The Hounds of War

Harper starts a run on the trust bank (Toronto Star)

2006-02-11T21:05:00.000-06:00

Public's trust has been bruised already

February 11, 2006

JAMES TRAVERS

Hope is the paper money of politics, trust is its gold standard. Prudently managed, hope and trust can buy power back from those caught abusing it and give governments the freedom needed to operate in the public interest.

So, how well off are Stephen Harper and the Conservatives just weeks after an election and days after forming a cabinet? Not as rich as they were before those two seminal events.

First impressions are important and the one imprinted so far is unsettling: Squint at Harper and his party and see Paul Martin and his.

It's not just the obvious parallels between defectors David Emerson and Belinda Stronach. It's not even that Harper broke two promises by appointing Michael Fortier to the Senate and making him the essentially unaccountable minister of public works and government services, historically a patronage hotbed and, of course, the department that wet-nursed the Quebec sponsorship scandal.

No, what's really worrying is the almost instant return of situational ethics. In explaining themselves this week, Conservatives sounded like they were reading from the Liberal manual.

There's precious little to choose between Harper's justification for reversing course to secure two credible ministers as well as strong cabinet voices for Vancouver and Montreal, and Jean Chrétien's defence that he broke a few contracting rules to save the country. Joined at the philosophical hip, both energetically make the case that the ends justify the means.

It's a familiar argument. Down south, George W. Bush is wearing it thin trying to convince his fellow Americans that Big Brother is only being protective when he spies on them or rides roughshod over the rights that define a great nation.

But, like Chrétien, Harper faces a harder sell than Bush. Americans traumatized by 9/11 are far more willing to consider their president's argument than Canadians, appalled by the culture of entitlement, are likely to be appeased by their prime minister's words.

To stretch the comparison to the breaking point, Bush has Osama bin Laden to help him muscle his country into letting the government do what it says is right — even if it's wrong — while Harper has Justice John Gomery reminding this country that faith in politicians is sorely misplaced. The difference is significant.

Canada's parliamentary system functions on two layers of trust.

Ordinary folks elect representatives in the expectation they will do their jobs, to the best of their ability and largely out of mind, while the rest of us get on with daily life. And those in the House of Commons make the similar assumption that a powerful executive will keep its arm out of the cookie jar whether or not anyone is watching.

What Gomery and academic advisers wisely recognized — while some critics have not — is that both trust layers are badly broken. Voters who can't be sure candidates won't instantly defect to greener opportunities have no guarantee of future conduct or, for that matter, any reason to cast another ballot. And parliamentarians who can't rely on prime ministers and their cliques to let ethics occasionally triumph over political or personal advantage have no reason to give complex government machinery the room and flexibility it needs to work.

Trying to restore those broken layers is a tough job. It requires the rigorous discipline abhorred by politicians trying to tighten their grip on power as well as by parties prospecting for a new leader.

The more cheerful news is that the task holds opportunities for Conservatives and Liberals.

To convince Canadians something more has changed than the noses in the public trough, Harper will have to read the riot act to a cabinet with the potential to be, well, ethically accident-prone.

The national capital's cruellest game is guessing the minister who will be forced first to explain a fishy contract. Will it be Fortier, who is connected by capillary to Quebec Conservatives, or Gordon O'Connor, the former general and lobbyist Harper dangerously named defence minister, or some dark horse?

Liberals have a different challenge and a different opportunity. They need to control their power lust long enough to allow some overdue introspection while peering far enough into the future to find a leader not tainted by the past.

If Conservatives succeed, they can put this week's bad impression behind them. If Liberals succeed, they will find someone untainted by the 13 years of corruptive power.

But both will fail if they again forget that it's much easier to withdraw from the hope and trust account than it is to make a deposit.

MP may bail over turncoat (Ottawa Sun)

2006-02-11T20:59:00.000-06:00

By STEPHANIE RUBEC, PARLIAMENTARY BUREAU

February 11, 2006

Conservative MP Garth Turner is contemplating leaving his caucus over the backlash from Prime Minister Stephen Harper's officials, angry at his public criticism of Liberal turncoat David Emerson's appointment to cabinet.

In his online blog, Turner says he had a series of "unhappy meetings" with caucus officials Thursday over his comments, including one with Harper, who demanded he publicly support the appointment.

The Halton MP said party officials have made him feel unwelcome, and have caused him to reconsider sitting in the Commons under the Tory banner.

"Right now I do not feel I'm allowed to do what I want and say what I think," Turner said in an interview yesterday, pointing out he'll decide whether to stay in the caucus after talking to party officials this weekend.

Turner said he would continue to sit as an MP and represent Halton if he does decide to bolt to the Tory caucus.

And Turner insisted he'll either table or back a private member's bill forcing politicians like Emerson who want to change their stripes after an election to run in a byelection.

"I'm expecting the Whip will be assigning me a renovated washroom somewhere in a forgotten corner of a vermin-infested dank basement in Ottawa," Turner wrote after meeting with Harper. "That should go well with my seat in the House of Commons that will be visible only during lunar eclipses."

William Stairs, Harper's director of communication, said Turner shouldn't expect to be a part of the team if he doesn't play the political game.

Yesterday, New Democrat MP Peter Julian asked the ethics commissioner to investigate the circumstances surrounding Emerson's decision to join the government. Emerson has said he was approached by the Tories.

Julian said that could place Harper in violation of Parliament's conflict-of-interest code, which prohibits members from acting to further their own or other MPs' private interests.

Dear Prime Minister Frankenstein (Charles Adler Online)

2006-02-11T06:58:00.000-06:00

February 7, 2006

The Harper honeymoon cannot be over. It never started.

Honeymoonis interruptis for the true blue believers. These folks felt like mouldy oldie spinsters, of little interest to any suitors for nearly 13 years. Imagine what it's like to be the bride in the bathroom of the honeymoon suite primping for the new stallion, only to step into the boudoir and find him in bed with a Lady in Red.

Only hours earlier you were the belle of the ball. Now you're the bride of Frankenstein.

Dear Prime Minister Frankenstein,

Remember the good old days when Belinda Stronach saw you as the horse with no game?

Every Conservative agreed when you said her gambit wasn't about principle. Just ambition. You probably wanted to say blond ambition. But you knew that Mrs. Harper would remove the kibble from your bowl.

Because you think of yourself as principled, nobody doubts that you can dress up this pig of a political play as principled. The government needs to have a member from one of Canada's three big cities. The government needs David Emerson's experience in international trade. After all, look at all he has accomplished so far on softwood lumber.

What exactly has he accomplished, Frankenstein?

Oh and one more "principle." The government needs to have a Vancouver MP in cabinet during preparations for the Vancouver Olympics. Now is it just me or are these eggs a bit runny?

The first rule of politics is that if you have to explain it, you're losing. The second rule of politics is that if you are trying to tell the faithful that you are a chess player and they are just checker players, you're losing.

Frankenstein, your messaging monkeys will tell you that you're a strategic thinker and your frustrated troops cannot spell "think." Grant those monkeys the real estate inside your brain and you will surely become the second coming of Joe Clark. Many of your staffers cannot remember those 15 minutes of lame when Joe was sworn in as prime minister and swore to God the Grits were gone for good. He thought Trudeau had hung up the holster just because the former PM said he would. But good ol' Pierre, rogue that he was, still had one more Derringer in his boot.

Fast forward to last fall. Remember how much sympathy you elicited from the true believers when Belinda decided to share the same treehouse with Ol' Man Martin. I mean, you didn't have them sobbing in their hankies the way Potato Patch Peter did. But that was understandable, Frankenstein. You only lost your shot at a coup. Peter lost his coo coo kachoo.

And all this brings us around to your very first act in office. You brought Liberal David Emerson into government. Apparently you didn't even ask him to turn in his Liberal membership card before putting his hand on the Bible.

You took a guy who told everyone in his riding that they should not vote for your guy because you were on the far right. After being sworn in, he told people that his entry into cabinet meant you were tacking left.

By the way, Frankenstein. Did you at least wait until you were elected before you bagged this four-point buck? Hope you had the boys pat him down. Hope he wasn't Grewalled up. Wired for sound? You would never feel cumfy wumfy with the public listening to the tape of you whispering sweet nothings into Liberal ears.

Speaking of nothing, didn't you once believe that Liberals stood for nothing?

Is that what makes David Emerson so comfortable in standing with you?

Emerson websites and blogs

2006-02-11T06:40:00.000-06:00

>> Recall David Emerson
>> Recall Emerson Petition
>> Elect Emerson
>> Joan Tintor's Blog
>> Garth Turner's Blog (The Turner Report)

Tory MPs say Emerson should run in a byelection (Politics Watch)

2006-02-11T06:30:00.000-06:00

I'm too sexy for this jacket

by Romeo St. Martin

February 9, 2006

OTTAWA — Two Conservative MPs are now publicly urging Trade Minister David Emerson to resign his seat and run as a Conservative in a Vancouver byelection.

Tory MPs Garth Turner and Myron Thompson both made the comments to reporters outside a Tory caucus orientation on Parliament Hill.

"I think being a Member of Parliament is a very important thing and I think being elected is a very important part of that," Turner said.

