Democratic Party History

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The Evolution of the New Democratic Party The Cooperative Commonwealth Federation was the beginning of the New Democratic Party. It is most known for its extreme success to holding the formula to universal health care in Canada. Since the party’s inception, the NDP has developed numerous social policies and labour movements which have been forwarded by many party leaders. This essay will focus on the major breakthroughs of the CCF and NDP, and less on the times where the NDP did not contribute much to governance. The policies produced by these leaders will be briefly mentioned, but their details will not. The lengthiest discussion will be on Tommy Douglas who is the father of Canada’s Medicare system. It will then touch on the succeeding…show more content…
Tommy Douglas was attempting to form the first Socialist government in Canada. Farm ownership was the key issue of the campaign. Farm owners believed that if they were to vote for Douglas, their farmland would be safe from foreclosures from mortgage companies. As a result, scare tactics from mortgage companies were used, to encourage voters to cast their ballot for the longstanding liberal government in Saskatchewan. Douglas used these threats to his advantage, with the promise of a blackened moratorium across the province in order to protect the farmers. Tommy also reinforced the conservatives and social credit with their policies in the House of Commons to gain electoral support (Shackleton,…show more content…
Archibald McNab, and the lieutenant governor on July 10, 1944 in a crammed legislative chamber (Stewart, 162). Tommy would waste no time before introducing legislature with new policies as he now had a more powerful sense as premier. Parliament aquatinted with new ideas never introduced by any Canadian politician to date. There was no unemployment insurance as the CCF pressed for it in repeated resolutions. There were no family allowances; the CCF was also the first advocate of this income support idea; however it would have to wait until 1945 before it would be considered. This proposal would eventually be passed in the province of Saskatchewan. The Saskatchewan Socialist government didn’t stop there with new ideas and policies. Arguably, the most important initiatives introduced by the CCF, was the Saskatchewan Health Services Act in 1944. This was the beginning of Universal Health Care in Canada. By January 1945, all old age pensioners, blind persons, mother allowance cases, and wards of government received a card entitling them to free medical care, hospital care, dental care, eye care and glasses, and medication (Stewart, 168). The only downside to this act was that free health care was not provided to all cancer patients. This was a revolutionary act towards health care, and was never taken by any other political party in Canada. Another step
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