As recently as 2006, Canadian liberals worried that a social-conservative tide led by Stephen Harper would sweep the country, taking us back to the era of restricted abortion, capital punishment, official discrimination against gays and father-knows-best.
But the reactionary tide, to the chagrin of some of the Conservative Party of Canada's staunchest backers (and arguably Stephen Harper's opponents, who had hoped to cast him as a fundamentalist zealot) never came.
Even today, with the Harper government in majority, the so-called hidden agenda shows no signs of materializing. If anything, the prime minister and his cabinet appear more determined than ever to keep their social conservative base in check - witness their quashing of Kitchener Centre MP Stephen Woodworth's attempts to restart the abortion debate.
And now we know why: As the latest batch of census data from StatsCan reveals, the character of the country has changed. And it continues to change, at a pace that suggests the trend may be irreversible.
For example: In 2011, building on a trend established in 2006, only 39.2 per cent of Canadian census families (defined as a married or common-law couple, regardless of gender, with or without children, or a lone parent living with one or more children in the same home) had children. A significantly larger number - 44.5 per cent - had no children. And the proportion of those without children is rising.
"Traditional" nuclear families - married couples with children - now make up barely more than a third of families, 31.9 per cent. That's well down from 37.4 per cent in the 2001 census.
Of the 9.3 million family units accounted for in the 2011 census (up 5.5 per cent from 2006), growing numbers are non-traditional. Between 2006 and 2011, for example, the number of common-law couples rose 13.9 per cent - more than four times the rate of increase for married couples. The number of single-parent homes has grown nearly 10 per cent since the last census, with the number of male lone-parent families up 16.2 per cent.
Most striking, with respect to the so-called Conservative hidden agenda, is the huge increase in same-sex unions. A total of 64,575 same-sex-couple families were recorded in the 2011 census - up more than 40 per cent from 2006. Of these, 21,015 were married, while 43,560 were common-law. The proportion of same-sex couples choosing to marry is now 32.5 per cent - double what was recorded in 2006.
Viewed historically, the numbers are even more striking. In 1961, married couples accounted for more than 90 per cent of census families. By last year, the proportion had dropped to 67 per cent, driven mainly by the increase in common-law couples. In 1961, fewer than nine per cent of families were single parent. In 2011, 16.3 per cent of all families were single parent, with the rise driven by higher divorce rates.
The implications for policymakers are profound.
In the 2005 federal political campaign, for example, Harper's conservatives ran on a platform that offered policy baubles to families with children - the child-fitness tax credit being the most obvious example. That suited the Conservative and conservative ideal of family as the core unit of social structure. How effective will such messaging be in 2015?
Not only does the increase in nonconventional family arrangements suggest social conservatism is well and truly dead in Canada, as a political force. It also presents a challenge to the ruling Conservatives.
In Quebec, a nominally socially progressive party has just taken power. In British Columbia, the New Democrats are on the ascendant; in Alberta, a socially progressive Tory party holds power. In Ontario, the New Democrats are surging in popularity.
Harper and his ministers have gotten away until now with a posture of stodgy indifference to most social issues, with the exception of Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird speaking up in defence of persecuted gays overseas. Given the shifts underway, the day may soon come when indifference is no longer enough.