"So I said during the campaign that I think anyone who crosses the floor ultimately should go back to the people for ratification and I stick by it.

"And hopefully in this case that will happen. Sooner? Later? I don't know when. But the prime minister took a calculated gamble in what he did."

Turner, however, said he wanted to be careful not to contradict Prime Minister Stephen Harper with his decision to name Emerson to cabinet two weeks after he was elected in Vancouver as a Liberal.

"The guy's obviously got a plan, but I'm not privy to it."

Turner said he was going to work within his caucus to get legislation put forward to discourage floor crossing.

He also expressed dismay about the Emerson appointment on his blog.

Other Tories were more tight lipped and walked briskly past reporters or offered up "no comments."

But Alberta MP Myron Thompson, one of the original members of the Reform caucus, said the Emerson decision is not sitting well with him or his constituents.

Thompson said also wants to see legislation in place to prevent people from crossing the floor.

When asked if Emerson should resign his seat and run in a byelection, Thompson said.

"Without the legislation in place to force it, I wouldn't suggest that has to be the case. I would say if he did it it would be the honourable thing to do."

While backbench Tory MPs are now starting to publicly question Emerson's appointment, no cabinet minister has cross that line yet.

"I don't think he's required to run in a byelection," said Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay. "It's certainly not legally necessary."

Harper, Emerson and controversial Senate appointee Michael Fortier did not speak with reporters on Thursday.

Emerson was scheduled to hold a teleconference with reporters late in the afternoon. Reporters waited on hold for half an hour before the operator informed them Emerson was "caught in traffic" and would have to reschedule the call at a later date.

Harper's honeymoon over 'before it began' (CTV)

2006-02-11T06:24:00.000-06:00

February 10 2006

Canadian Press

OTTAWA — It wasn't supposed to be this way.

Given the experienced brain trust on Stephen Harper's Conservative transition team, no one was predicting such a controversial first week for the new prime minister and his rookie cabinet.

The brouhaha began 25 minutes before Harper was even sworn into office Monday morning, when former Liberal industry minister David Emerson arrived at Rideau Hall in front of a gob-smacked national media to be sworn in as Tory trade minister.

By Friday, the array of troubles ranged from the Conservative front bench to its parliamentary secretaries, from federal-provincial relations through the Tory back bench, and even into its beleaguered communications group and the harried departmental staffing team.

"It's sort of like, 'The best laid plans go awry,"' said Jonathan Rose, an expert in political communications at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont.

"It reminds us that politics is the stuff of individual personalities and people who often are at odds with the leadership of the party."

Just how bad were Harper's first five days in office? Let us count the ways:

* Emerson's stunning defection to Harper's cabinet two weeks after he was elected as a Liberal outraged even many Tory stalwarts, who had supported legislation banning such party-switching. "I expected some of the superficial criticism I've seen," Harper responded to the Vancouver Sun, the rhetorical equivalent of waving a red flag in front of a bull. Since then, Emerson's work on the softwood lumber file has been questioned, he's contemplated quitting politics and his cabinet reward has formally been referred to Parliament's ethics commissioner by the NDP.
* Michael Fortier, the unelected Conservative campaign co-chairman who was elevated to cabinet and given a Senate appointment, told reporters he hadn't run for office because he didn't feel like it.
* Gordon O'Connor, the new defence minister, is being challenged because of his past work as a military procurement lobbyist. His new job will put him in charge of massive spending on military procurement.
* Ted Menzies, the affable Alberta MP, was made parliamentary secretary for the francophonie and official languages, although he speaks no French.
* Ontario MP Garth Turner, a former cabinet minister in the Brian Mulroney government, spoke openly about his disdain for Emerson's floor-crossing and was called on the carpet by Harper -- only to write about the dressing down on his web site. Turner now plans to introduce a private member's bill calling for floor-crossers to face voters in byelections.

There was also the matter of MPs slipping en masse out back doors to avoid reporters after their first national caucus meeting; a cabinet session at Meech Lake that left the national media huddled on a wind-swept highway seeking comment from ministers in limousines that didn't stop; and at least two significant phone calls -- one between Harper and Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty and another between Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay and the U.S. secretary of state -- about which the government provided no information.

Not coincidentally, the party is reportedly having trouble finding experienced people to staff key positions.

"It's staggering that their honeymoon is over before it's begun," said David Docherty, dean of Arts at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont.

With steady hands including Senator Hugh Segal, a career Tory backroomer, and former Mulroney chief of staff Derek Burney on the transition team, no one foresaw such early chaos.

"It means one of two things," said Montreal Liberal Denis Coderre. "Either the guy (Harper) is a loner, or I missed something."

The Tory communications troubles are nothing new for those familiar with Harper's leadership and his open disdain for the inexact science of media messaging.

But supporters, and even some critics, say Harper has all too often been underestimated.

Party strategist Goldy Hyder dismissed the first week of controversies as a natural consequence of political coverage.

"I don't remember you guys reporting safe landings," he said.

And he hinted there's some kind of method to the madness.

Harper opened the federal election campaign in November by promising to revisit Canada's same-sex marriage law, a statement many commentators considered a profound misstep. It wound up helping inoculate Harper from later criticism.

Hyder hopes the troubled opening week serves the same purpose.

"I can't help but compare it to the launch of the campaign where everybody said, 'Geez, you guys just ended it before it started with the same-sex (marriage) comment.' These things all pass."

Dissident Tory seeks to introduce bill to curtail party-switching (cnews)

2006-02-11T06:22:00.000-06:00

By STEPHEN THORNE

February 10, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - A rebellious Conservative wants to introduce legislation that would deter future David Emersons and Belinda Stronachs from switching political parties.

Ontario MP Garth Turner hopes to push ahead with a private member's bill even after being reprimanded by Prime Minister Stephen Harper for his outspoken stand.

"It's on the public agenda and I think it needs to be addressed. People feel a bit cynical about the system," Turner said in an interview Friday.

"Let's talk about it, let's try and fix it."

He says he doesn't regret his decision to speak out against Emerson's jump to the Tories. But he expects there will be a price to pay.

In his online blog, Turner writes that he expects to be assigned an office in "a renovated washroom somewhere in a forgotten corner of a vermin-infested dank basement."

He said he had a series of unhappy meetings with caucus officials Thursday over his comments, including one with Harper.

"I think it is now safe to say my career options within the Conservative caucus are seriously limited," writes Turner, a former columnist and Progressive Conservative MP, now representing the Ontario riding of Halton.

"If you would like a course on how not to be popular in Ottawa, then take a seat."

Turner told The Canadian Press that he was asked to "curtail my activities" - but refused.

"I am a member of Parliament," he said. "That's my job. When my constituents are upset about something, it's my job to relay that."

Turner said earlier this week that Emerson, a Vancouver-area Liberal who crossed the floor Monday to take the post of trade minister in Harper's cabinet, should step down.

His proposed legislation would require MPs to face voters in a byelection when they want to switch parties. It's extremely rare for a private member's bill to succeed in the House of Commons.

Even if it were successful, the bill would only apply in the future, not in Emerson's case.

"You couldn't do something like this retroactively. But I think, going forward, we need to improve the system from what it is today," he said in an interview.

On Friday, New Democrat MP Peter Julian asked the ethics commissioner to investigate the circumstances surrounding Emerson's decision to join the government. Emerson has said he was approached by the Tories and offered the cabinet job.

Julian said that could place Harper in violation of Parliament's conflict-of-interest code, which prohibits members from acting to further their own or other MPs' private interests.

"It is our opinion that the considerable increase in salary, augmented potential pension, staff and assorted perks enjoyed by members of the cabinet such as a personal car and driver amount to furthering Mr. Emerson's private interests over what he would have received as an opposition MP," wrote Julian, who represents the B.C. riding of Burnaby-New Westminster.

"Therefore, in our opinion, Mr. Harper may be in breach of Section 8 of the Conflict of Interest Code and I would ask that you investigate this matter."

In what he called a principled position, Turner said all government members - not just cabinet ministers - should be elected as members of the party that forms the government.

"Anybody who switches parties should go back to the people. To do otherwise is to place politicians above the people when, actually, it's the other way around."

Turner said his comments were deemed "not helpful."

Harper has been under fire all week for appointing Emerson and unelected Montrealer Michael Fortier to cabinet.

Fortier, a Tory organizer who was handed Public Works, will be appointed to the Senate until the next federal election, when he plans to seek a seat in the Commons.

The appointments, which Harper says were designed to give two of the country's biggest cities representation in cabinet, rankled many Conservative MPs.

The party had previously contended that floor-crossers like former Conservative Belinda Stronach should have to face the electorate before taking their new seats. And Harper has been a strong advocate of an elected Senate.

Turner said he had "swallowed with gusto" promises of more free votes, more powerful committees of "free-thinking" MPs, a more responsive government, and an elected and responsible Senate.

He said Harper's decision to appoint a floor-crossing Liberal and an unelected party official to cabinet "seemed to fly in the face of everything I had told voters about accountability and democracy."

"It also made me question the whole process."

Turner, who moved into his constituency office Thursday night, said he knew in advance the potential consequences of taking his stand.

