Reasonable men and election

Everybody says that they don’t want one. Everybody talks about it. First, it was Michael Ignatieff’s turn. The leader of the Liberal party and the official Leader of the Opposition in one promised to deliver his verdict on the government’s economic report card on Monday. This was expected to be also the verdict on the future of the Stephen Harper’s Conservative government.

The former happened, the latter too. Sort of. A semantic decomposition of the Harper’s report card was rather brief – if the funds for infrastructure investments had been authorized, committed and flowing it didn’t necessarily mean that the money were already there. A clear message was sent on the employment insurance too.

The political part of the message was less plain. Sticking to his trademark, Ignatieff was as direct as two fighting pretzels when it came to answering the question whether he’s willing to bring the government down in the Friday’s vote and trigger an election.

Despite that, the message to the other side of the House of Commons was loud and clear: I don’t want an election, but your report is not adequate and I do have responsibility. But rather than threatening Harper with an early election and being the one who initiated it, Ignatieff played the ball to the other side leaving it up to Harper to decide. That left Harper with the only reasonable option. To react and, in the same pretzel fashion, agree to talk to the leader opposition.

Harper is apparently coming to terms with the idea that the leader of a minority government has a very limited set of options available to keep the job. And Ignatieff made that clear. It’s Harper’s responsibility to make sure the Government has the confidence of the House and it’s the Harper’s responsibility to seek the support of the opposition. Had he chosen to ignore Ignatieff, he would have turned himself into the man who triggered an election nobody wanted.

By the way, Harper made a big deal out of the fact that Ignatieff didn’t ask those question during the Question Period in the House. In fact, pretty much everybody expected the Leader of the Opposition to do so. But by refraining from triggering a fierce showdown over a two-sword-length wide demarcation line in the House, Ignatieff forced Harper, who simply had to react, to go the National Press Theater, which is an environment the Prime Minister doesn’t really like.

I’m a reasonable man, said Ignatieff to avoid being the one who triggered an election. I’m a reasonable man, said Harper to avoid being the one who triggered an election. Nobody wants it. But apparently, Harper doesn’t want it more. Which gives a tiny little edge to Ignatieff. Let’s see how the expected meeting between the two goes.

FIAT voluntas tua…

Exiting the bankruptcy, reopening factories, getting rid of 789 U.S. Dealerships, being welcomed into the FIAT family. What a great day for Chrysler. Or is it?

There have been excitement and high expectations about what would FIAT’s technologies and their implementations do with Chrysler’s model line-up and general well-being. The focus is on small cars, diesel and petrol engines using turbocharging or supercharging technologies, the latest mantra for power-hungry enthusiasts.

FIAT (and Lancia) left American market in 1984, Alfa Romeo made an exit 1995. The North American notion of FIAT remains associated with Italy’s sports car tradition and design. Then there’s the small car heritage triggered by the Cinquencento, Fiat 500, now represented by the it’s new reincarnation, the new 500 which, while incredibly cute, is also expensive and impractical, very much as the BMW’s Mini, clearly aiming at image-sensitive urbanites. And then there’s Ferrari…

However, having an image and the technology doesn’t necessarily mean that their realization and implementation will work. In case of FIAT, it doesn’t.

Despite recent improvements, FIAT struggles with quality and reliability, as much as Chrysler does. The latest JD Power and Associates 2009 UK Vehicle Ownership Satisfaction Study ranked FIAT 29^th out of 29 brands (101 models were evaluated).

Chrysler ended up 28^th. JD Power’s customer satisfaction studies are deeply flawed as they rely solely on customer’s subjective perception and rather unmeasurable evaluation attitudes. For example, a car owner who expected their car to break down 10 times during the first two years of ownership will be a satisfied one since if the car only broke 7 times. This is further underlined by the fact that Vehicle Appeal constitutes 37% of the overall score while Quality and Reliability make up only 24%. JD Power’s survey is based on mere 15,700 online interviews averaging about 155 responses per a model.

This is in sharp contrast with the traditional annual report conducted by the German industrial audit body TÜV and car magazine Auto Bild. The 2009 report was based on 7.7 million standardized tests. Only models with at least 10,000 tests were included in the result. Average mileage is also taken into the account.

What does it have to with FIAT and Chrysler? Despite radically different and significantly more relevant and scientific method, the best FIAT group’s car in the 2-3 years-old category is the Panda on the 90^th place. The sole Chrysler included in the report is the PT Cruiser on 115^th place.

Hardly a match made in heaven. In the takeover, FIAT may have an upper hand thanks to better technology and more money. But in the automotive world, success always comes down to the product lineup, it’s quality and reliability which, at the moment, neither FIAT nor Chrysler can offer. Adding rather peculiar US customer into the equation makes the whole FIAT-Chrysler marriage look like the world’s greatest automotive adventure. As they say, fiat voluntas tua…. thy will be done….