Brunswick is “too clunky” and to shorten it would make it easier for people to remember. Even though the party has been going by that name for decades.

But one of the supporters of the motion, which will be debated at the upcoming convention, let the cat out of the proverbial bag—stating that the word progressive does not represent the ideas of the party. Also the youth wing wants to move the party closer to the federal Conservatives.

They correctly claim that the word progressive “belongs more on the left end of the political spectrum” and should not be part of any rightwing movement. Once again showing that the youth are the most radical wing of a political party—even if in this case they are reactionary in their outlook.

The leadership of the party is against this motion, trying to claim that the party is a “socially progressive” party, while being fiscally conservative. The truth is that they are neither socially progressive nor fiscally conservative. After all, this is the party that to this day, even in opposition, is fighting against a woman’s right to choose. Adam Pottle, a youth executive member, explained how the name change in driven by a reactionary desire to go back a century: “We wanted to bring the party more in line with history—before the early 30s.”As for fiscally conservative, they ran up the biggest debt the province has ever seen.

In the end it does not matter what the name of the party is. The fact of the matter is that it is a rightwing reactionary party that does not deserve the vote of any person who has the ability to think for themselves.