"Speaking of offices, after today I'm expecting the Whip will be assigning me a renovated washroom somewhere in a forgotten corner of a vermin-infested dank basement in Ottawa," he said. "That should go well with my seat in the House of Commons that will be visible only during lunar eclipses."

Harper's caucus crisis (Politics Watch)

2006-02-11T06:19:00.000-06:00

by Romeo St. Martin

February 10, 2006

OTTAWA — "I would like to be Stephen Harper's worst nightmare … I'm going to be in his face."

Trade Minister David Emerson on election night.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper's decision to hand a cabinet job to Liberal turncoat David Emerson and a Senate seat and cabinet job to party official Michael Fortier has become not only a public relations disaster but is creating quite a strain on his caucus.

As many as eight MPs have either expressed reservations or openly criticized the new appointees publicly.

And on Thursday, few MPs or cabinet ministers were willing to discuss the new cabinet ministers with reporters, as they rushed past them on their way into a caucus orientation and then snuck out the back at the end of the day.

It is the first time divisions within the normally disciplined Tory caucus have been evident since the Canadian Alliance and Progressive Conservative Party united in a merger in 2003 that many expected would not be easy.

The reasoning was that the "progressives" in the Tory caucus could not get along with the "populists" and "social conservatives" in the Alliance, previously known as Reform.

But after a leadership convention, a policy convention, a disappointing 2004 election and two years in opposition reporters in Ottawa were disappointed to find that those divisions were not creating the problems from the two factions in the party that had been anticipated.

Harper's leadership style was the subject of some grumbling, but there never was a tipping point and the Tory caucus remained largely united.

While the Liberal caucus was leaking damaging quotes from their caucus meetings, the Tories remained disciplined. Not everyone was happy with Harper, but no one was ever in disagreement enough to the point where they saw the need to make a strategic leak.

That changed this week after Harper made his controversial appointments.

For the first time in recent memory details about the behind-the-scenes happenings in the Conservative caucus meeting since the election were leaked out to the Globe and Mail in a story that was published Wednesday morning.

"The caucus meeting was described as unusually quiet, with Mr. Harper doing most of the talking," the Globe reported.

"Everybody was in shock," a western MP told the Globe.

In two well-kept cabinet moves (that supporters are calling brilliant), Harper has done more to create division in his caucus and - based on the opinions coming out this week from Blogging Tories - the conservative movement as a whole than any differences on abortion, gay marriage, national unity -- you name it -- since the two parties merged in 2003.

The prime minister said his thinking on this issue is to provide representation to people in Vancouver and Montreal, two of the three major metropolises where the Conservatives did not elect MPs in the election.

But critics were quick to point out that Harper did not name anyone to represent Toronto.

Harper says his new finance minister Jim Flaherty, who represents a riding in Oshawa, would be Toronto's voice at the cabinet table.

But then that would seem to kill the argument for the need for Vancouver to have David Emerson in cabinet, as Tory MP James Moore represents a Vancouver area riding that is much closer to Stanley Park than Flaherty's riding office is to the CN Tower.

As for Fortier, there are two Montreal-area Conservatives already in the Senate who Harper could have put in cabinet without breaking a promise to name elected senators to the upper chamber. And Fortier's Senate riding doesn't even include any part of Montreal in its boundaries.

Toronto Star columnist Chantal Hebert observed this week that Emerson and Fortier were likely not selected to represent constituents in those two major cities, but to represent business elites.

Emerson is a former forestry executive with lumber giant Canfor and Fortier is a Mulroney Tory who was an executive in Montreal's financial community.

By making these two controversial appointments, Harper has now placed a large chunk of his caucus in an untenable situation for what some see as no good reason.

Former Reformers, who have campaigned for over two decades for an elected Senate and criticized virtually every Mulroney, Chretien and Martin Senate appointment, now have to face reporters' questions about Harper's decision.

On Emerson, 40 Tory MPs voted in November in favour of a private members motion to examine forcing floor crossing MPs to sit as independents and run in a byelection.

While Harper is not in favour of such legislation, there is no doubt that he is not a fan of turncoats.

In May of last year on the day Belinda Stronach left the Tory caucus for a cabinet job, an overtly bitter Harper held a press conference on Parliament Hill where he freely took cheap shots at every opening offered.

Maclean's columnist Paul Wells asked Harper how come the Liberals seemed to be the main beneficiaries of turncoats while the Tories always seem to be the one to be on the losing end.

Harper said his party wouldn't go out of its way to "romance" MPs to cross the floor.

"We are trying to create a principled party where people act in a principled way," Harper said.

"We're fairly cautious about encouraging party jumping because I think that's the kind of thing that generates cynicism and frankly when somebody jumps once you're not sure to trust them that they won't jump the next time."

But somehow on Monday, people acting in a principled way and concerns about public cynicism no longer seemed to be a priority once Harper's party got power.

Emerson did not leave the Liberal party because of any fundamental policy difference that he could explain to reporters.

What he made clear is he left the Liberals because they were no longer in power - plain and simple. Emerson sees himself not as a politician, but as a career cabinet minister.

He even said if former prime minister Paul Martin won the election two weeks earlier he would have remained on with the Liberals.

Harper has not taken questions since Monday and Conservative MPs who attended two caucus meetings this week are having a difficult job spinning to reporters a story that would even be hard for the partisan of Liberals to swallow.

On Tuesday, several MPs and cabinet ministers repeated similar talking points in defence of Emerson.

Conservative MP James Moore, who did not make the cabinet cut for B.C. and was one of Stronach's harshest critics post defection, was smirking as he repeated talking points about Emerson.

"All I know is that David Emerson is a very talented guy who will do good things for British Columbia," he said on more than one occasion.

But at least Moore was able to get the talking points out.

MPs gave Emerson and Fortier polite applause when Harper introduced them to caucus, but there was not a whistle, cheer or a "woo hoo" to be heard.

Pressed by reporters after the meeting, MP Ken Epp refused to praise the new cabinet picks.

"I'm not willing to get into the middle of this thing, you guys," he said to reporters. "You're not going to get anything out of me. I'm supportive of my leader and my team."

Tory MP Maurice Vellacott momentarily broke way from the talking points and told reporters "if you want me to be honest, I've got a bit of an uncomfortable feel about it."

Later that same day, the Canadian Press reported MP Bill Casey said he was annoyed with Emerson being in charge of the softwood lumber file because of how he has handled it while industry minister with the Liberals.

"I'm not very happy about that, no," he told a Nova Scotia radio station.

The following day, two anonymous Tory MPs spoke out to the Globe and Mail. One described the moves this way, "This is shocking. It's just unbelievable. Who was Stephen talking to? We campaigned against this kind of stuff."

By the time the Tory caucus met again on Parliament Hill on Thursday for an orientation session, a siege mentality had taken over a number of MPs, who when in opposition always seemed to have time for scrums to take a swipe at the Liberals.

Cabinet ministers like Jay Hill and Rona Ambrose did not break stride as they walked into the meeting room, seemingly unable or unwilling to defend their embattled new colleagues.

Ambrose is one of four Tory cabinet ministers who voted in favour of Bill C-251, a private members motion that would examine prohibiting MPs from crossing the floor.

The others are Bev Oda, Diane Finley and Carol Skelton.

Skelton even introduced her own motion similar to C-251 last year to limit party swapping.

But speaking with reporters Thursday, it seems such a bill was sooo 2005.

"That was last year," Skelton said. "We talked about it and I decided not to proceed with it. It's one of those matters that is debatable."

However, not all MPs are appear willing to reverse positions, stretch their credibility or hide from reporters to defend Harper's decision to embrace Emerson.

And this includes Senate appointee Fortier, who told CanWest that MPs who cross the floor should face voters in a byelection.

MP Myron Thompson suggested he would prefer it if Emerson resigned and ran in a byelection as a Conservative. He called it the honourable thing to do.

Ontario MP Garth Turner was more frank and said while he didn't want to second guess Harper it was his view before Monday that those who cross the floor should resign and run in byelections and that Harper's embracing of Emerson wasn't going to change his view now.

Late Thursday evening, Turner reported on his blog that his frankness with reporters did not sit well in a meeting he had later in the evening with Harper and other conversations with party officials.

"This one MP came face-to-face with the party machine in a series of unhappy meetings including one tonight with the prime minister," he wrote. "I think it is now safe to say my career options within the Conservative caucus are seriously limited."

If Harper is making an example out of Turner, as Turner alleges, then it seems he is willing to butt heads with someone who has been a well-known Conservative for two decades in defence of someone who was making up Tory hidden agenda allegations last month.

Also shocking in this whole episode this week is the incredible arrogance being exuded by Harper and his controversial cabinet ministers.

To paraphrase John Lennon, Emerson appears to believe he is "Bigger than the Liberals."

When asked about his former Liberal riding association wanting back more than $90,000 it spent on his election campaign, Emerson said, "I think these people ought to give their head a shake and ask themselves how much of that money would have even come to the Liberal party if I hadn't been there."

Fortier was asked by reporters if he wanted to serve in cabinet why didn't he run in the federal election. His response sounded like something that could be used in a future Liberal attack ad: "I didn't run in the election because I didn't want to run in the election."

As for Harper, he seems to believe he is smarter than his critics on this matter and has no problem expressing this view publicly even if those critics could include some of his long-time, loyal caucus supporters.

