EDMONTON — Conservatives tuning into the next leadership debate hope to see the six candidates vying for the party’s top job lay off the personal attacks, says one campaign manager.
“I want the candidates to speak to the issues, debate the issues, debate them vigorously. But don’t become personal,” said Ed Fast, the British Columbia MP who is co-chairing former Quebec premier Jean Charest’s leadership campaign.
“At the end of the day, all of us are part of the Conservative family and we’re going to have to come together to fight the next election and be successful.”
Charest, along with the contest’s other five contenders, are headed to Edmonton to participate in the party’s first official leadership debate happening in English on Wednesday, which will be followed by one in French two weeks later.
Party members and interested Canadians had a chance to see how five out of the six candidates reacted to one another when they took the stage in Ottawa last week for an unofficial debate, held as part of a conference for conservative faithful.
They saw an hour and a half of fiery exchanges, which included Leslyn Lewis laying into fellow MP Pierre Poilievre for his stand against COVID-19 mandates and Poilievre going after Charest for his past work with Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei. Poilievre also accused Charest of being a Liberal for having led the Quebec Liberal party.
“Our members are highly engaged,” said Andrew Scheer, the former Conservative leader and Saskatchewan MP who is now working to get Poilievre elected.
“Our members want to see how leadership candidates can handle the sparring from each other, because it’s going to be a lot tougher in a general election campaign.”
Speaking ahead of last week’s debate, Scheer said Poilievre — who has earned the reputation of being a bulldog through years of aggressive performances in the House of Commons — also comes with a deep knowledge of policy.
“He is one of the most well prepared members of Parliament I’ve ever seen,” Scheer said.
Laryssa Waler, who previously served as Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s director of communications, said debates take a back seat to the party memberships candidates have to sell to supporters by June 3, if they hope to count on them picking their name on the party’s ranked ballot.
She said while watching debates, it’s important to remember most Conservatives have already chosen which candidate to back. Those on stage are also looking for opportunities to chip away at the support of their rivals, Waler added.
“Everybody else on that stage needs Pierre not to get 50 per cent,” she said, referring to the fact that a candidate must achieve majority support to be declared the winner when the ballots are counted on Sept. 10.
“If Pierre gets 50 per cent, it’s over.”
Poilievre returns to Edmonton after holding a rally in the city last month that drew more than 2,000 people. His raucous events have been a defining feature of his campaign, which insiders say is a sign of momentum rarely seen in leadership races.
One big difference between last week’s debate and Wednesday’s will be the presence of Patrick Brown, the mayor of Brampton, Ont. His campaign said he decided to forgo last week’s event to sell memberships. He did, however, declare that he “won” in an email sent out afterwards.
Brown, like Charest, sees a path to victory by bringing in droves of new Conservative members, rather than trying to win over the existing grassroots. Brown is specifically focusing his efforts on drawing support from racialized Canadians, including those with Muslim, Tamil, Sikh, Chinese or Nepalese heritage.
Michelle Rempel Garner, the longtime Calgary MP who is a co-chair on Brown’s campaign, said the party needs to grow in these communities in large cities to be more competitive against the Liberals.
As such, she hopes those watching Wednesday’s debate will put themselves in the shoes of an undecided voter and ask themselves who is the best suited to make sure the Conservative party wins the next federal election.
Topics expected to be covered at Wednesday’s debate include the future of energy and the environment, law and order, the cost of living and the North.
Rempel Garner said the party would be wise to organize the topics in such a way that candidates address issues that have in the past held Canadians back from voting Conservative.
“Specifically topics like child care, like support for religious freedoms, like support for the LGBTQ community, like our position on women’s rights, reproductive health … and climate,” she said.
“Those are all issues that have repeatedly dogged our party over several elections.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 10, 2022.
WINNIPEG – The federal New Democrats have kept a longtime stronghold in the Elmwood-Transcona riding in Winnipeg.
The NDP’s Leila Dance won a close battle over Conservative candidate Colin Reynolds, and says the community has spoken in favour of priorities such as health care and the cost of living.
Elmwood-Transcona has elected a New Democrat in every election except one since the riding was formed in 1988.
The seat became open after three-term member of Parliament Daniel Blaikie resigned in March to take a job with the Manitoba government.
A political analyst the NDP is likely relieved to have kept the seat in what has been one of their strongest urban areas.