In an interview with the Vancouver Sun this week, Harper called the criticism "superficial."

"But I think once people sit back and reflect, they'll understand that this is in the best interests of not just British Columbia but frankly of good government," Harper added.

For the time being, the good of the government will have to wait.

Right now we have government on the run, with MPs being muzzled, cabinet ministers sneaking out the back door, the entire press gallery sensing fear and cabinet ministers, presumably without cellphones, canceling teleconferences because of traffic tie ups.

Harper and his crew will have to ride this out because as it stands now the only man who can put an immediate end to this situation is David Emerson - and that is certainly Stephen Harper's worst nightmare.

Stephen Harper sets idiocy record--commits political suicide during swearing-in ceremony

2006-02-09T19:38:00.000-06:00

by Greg Felton

February 09 2006

Before the first Throne Speech is delivered, Canada’s new prime minister has managed to destroy his own credibility, infuriate his own MPs, and negate his party’s moral authority to govern.

Near the end of my Jan. 5 column I said that if the Harper Party managed to form the next government, it would spend so much time in damage control mode that it would have no time to govern. At the time, I thought the government benches would at least be warm before the first disaster struck, but I misjudged Stephen Harper’s propensity for self-immolation.

Before the first Throne Speech is delivered, Canada’s new prime minister has managed to destroy his own credibility, infuriate his own MPs, and negate his party’s moral authority to govern. This startling three-fold flame-out is not the result of a simple misjudgment; it represents a fundamental failure of character, and for a man who sanctimoniously prated on about the Liberals’ lack of ethics and how his party was going to revitalize Canadian democracy, this disaster is irreparable.

As recently as Dec. 14, 2005, Harper declared: “We need sweeping reforms to show Canadians that their national government will not tolerate corruption in the future. Cleaning up corruption and restoring accountability is the first step. We also need to vigorously pursue other measures to put Canada back in the forefront of democratic practice.”

Two elements of this plan for democratic reform include establishing a federal process for electing Senators, and requiring that a party’s local candidate has the approval of the constituency association.

Harper is a vigorous detractor of Canada's Senate because it is an appointed body, and he has condemned the Liberal practice of bringing in outside big-name candidates to carry the party banner in ridings where they have no history with the electorate or support among the constituency association. By appointing Michel Fortier and David Emerson to cabinet, Harper deliberately betrayed both principles.

Fortier was Harper's campaign chairman, and Harper appointed him to the Senate just so he could make him Minister of Public Works and Government Services. (Oooh, can you spell “cronyism?” Knew you could.) Emerson is/was an elected Liberal from Vancouver–Kingsway whom Harper invited to cross the floor to become Minister of International Trade inter alia.

All things being equal, the Fortier appointment should not be considered an outrage. In 1962, Conservative Prime Minister John Diefenbaker appointed Malcolm Wallace McCutcheon to the Senate so he could become Minister of Trade and Commerce. According to tradition, political outsiders must be appointed to the Senate to sit in Cabinet or run in a byelection as soon as possible.

But things aren't equal. McCutcheon was an outsider who had had no political experience. Fortier is a long-time party apparatchik who should have had the courage to stand for election. Second, Diefenbaker didn’t run on a holier-than-thou platform of “democratic reform.” Many people supported Harper because of his contempt for the appointed Senate his pledge to turn it into an elected assembly. Now they see that Harper would rather betray this principle so that he could appoint Fortier rather than select one of his 123 elected MPs.

Harper defended both the Fortier and Emerson appointments claiming that he needed to have government representation in Canada's biggest cities, but that’s a rationalization not an explanation. The lack of big-city MPs is entirely due to the fact that educated, urban voters overwhelmingly rejected Harper’s parochial brand of government.

Second, what does it -say about Harper’s faith in his caucus. Long-serving Harper Party MPs like Diane Ablonczy and Jay Hill were passed over in favour of, um… “parachute” ministers. They and other MPs are justifiably furious that Harper would embrace the very practices the party condemned.

Of the two above-mentioned appointments, Emerson’s is clearly the most hypocritical. Last May, when Belinda Stronach crossed the floor to join the Liberal government, Harper Party MP Tony Abbott said she “whored herself out for power.” Emerson didn’t?! Here is a man who didn’t even wait until Parliament began sitting before accepting Harper’s offer, yet had the gall to say he “absolutely” would have stayed a Liberal if the party held on to power. Seems this political mercenary thinks himself too good to sit on the Opposition benches. Thus, it came to pass that the man who declared in January that he wanted to be Harper’s “worst nightmare” overnight chose to become Harper’s wet dream.

Even if the Emerson/Fortier scandals hadn’t happened, Harper's Cabinet is hardly a model of ethical transparency.

Stockwell Day (Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness)—Day is a delusional Christian zealot and Israel ass-kisser who spent much of his time as foreign affairs critic denouncing the Martin government for not being an echo chamber for Israeli aggression. For Day, Palestinian resistance fighters against Israel’s illegal Occupation are “terrorists,” but not so the Israeli military, which enforces the Occupation and commits daily acts of genocide as defined by Article 6 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Count on Day to continue being a gormless cheerleader for the anti-Arab “war on terrorism.”

Also of note: when Day was an Alberta MLA, he was also was found guilty of libel for gratuitously impugning the character of a Red Deer lawyer. He billed the Alberta taxpayers for $750,000 in legal fees to fight a $60,000 judgment.

Vic Toews (Minister of Justice)—Last year, this former Manitoba attorney-general, pleaded guilty to breaking the Manitoba election law by overspending in the 1999 provincial election campaign. Like Harper, he opposes same-sex marriage and wants a free vote in the House to determine if MPs want to revisit the issue, even though overturning this law would be grossly unconstitutional.

Gordon O’Connor (Minister of Defence)—A retired Brigadier-General, O’Connor was a defence industry lobbyist before entering politics. Harper said he is opposed to cabinet ministers becoming lobbyists, but not lobbyists becoming cabinet ministers. A=B, but not B=A.

Canadian voters are a generally forgiving lot, but when they feel their trust has been betrayed they take their anger out on the ballot box; hence, Harper’s Party of the Damned can only mark time until the inevitable non-confidence motion forces the Governor–General to call another election or invites the Liberals to form a government. Given recent events and the fact that the sum of Liberal and NDP seats is greater than the Harper Party’s, this would be the more likely scenario.

I wonder, then, what would happen to Emerson. He can’t run again in Vancouver–Kingsway, which means he’d have to be parachuted—there’s that word again—into a safe Harper Party riding, perhaps over the democratic wishes of the local consituency association. Even if he should win, he’d end up in Opposition because the odds of the Liberal Party taking him back are nil. Ah, the price of hubris!

When all this is over, the Liberals will be back in power and the reign of Stephen Harper will be remembered as nothing more than a fart in Canada’s political winds of change.

2006-01-24T06:53:00.000-06:00

Conservative Party Links to Right Wing American Groups

2006-01-22T20:15:00.000-06:00

Ever wonder about the extent of religious activism within the Conservative Party of Canada?

This site just came to H.O.W's attention. A full report outlines Harper and the CPC's connection to various regious organizations within the U.S.

From the site: "...the Vancouver Sun estimates that “roughly half the current 98 members” of the Conservative caucus “are religious social conservatives,” which is “well over double the national average.”

Read more by visiting: http://www.harperstiestousa.org/

>> Is religious right poised to set Harper's agenda?
>> Candidates offer anti-abortion lobby group a pledge to support abortion ban
>> CPC President hints at back door deal on abortion
>> CPC MP drafting private members bill dealing with the "unborn"

An Open Letter to Stephen Harper from the Ghost of Leo Strauss (From Daily Digest)

2006-01-22T11:40:00.000-06:00

Marie Hooey

An Open Letter to Stephen Harper from the Ghost of Leo Strauss

Dear Stephen,
(Disciple #666000)

I just wanted to write and congratulate you on your campaign for control of the people and government of Canada. You have been a very astute disciple of my philosophy and it looks like it just might payoff. Indeed, you have earned the 'neo-con' moniker, as you truly are a Straussian of the highest order.

Here's a list of the things, that I see from my lofty seat on high, that you have done right.

1. Your campaign slogan, "Stand up for Canada" was priceless. It implies right off the get go, that no one else in government is standing up for Canada. To think that the sheeple fell for it is a knee slapper. Luckily for you Stephen, most people are unaware of your 1997 speech to our American right wing, think tank, the Council for National Policy. They would be appalled at the comments you made about Canadians and your own country. So just where did you get that slogan? Is it pure irony that its almost a deadringer for the title of David Orchard's book, "Fight for Canada?" I bet Peter thought that one up.

2. The continual pounding you have given the Liberals over their sponsorship, corruption scandal has been highly effective, not to mention your Christmas attack ads. You learned well from our American Swift Boat brothers. Now the electorate, even in Quebec are playing right into your hands and will vote for you just to punish the Liberals. Oh, Stephen if they only knew just what you have in store for them eh! As corruption cases go, this one was rather small potatoes compared to brother Bush's platefull. (the Plame affair, NSA spying, Delay's downfall and the blockbuster Abramhoff scandal)

3. You followed my teachings well - especially the one about the elites having the right and even the obligation to manipulate the truth. You have done, as Plato recommended, taking refuge in "pious lies" and in selective use of the truth. Your recent stance on universal health care makes my point. Only a few realize that you were President of the National Citizen's Coalition whose very being was to prevent public health care services in Canada. Well done Stephen. I would predict that you and ole Tommy Flanagan are just going to be content to see it implode from neglect.

The minions will pay!

4. You know Stephen, I don't think you have mentioned religion once in your whole campaign. How did you manage that? Better yet how have you quieted your religious right? I do know that good ole boy Ralph Reed, the former head of the American Christian Coalition and George Bush's senior campaign advisor, has been rallying the troops in Canada as of late. I loved his challenge to the faithful to "get on your work boots and tennis shoes and go out there like it all depends on you, pray like it all depends on God and let's usher in the greatest victory in the history of this country." Yes, Stephen you know religion is useful to maintain the illusions of the masses and that it is the opium of the people. I am delighted to see how my followers have managed to also make it politically
powerful. Good on you all. I must add however, that I feel bad for good ole Ralph though. It does look like his run for the Lt. General of Georgia has come to a resounding end, as he is in it up to his neck, in this Abramhoff corruption scandal. Oh well, sometimes one gets caught out.

5. Speaking of quieting - how have you managed your group so well. They kind of blew it for you last time eh? I mean they have been absolutely muzzled from ranting about their anti-gay marriage, anti-abortion, death penalty stuff. Again, well done Stephen.

6. 1% off the GST. Delightful! Hit em with one of the things they hate so much. The Liberals did however, squelch you a bit, when they informed the electorate about your income tax increases. No one will have the time to figure out the fuzzy numbers on this one.

7. Increases to military spending, missile defense and more Canadian, cannon fodder for America's never-ending wars - great. Your success will make Georgie and his pentagon cabal ecstatic. Get em ready for Iraq. Billions to the military industrial complex just as planned.

8. Deep integration and continentalism - splendid. Help King George take care of Cuba and the new, democratically elected, leftist governments in South America and your dreams will come true.

9. "The evolution of Stephen Harper" - masterful. What a few tie-less shirts and soft, cuddly, turtle necks can do. I'm sure the low dose lorazepam helped quell the anxiety/anger too, affording the ability to smile and giving the illusion of calm in the heat of campaign. You also mastered the art of focusing on the bottom of the TV camera while spinning your "pious lies." It really does help when you don't have to look directly at those you are deluding. Evolution? - just wait till they get a load of "intelligent design!"

10. Dumping the Deputy? Goodbye Peter! - the greatest irony of all.

I could go on Stephen but even we, the departed, must utilize constraint. May God be with you on Monday as he is with your southern brother. Let's hope Jack doesn't throw a wrench in the works and for God's sake don't say another thing about "Liberal" judges.

Yours in neo-conservatism,

Dearly departed Brother,

Leo Strauss

Latest Poll Tracking from SES Research

2006-01-22T08:11:00.000-06:00

January 20, 2006 Libs 29: Cons 36: NDP 17: BL 11: GR 6
January 18, 2006 Libs 31; Cons 37; NDP 17: BL 11; GR 5
January 15, 2006 Libs 29; Cons 37; NDP 18; BL 11; GR 5
January 12, 2006 Libs 31; Cons 40; NDP 14; BL 10; GR 6
January 11, 2006 Libs 29; Cons 38; NDP 16; BL 12; GR 5
January 7, 2006 Libs 32; Cons 34; NDP 17; BL 11; GR 6
January 5, 2006 Libs 33; Cons 34; NDP 17; BL 11; GR 5
December 30, 2005 Libs 35; Cons 35; NDP 14; BL 13; GR 4
December 22, 2005 Libs 39; Cons 29; NDP 15; BL 12; GR 5
December 20, 2005 Libs 37; Cons 31; NDP 14; BL 13: GR 6
December 18, 2005 Libs 38; Cons 29; NDP 16; BL 12; GR 4
December 15, 2005 Libs 39; Cons 33; NDP 12; BL 12; GR 5
December 13, 2005 Libs 38; Cons 31; NDP 14; BL 12; GR 5
December 11, 2005 Libs 39; Cons 31; NDP 14; BL 13; GR 4
December 8, 2005 Libs 41; Cons 26; NDP 18; BL 11; GR 4
December 7, 2005 Libs 40; Cons 26; NDP 18; BL 11; GR 4
December 6, 2005 Libs 40; Cons 28; NDP 17; BL 11; GR 4
December 5, 2005 Libs 38: Cons 30; NDP 16: BL 12; GR 5
December 4, 2005 Libs 37; Cons 30: NDP 16; BL 13; GR 5
December 2, 2005 Libs 36; Cons 31; NDP 14; BL 14; GR 5
December 1, 2005 Libs 37; Cons 29; NDP 15; BL 14; GR 5

Latest National Seat Projections from DemocraticSpace.com
>> Quebec
>> Ontario
>> B.C.
>> Others

Projections from Electionforecast.ca

Is religious right poised to set Harper's agenda? (Toronto Star)

2006-01-22T08:10:00.000-06:00

January 20, 2006.

SCOTT SIMMIE
STAFF REPORTER

Assume, as many now do, that Stephen Harper will become the country's next prime minister.

If it's a sweep, he may well have one Ontario MP, Rondo Thomas, who believes the definition of marriage should not be tinkered with because it has been in place since Adam and Eve.

"That's about 6,000 years ago, for those of you who might not be aware," says the Conservative candidate for Ajax-Pickering, in a presentation taped long before the campaign and currently posted at trailervision.com

Harper could have another MP, David Sweet, who used to head the men's Christian organization Promise Keepers Canada, though that affiliation is absent from his political website. Running in Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Westdale, he's quoted as having once said: "There's a particular reason why Jesus called men only. It's not that women aren't co-participators. It's because Jesus knew women would naturally follow."

And Harper may have a third MP, Harold Albrecht (Kitchener-Conestoga), who once wrote a letter to the editor of his local paper stating "these same-sex marriages would succeed in wiping out an entire society in just one generation." (When reporters tried to question him on those views yesterday, he was hustled away by handlers.)

Though all three have a right to their religious beliefs, statements like those scare some people, especially those concerned a conservative religious agenda could strip away what they regard as hard-fought freedoms.

"Egale Canada is concerned that a Conservative majority is a major threat to equality," says Laurie Arron, the gay and lesbian group's director of advocacy. "There are many Conservative candidates who are hiding their true beliefs and backgrounds. We've identified 34 new candidates with extreme social agendas... many of whom oppose not only equal marriage but also abortion, even when the mother's life is in danger."

At the outset of the campaign, Harper said he would allow a free vote on the issue of same-sex marriage if he took power. When the controversial Civil Marriage Act was passed last year, most Conservative MPs voted against Bill C-38 and a total of 32 Liberal MPs, almost a quarter of Martin's caucus, also voted "No."

A surf around some conservative religious websites gives a sense that Paul Martin and the Liberals have taken Canada down a path of — as one website describes it — "moral decay." The implication, though not always overtly stated, is that Harper and the Conservatives can reverse that trend, and that it's time for those who hold traditional faith-based values to stand up and be counted.

"We will influence policy conferences, We will affect nomination meetings, We will decide elections," states the website for Concerned Christians Canada.

And some of the more prominent players on the Canadian religious scene have waded in.

"For the first time in many years they (voters) have a choice between the radical agenda of the liberal elite, an agenda that will result in legal prostitution, legal brothels and legal drugs — and a leader loyal to common-sense values," writes Charles McVety in the current issue of Evangelical Christian Magazine.

McVety, president of the Canada Christian College, has reason to watch this election closely. For starters, candidate Rondo Thomas is the college's vice-president of student affairs and dean of biblical studies. But McVety is also president of the traditional faith/morals-based Canada Family Action Coalition, whose vision is to see Judeo-Christian moral values restored. It has been urging its 20,000 members to get out and participate in this election. The same-sex marriage issue ("The government invaded the purview of the church," says McVety) was a major catalyst.

"I believe that people of faith have woken up and participated, and I don't just mean vote," he says. "I mean volunteering, putting up signs, making phone calls, stuffing envelopes... If we leave participation to a few extremists, then we'll have an extremist agenda that's front and centre."

Though some might peg McVety's views as right of centre, he says they're widely shared. He also points out there's been Christian support for Liberal MPs who share similar views. And he rejects the suggestion that such views are indicative a religious right exists in Canada.

"Frankly, I don't," he says. "If you attended any of our Defend Marriage rallies, you would have seen thousands of Sikhs. Would you call the Sikhs the religious right? Would you call the Catholics the religious right? Would you call the Chinese the religious right? I don't think so."

Despite a considerable amount of media attention paid to the religious right, those taking the nation's pulse don't see anything out there with the kind of political clout that helped carry the last U.S. election for the Republicans.

"If there is one (religious right), it's small, and it's nowhere near the size compared to the hype and scaremongering," says Andrew Grenville, vice-president of polling/research firm Ipsos Reid. "What is occurring is that people are so affronted by the way things worked out in the U.S. that they fear it's going to occur here. So the fear is certainly larger than the group."