Christopher Adams, an adjunct professor of political studies at the University of Manitoba, says NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh worked hard to keep the seat in a tight race.
“He made a number of visits to Winnipeg, so if they had lost this riding it would have been disastrous for the NDP,” Adams said.
The strong Conservative showing should put wind in that party’s sails, Adams added, as their percentage of the popular vote in Elmwood-Transcona jumped sharply from the 2021 election.
“Even though the Conservatives lost this (byelection), they should walk away from it feeling pretty good.”
Dance told reporters Monday night she wants to focus on issues such as the cost of living while working in Ottawa.
“We used to be able to buy a cart of groceries for a hundred dollars and now it’s two small bags. That is something that will affect everyone in this riding,” Dance said.
Liberal candidate Ian MacIntyre placed a distant third,
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024
OTTAWA – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau say the Liberals have “all sorts of reflections” to make after losing a second stronghold in a byelection in Montreal Monday night.
His comments come as the Liberal cabinet gathers for its first regularly scheduled meeting of the fall sitting of Parliament, which began Monday.
Trudeau’s Liberals were hopeful they could retain the Montreal riding of LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, but those hopes were dashed after the Bloc Québécois won it in an extremely tight three-way race with the NDP.
Louis-Philippe Sauvé, an administrator at the Institute for Research in Contemporary Economics, beat Liberal candidate Laura Palestini by less than 250 votes. The NDP finished about 600 votes back of the winner.
It is the second time in three months that Trudeau’s party lost a stronghold in a byelection. In June, the Conservatives defeated the Liberals narrowly in Toronto-St. Paul’s.
The Liberals won every seat in Toronto and almost every seat on the Island of Montreal in the last election, and losing a seat in both places has laid bare just how low the party has fallen in the polls.
“Obviously, it would have been nicer to be able to win and hold (the Montreal riding), but there’s more work to do and we’re going to stay focused on doing it,” Trudeau told reporters ahead of this morning’s cabinet meeting.
When asked what went wrong for his party, Trudeau responded “I think there’s all sorts of reflections to take on that.”
In French, he would not say if this result puts his leadership in question, instead saying his team has lots of work to do.
Bloc leader Yves-François Blanchet will hold a press conference this morning, but has already said the results are significant for his party.
“The victory is historic and all of Quebec will speak with a stronger voice in Ottawa,” Blanchet wrote on X, shortly after the winner was declared.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh and his party had hoped to ride to a win in Montreal on the popularity of their candidate, city councillor Craig Sauvé, and use it to further their goal of replacing the Liberals as the chief alternative to the Conservatives.
The NDP did hold on to a seat in Winnipeg in a tight race with the Conservatives, but the results in Elmwood-Transcona Monday were far tighter than in the last several elections. NDP candidate Leila Dance defeated Conservative Colin Reynolds by about 1,200 votes.
Singh called it a “big victory.”
“Our movement is growing — and we’re going to keep working for Canadians and building that movement to stop Conservative cuts before they start,” he said on social media.
“Big corporations have had their governments. It’s the people’s time.”
New Democrats recently pulled out of their political pact with the government in a bid to distance themselves from the Liberals, making the prospects of a snap election far more likely.
Trudeau attempted to calm his caucus at their fall retreat in Nanaimo, B.C, last week, and brought former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney on as an economic adviser in a bid to shore up some credibility with voters.
The latest byelection loss will put more pressure on him as leader, with many polls suggesting voter anger is more directed at Trudeau himself than at Liberal policies.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 17, 2024.
The New Democrats have declared a federal byelection victory in their Winnipeg stronghold riding of Elmwood—Transcona.
The NDP candidate Leila Dance told supporters in a tearful speech that even though the final results weren’t in, she expected she would see them in Ottawa.
With several polls still to be counted, Conservative candidate Colin Reynolds conceded defeat and told his volunteers that they should be proud of what the Conservatives accomplished in the campaign.
Political watchers had a keen eye on the results to see if the Tories could sway traditionally NDP voters on issues related to labour and affordability.
Meanwhile in the byelection race in the Montreal riding of LaSalle—Émard—Verdun the NDP, Liberals and Bloc Québécois remained locked in an extremely tight three-way race as the results trickled in slowly.
The Liberal stronghold riding had a record 91 names on the ballot, and the results aren’t expected until the early hours of the morning.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