But he also points out, as do others, that there's a flip side to this equation.

"There's a religious left, too, that's pretty strong," says Grenville. "These are people whose religious values are such that they feel they need to express it in supporting parties with strong social programs."

And there's no neat way to predict, based on denomination alone, where someone might land on that spectrum. Though regular church-going Catholics historically tend to favour the Liberals and Protestants tend to lean toward the Conservatives, many other factors also go into decisions at the ballot box. And they're not always black and white.

The Evangelical fellowship, for instance, is urging voters to ask candidates about their stand on issues ranging from the definition of marriage, the legal status of unborn children, steps to make the refugee system more transparent and compassionate, and measures to assist the homeless.

Editorial: 'Old' Harper pops back into spotlight (Toronto Star)

2006-01-21T19:53:00.000-06:00

January 20, 2006

Conservative leader Stephen Harper has sent a chill down the backs of judges and lawyers with his campaign musings about how some judges appointed by the federal Liberals are activists with their own social agendas who might derail measures implemented by a Tory government.

"I am merely pointing out a fact that courts, for the most part, have been appointed by another political party. But courts are supposed to be independent, regardless of who appoints them and they are an independent check and balance," he told reporters. At the same time, Harper suggested many senior bureaucrats are Liberal lackeys who might not co-operate with a new Conservative government.

Sadly, despite all efforts to portray himself as a changed, more moderate leader, such rhetoric smacks of the old Stephen Harper, one who barely two years ago lashed out at Liberals for allegedly stacking the courts with liberal-minded judges in a move to approve same-sex marriage.

At the time, he also suggested some judges appointed under Conservative governments were liberal-oriented. He said Ontario Chief Justice Roy McMurtry, a former Conservative attorney general, was a "conservative" in name only, after McMurtry ruled same-sex marriage is legal.

Harper's comments this week raise questions about whether he intends to start appointing judges based on political leanings. In the past, Harper has talked of changing the way top judges are picked. It is still official Tory party policy that all appointments be ratified by Members of Parliament.

In 2003, Supreme Court Chief Justice Beverley McLaughlin said in a speech "it would be misguided to appoint judges in a manner that gives more weight to partisan politics." She is correct, because Canada is considered to have the best independent judiciary in the world.

Our current system of selecting justices to the Supreme Court has worked well, during both Liberal and Tory governments. The choices over the decades have been knowledgeable, respected and fair-minded. And, yes, the prime minister names each justice when a vacancy arises, but does so only after extensive consultations with senior judges, provincial justice ministers, law school professors and top lawyers.

Harper should not try to change radically a system that works.

And he should squelch any thoughts he might be harbouring of cleaning out the top ranks of the public service, as Brian Mulroney tried to do when he took power in 1984. Most bureaucrats are dedicated, non-partisan. Some of those considered by Mulroney's advisers to be Liberal hacks have subsequently risen to the highest levels in Canada's private sector.

Harper should reconsider his comments against both the judiciary and the public service. If he doesn't, then it will be just another sign that the "new" Stephen Harper isn't really much different than the "old" one.

Has he squandered his shot at majority? (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-21T19:46:00.000-06:00

By BRIAN LAGHI

January 20, 2006

Ottawa — Stephen Harper was supposed to tiptoe his way to a majority this time around.

But, with a controversial final week of campaigning almost in the bag, Mr. Harper may be awakening the sleeping giant.

Polls suggest that Ontario voters, who make and break federal elections, are pulling away a little from the Conservatives, and after a week in which Mr. Harper put them in mind of the controversial ideas that fuelled the Reform Party, they may soon find themselves with even more second thoughts. That, plus Mr. Harper's new campaign focus on solidifying a majority, has meant a spotty week for the Conservative Leader, something he hasn't experienced since the beginning of the campaign.

While the Tories continue to lead the polls by about nine points — and still seem headed to victory — the likelihood of a majority appears to be receding. In a mild repeat of 2004, Ontario voters have begun having misgivings.

Polls there show they are starting to prefer the Liberals over the Tories, albeit by the margin of error.

Eighteen months ago, Mr. Harper saw his chances at governing go up in smoke after he and others began talking about the possibility of a majority government.

It was a mistake that Mr. Harper and his troops pledged not to make again.

But with the election just three days away, a number of late-breaking factors may give Ontarians pause.

Take, for example, Mr. Harper's announcement earlier this week that a Liberal-dominated Senate, Supreme Court and civil service would serve as a check on his government were he to win a majority.

The comments were supposed to ease anxieties.

Instead, they brought a focus on the fact that Mr. Harper might head to Parliament with intentions to change the way the Supreme Court is appointed.

But the concerns are less about judicial activism than they are about the resurrection of Reform grievances over the West's exclusion from power.

While Reform accomplished many worthwhile things during its dozen years of existence — raising alarm bells about fiscal and democratic deficits come to mind — the party rubbed many central Canadians the wrong way by complaining that government has been manipulated against Western interests.

Reformers planned to fix that by ending judicial activism and bringing in a Triple-E Senate, notions that caused suspicion in Ontario.

Mr. Harper's suggestion this week that some judges are social activists opens the door for Liberal Leader Paul Martin to ask what Mr. Harper has in mind.

Would he, for example, pack the court to overturn certain civil rights? Will the civil service be remade?

"It reinforces the idea that a Tory majority is to be feared and gets him back into the chippy old conspiracy-theory frame," said a Tory supporter who asked not to be identified.

"The [notion that] the system and everybody in it is rigged against him."

The second difficulty of the week stems from an unneeded focus that Mr. Harper has put on winning a majority by striding into Liberal-held ridings and commenting on his chances of winning them.

What Mr. Harper almost certainly meant to do was turn the likelihood of victory into inevitability, thereby attracting voters who might want to get on board to ensure their region is represented in a Conservative government.

This attempt was aimed at Quebeckers and at residents of big cities such as Toronto and Montreal. But Canadians probably don't want to give Mr. Harper a blank cheque, and the prospect of a roaring majority may contribute to that feeling.

"It smacks of triumphalism, yet again," said the Conservative supporter. "It's a mild version of what happened last time."

Finally, some Conservatives have begun to notice that while Mr. Harper's party continues to run essentially negative ads, the Liberals have shot one that portrays their leader as calm and prime ministerial.

It's a tack that some Tories hope their man will again pick up before the campaign ends, and forget talking about a majority.

"He should get back to what he was doing so well."

Grits stir pot on social issues (Chronicle Herald)

2006-01-21T19:32:00.000-06:00

Martin says controversial Conservatives "just in hiding’

By MICHELLE MacAFEE
The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Paul Martin twisted the arrow in Stephen Harper’s Achilles heel Friday, hoping his warnings about a Conservative government’s positions on abortion and same-sex marriage will tighten the race in time for Monday’s vote.

Recent polls suggest Martin’s revved up accusations that a Harper-led government would turn back the clock on controversial social issues has taken a bite out of the 10- to 12-point lead Harper had just last week.

But those same polls indicate public opinion is volatile, leaving the main party leaders to embark on one final zig-zag across the country to shore up support.

Harper started the day in Toronto, where he used a stump speech to refocus his campaign on the need for change, accountability and tax cuts after several days spent explaining his position on the judiciary, abortion and same-sex marriage.

Martin spent Friday in Atlantic Canada, where he warned supporters in St. John’s, N.L., that Canadians aren’t getting the full story about the front-running Conservatives.

He singled out Tory hopefuls Cheryl Gallant, Rob Anders, Rob Merrifield and Harold Albrecht as candidates whose comments have landed them in hot water before but who have been conspicuously silent in recent weeks.

"Candidates who (made) Canadians so uncomfortable with the Conservatives in the last election . . . they haven’t gone; they’re still there.

""They’re just in hiding," Martin told a room full of cheering Liberals.

"I don’t know where they are. Maybe they’re all in some kind of a safe house, biding their time, watching Jeopardy."

Martin questioned what will happen after the election.

"Are these social conservatives going to stay in hiding, or are they going to come out for the spring thaw?

"" If they come out, are they going to start pressing their views, advancing their causes?"

Martin said a Liberal government would protect charter rights such as same-sex marriage and a woman’s right to choose, a message pollsters have said resonates in key battlegrounds such as Ontario and among female voters.

After being credited with running a smooth, policy-focused, relatively gaffe-free campaign, Harper has in recent days been sidetracked by questions about biased courts and his party’s position on same-sex marriage and abortion.

Harper, who has insisted his party won’t criminalize abortion, denied his candidates are avoiding the spotlight.

"Our candidates are campaigning in their ridings, they’re going door to door, working very hard, talking to local media and I’m very pleased with their efforts," Harper said following a rally.

Harper noted several Liberal MPs and candidates are also opposed to same-sex marriage, a position supported on Friday by a lobby group that favours the traditional definition of marriage.

Vote Marriage Canada is endorsing 211 candidates, including 10 incumbent Liberal MPs, it says have promised to support changing the definition of marriage in the next Parliament to mean the legal union of one man and one woman.

Harper’s strategy throughout the day was to urge Tory workers to concentrate during one final campaign push through the weekend.

"If the Liberals are re-elected we will not have any kind of direction for this country," said Harper.

"The scandals, the corruption, the investigations will continue.

""We cannot have our country go forward like that."

NDP Leader Jack Layton continued his delicate balancing act of attacking both Martin and Harper while positioning himself as the best check on a new Conservative government.

But at a rally in Vancouver, Layton saved some of his toughest talk for Martin, saying the Liberal leader is misleading voters into thinking his party is the only choice.

"Mr. Martin is trying to perpetrate one more Liberal fraud in this election, hoping you’ll reward him one more time with your vote," Layton said.

Layton went on to say that Martin is desperately campaigning to "save the furniture."

Layton is making a last big push in British Columbia, where the NDP has its eye on a dozen or more ridings.

Who's Tory now? (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-21T19:29:00.000-06:00

To help you understand just how radical Stephen Harper may be, GEOFFREY STEVENS recommends some political homework

By GEOFFREY STEVENS

January 21, 2006

Let us be clear about one thing. The Conservative party that Canadians may elect on Monday is unlike any party, Conservative or Liberal, that Canadians have ever entrusted with the keys to the national capital.

The party of Stephen Harper is emphatically not the party of Sir John A. Macdonald, John Diefenbaker, Robert Stanfield, Joe Clark or Brian Mulroney. The Old Tories (if I may call them that) were consistently the most interesting party in Canada; for long stretches, they were our only interesting party. Unlike the Liberals, they were not obsessed with power (which they seldom enjoyed); unlike the New Democrats, they were not blinded by doctrine.

Old Tories were adaptable. They could be fiscally conservative and socially progressive, or vice versa. Depending on the proximity of the next election, they could be in favour of less government or more, defenders of the status quo or advocates of change. And they could take religion or leave it.

They could be maddening. Frequently unruly, they preferred scrapping among themselves to uniting against a common enemy. Booze -- scotch, usually -- was their lingua franca. While the Liberals would soberly debate which worthy Grit would get the next Senate seat, the Tories would come to blows over anything from bilingualism to the death penalty. On two occasions (Diefenbaker in the 1960s and Clark in the 1980s), the party demolished its leader. On one (Mulroney in the 1990s), the leader demolished his party. The Old Tories were never dull and often they were a lot of fun. This, alas, cannot be said of the Harper New Tories.

These three books may help to prepare us for the transition from Paul Martin's sloppy liberalism to Harper's scripted conservatism.

Radical Tories: The Conservative Tradition in Canada (Anansi, 1982), by the late Charles Taylor, is the oldest of the three, but it is still a gem -- a scholarly yet provocative study of the philosophical evolution of an important political movement. For many years a foreign correspondent for The Globe and Mail, Taylor was a careful craftsman and an elegant wordsmith. He uses the writings of historians Donald Creighton, W. L. Morton and George Grant, among others, to trace the reformist strain -- compassionate conservatism -- that ran through the Old Tory party from the days of Sir John A. to Stanfield, leader from 1967 to 1976.

"Real Conservatives are never ideologues," Taylor writes. The best Conservative statesmen have been true innovators. And (agreeing with Stanfield) "the true conservative is neither a doctrinaire supporter of private enterprise nor a diehard opponent of necessary reforms."

Taylor was able, in 1982, to view the future of the Conservatives with what he called "a stubbornly residual optimism." Whether he would feel the same optimism in 2006, when radical toryism has given way to the narrower social conservatism of the Harper era, is a question.

That answer may be found in the most recent of these three books: The Pilgrimage of Stephen Harper (ECW Press, 2005), by Lloyd Mackey, a Parliamentary Press Gallery veteran who writes about public affairs from the intersection of faith and politics. As Mackey sees it, Harper is very much a faith-based politician, as are many of his "so-cons" from western Canada. He is a devout Christian -- he and his wife Laureen Teskey worship at Centre Street Church, a huge evangelical congregation in Calgary -- and religion plays an important part in their family life.

A sympathetic biographer, Mackey maintains Harper has become more "nuanced" in his views since 2001, when he and several others wrote their famous (or notorious) "firewall" letter to Alberta Premier Ralph Klein, urging him to take more constitutional power into Alberta's hands. However, there is no evidence that Harper has modified his core views. For example, he still opposes same-sex marriage, although he has promised not to invoke the notwithstanding clause to cancel that right.

Harper comes across as being intelligent and controlled. But he seems devoid of the fun and love of the game that infuse the pages of my third selection: Life of the Party: The Memoirs of Eddie Goodman (Key Porter, 1988).

It would be hard to imagine two more different Conservatives than Goodman, a Toronto lawyer with a zest for politics, and Harper, an arid intellectual from Alberta. A lifelong Red Tory, Goodman was the happy warrior of the Conservative party. He brought an irrepressible ebullience to the backrooms of his party. Eddie knew everyone and just about everyone loved Eddie.

The press was charmed by him. Goodman tells an anecdote about the 1968 federal election. The Liberals had a charismatic new leader, Pierre Trudeau, and the Tories, trailing badly in the polls, were in danger of being swamped by Trudeaumania. Goodman called a press conference in Ottawa and said he had two announcements, the first one being confidential. "I informed the breathless press gallery that I had it on absolutely impeccable authority that Pierre Trudeau was a lousy lay and that Bob Stanfield went home every day for a nooner."

The 60 reporters laughed. Then he distributed a "poll" that he and another Conservative had fabricated that "showed" the Tories gaining everywhere. The reporters gasped. In the end, they didn't buy it, as Eddie knew they wouldn't, but they had a laugh, they accepted that there was still some life in the Tory campaign and, as Goodman hoped, they started to question the accuracy of other polls.

Memo to Stephen Harper: There is no law (yet) that says politics cannot be fun.

Geoffrey Stevens teaches political science at Wilfrid Laurier University and the University of Guelph. His most recent book, The Player: The Life and Times of Dalton Camp, won the Drainie-Taylor Prize for best biography of 2003.

PM challenges Harper on abortion (cnews)

2006-01-21T19:22:00.000-06:00

By STEPHANIE RUBEC -- Toronto Sun

January 21, 2006

ST. JOHN'S, Nfld. -- After presenting himself as a protector of women's rights and slamming Stephen Harper for failing to make his intentions on abortion clear, Paul Martin says he'll let backbenchers vote their conscience on the issue.

This week Martin insisted he would instruct all Liberal MPs and senators to vote against any bill that sought to ban abortion and that his new government would stand firmly in favour of a woman's right to have an abortion.

But yesterday he told reporters in St. John's that he would treat a Commons vote on the issue in the same manner he did last year's decision on same-sex marriage -- by whipping his cabinet but unleashing backbenchers.

The same-sex marriage vote saw 32 Liberal MPs vote against changing the definition of marriage and, if they are re-elected, it's expected that a similar number of members would vote against abortion.

"Harper hasn't said what his government will do if an MP wants to bring this forward," Martin insisted.

Martin issued a challenge to Harper to use the dying days of the election campaign to lay out exactly what a Conservative government's position would be on a possible private members' bill to ban abortion.

POLICY DISCUSSION

"It reminds me of Kim Campbell saying during an election that this is no time for a serious discussion on policy. Well, I disagree with Harper," Martin said, insisting that the "overwhelming majority" of Conservative candidates oppose a woman's right to an abortion.

Harper has said his government would neither support nor encourage a move to ban abortion and that he would use "whatever influence" he had to ensure the matter doesn't come to a vote.

Harper puts end to formal news conferences (Canada.com)

2006-01-21T19:19:00.000-06:00

Canadian Press

January 21, 2006

TORONTO -- Stephen Harper, anxious to protect his party's lead heading into Monday's vote, has cut off news conferences with the national media.

The Conservative leader brushed aside questions from reporters as he campaigned in the Liberal stronghold of Toronto.

His spokeswoman, Carolyn Stewart Olsen, says Harper no longer has time for formal question-and-answer periods.

''We're moving fast today,'' she said of the Tory leader's Saturday sprint through southwestern Ontario's vote-laden heartland between Toronto and Windsor.

Harper says open, accountable government will be one of his top priorities if he becomes prime minister.

But Conservative workers have repeatedly blocked reporters from asking questions of local candidates - especially those who are on the record as opposing gay marriage and abortion.

There was another incident on Saturday, this one caught by TV crews.

Television reporter Lina Dib was grabbed by Conservative security as she tried to ask a question of Tory hopeful John Carmichael.

''Don't you hold me, is that clear?'' she yelled, spinning around and jabbing her index finger at the suddenly sheepish young man.

''Okay,'' he mumbled, backing away. A spokesman for Harper later apologized to Dib.

Harper has been accused of shielding several candidates from media scrutiny.

Conservative incumbents Cheryl Gallant in eastern Ontario and Rob Merrifield in Alberta, who both made uncomfortable headlines during the last campaign, have either turned down or ignored requests for interviews.

Other candidates have been spirited away by handlers at public rallies before they can be interviewed by reporters.

Polls suggest the Conservatives and Liberals are in close fight for support in the province that shunned Harper in 2004.

He has spent most of his last campaign days in areas where the Tories are expected to make gains, and even where they're not.

Harper heads to British Columbia on Sunday before returning to the Conservative heartland and his riding in Alberta.

Harper can be hero, dark lord or enigma (cnews)

2006-01-21T19:14:00.000-06:00

By JOHN WARD

January 21, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - Stephen Harper, who seems poised to become the country's 22nd prime minister, is viewed by some as a western hero, by others as the Dark Lord personifed and by many as an enigma.

There's a journalistic cottage industry in stories asking: Who is Stephen Harper?

Where many of his predecessors could be summed up in a phrase or two - Pierre Trudeau: the charismatic intellectual; Brian Mulroney: the rags-to-riches boy from Baie Comeau - Harper defies easy pigeonholing.

But he has been writing and speaking on his ideas and philosophy for 20 years and his core values seem little changed.

The boy who grew up in middle-class Toronto has matured into an Albertan. The high school athlete who turned to the loneliness of long-distance running has become a leader who keeps counsel only with close friends and advisers. The bright star of the economics department at the University of Calgary has become the policy wonk of today.

His views are clear in key areas.

He stresses economic conservativism, abhors big government and big programs and believes the West has been milked by central and eastern Canada since the days of Sir John A. Macdonald and his national policy. He supports a looser federation that pays more than lip service to provincial demands.

He sees family, community and church as keystones of society. His wife Laureen and their children, Ben and Rachel, are a tight-knit family, kept away from the political glare as much as possible.

Born in Toronto, Harper was a Trudeau Liberal who moved west and grew disenchanted with a 'just society' that, when viewed from an Alberta vantage point, seemed less than just.

He goes against the mainstream in many ways.

He's a transplanted Albertan in a country which hasn't seen a western prime minister since Joe Clark's ill-starred and short-lived government a generation ago,

He's a rock-ribbed conservative in a country where many pride themselves on being liberal and progressive. Where others may embrace the Charter of Rights as the fount of Canadian values, he is a doubter, even a heretic.

He sees the welfare state as "not the politician's 'sacred trust,' but the taxpayer's burden." Government should collect what taxes it needs, no more.

"Government is not a profit-earning business," he said in a campaign interview. "That's not the purpose of government, to turn a huge profit."

He's a social conservative at a time when that philosophy is viewed with deep suspicion by many voters who see it as a northern version of the American religious right.

He is a Protestant - from a Presbyterian background who now favours Christian and Missionary Alliance congregations in Calgary and Ottawa - in a city where prime ministers have, for decades, generally been Roman Catholics.

He comes out of the Calgary School, a movement of conservative political scientists such as Tom Flanagan, who question conventional wisdom on issues such as the Charter and aboriginal self-government and who are well to the right of their colleagues at the University of Toronto or McGill.

He is a politician who prefers policy to process and who clearly dislikes the gladhanding and hoopla of politics.

He is a thoughtful man with a circle of advisers he keeps close.

Belinda Stronach, who abandoned Harper and the Conservatives for the Liberals last year, sees that as a mark against him:

"He surrounds himself with like-minded people and doesn't want input from others who have a different viewpoint."

He is an intellectual who clearly sees political journalists as a biased, unruly and lazy tribe, but who has gone out of his way in this campaign to deal with reporters.

He's a well-built, healthy-looking man who still suffers from the asthma which plagued his childhood.

He's supposedly the dull policy guy, but he's writing a history of hockey even as he campaigns.

More than 20 years ago, in one of his first speeches to what would become the Reform party, the boy wonder of the University of Calgary called for renewal:

"In the stale air of politics, what Canada really requires is the sweeping winds of change."

Harper was born in Toronto in 1959, son of an accountant. He finished high school at the top of his class, then went to the University of Toronto. Biographer William Johnson says the young Harper wanted to be a diplomat.

But he dropped out of class and moved to Edmonton where he worked in the oil patch.

He enrolled at the University of Calgary and studied economics.

In 1984, he went to Ottawa as an assistant to Calgary Tory MP Jim Hawkes. But the Mulroney Conservatives struck him as too liberal and he quit after a year to go home and get involved in the movement that would eventually blossom into the Reform party.

In 1993, Harper defeated his old boss, Hawkes, in the election that first propelled Reform into prominence in the Commons.

He spent one term in the Commons with Preston Manning's Reformers, but quit that, too, and went back to Calgary and a job with the right-wing National Citizen's Coalition.

His occasional forays onto the national scene in those days raised suspicions about his agenda, especially in his 2001 newspaper article, in which he called on Alberta to erect a firewall against the federal government; collect its own taxes, run its own health-care system and establish its own pension plan.

Some say it was the Stockwell Day debacle that drew him back to federal politics and the gasping Reform party. With Day becoming a figure of ridicule, with MPs abandoning the leader to sit as a rump in Commons, Harper concluded that without a united right, conservative values would go nowhere.

Back in Ottawa, he won the leadership of the re-named Canadian Alliance, then brokered a shotgun marriage with the remnants of the old Progressive Conservative party.

In the 2004 federal election, his first as leader, Harper found himself demonized by the Liberals, who pulled out all the stops and resurrected every right-wing quote they could find to paint him as the enemy of liberal Canadian values and a threat to abortion rights, women's rights, the poor and the federation. It worked enough to preserve a Liberal majority.

But it also prompted Harper to re-think matters.

In an interview in this campaign, he said he has evolved.

To some, the evolution is only skin deep.

"I think what has evolved tremendously are simply his political skills," says Greg Inwood, a political scientist at Ryerson University:

"I think he still has his core belief system, but his political acumen has improved and his political antenna are more sensitive.

"That's demonstrated through his behaviour in this campaign where he's run almost a letter-perfect campaign."

Steve Paten, who teaches political science at the University of Alberta, agrees that Harper's basic ideas are unchanged, but that he has become more pragmatic.

"He's more willing to run on a campaign platform that not very long ago he wouldn't have been very comfortable with," Paten said.

That said, Inwood added, the platform is built mainly around tax cuts with a lot of other promises that are very vague and malleable.

Inwood said that willingness to embrace a wider platform may signal that Harper is prepared to govern the same way should he win Monday's election.

"Once he gets into power he may well realize that he can't just go storming the barricades with right-wing policies; that his tenure will be awfully short if he does."

The demonization of Stephen Harper continues, on blogs, in increasingly frantic e-mails among opponents, on op-ed pages and on the hustings.

Labour leader Buzz Hargrove of the CAW accuses him of separatist leanings and urges Quebecers to do anything - even vote Bloc - to stop the Tories.

Paul Martin has accused him of planning to stack the courts with like-minded judges and hints Harper plans a coup against abortion rights and same-sex marriage with the most radical right-wing agenda to ever get close to power in Canada.

Harper has said he'd allow a free vote in Parliament on the same-sex issue, but adds that it isn't among his top five priorities.

As for abortion, he was clear in a recent interview: "I've never campaigned on restricting abortion, and a Conservative government will not be supporting abortion restrictions."

His style, too, has changed.

He shed the white shirts and tightly cinched ties for open collars and turtlenecks. His stiff delivery has loosened. He'll crack jokes at the back of the campaign plane with the journalists he used to shun.

The shy, crooked smile that used to play around his lips without ever touching his eyes has often been replaced by a broad grin.

Evolution? Camouflage? Biographer Johnson suggests not.

"He's not good at acting or pretending," Johnson wrote.

Tory agenda may hinge on ability to win majority (CTV.ca)

2006-01-21T19:08:00.000-06:00

January 21 2006

Canadian Press

OTTAWA — Who knew it would come to this?

As the federal election campaign winds down and voting day looms, there's one question being asked in every backroom in Ottawa: if the Conservatives win, will it be a minority or a majority?

A lot depends on the answer.

If Stephen Harper ekes out a majority, no matter how slim, he has a chance to be his own man as prime minister. With a minority, everything depends on whether he can tailor his legislative agenda to meet the demands of others.

The differences between those scenarios could be enormous -- affecting how much and what kind of taxes Canadians pay, who gets to marry whom, how long people wait for medical care, and whether there is fiscal peace or war between Ottawa and the provinces.

Start with the dollars-and-cents issues.

Harper's first priority if he forms a government would almost surely be his economic platform, highlighted by promises to slash the GST and offer families with young children a child-care tax credit.

It certainly wouldn't be same-sex marriage -- an issue on which he has promised an eventual free vote, but which could also revive fears that Harper has a hidden far-right agenda on social issues.

"If he gets elected as prime minister, it won't be because the No. 1 pressing issue is same-sex marriage," said a Tory insider speaking on condition of anonymity.

"You want to get some early wins on the board to show you're making progress, and those wins will come through the economic items."

Harper's GST and child tax credit promises are not without a potential downside.

The price of cutting the GST would be cancelling Liberal income tax cuts for low- and middle-income brackets. Financing the child credit would mean abandoning some Liberal transfers to the provinces that help fund day care.

The new measures would sail through with a Tory majority. In a minority Parliament, however, they could spark endless haggling -- particularly with the Grits and NDP.

"It would enable (Harper) to make all the changes he has promised on taxing and spending," said Heather MacIvor, a political science professor at the University of Windsor.

"Money bills are crucial, and with a majority you can get those suckers through."

A majority would also solve one of Harper's greatest dilemmas -- the prospect that, in the face of Liberal and NDP hostility, he might have to turn to the Bloc Quebecois for support in the Commons.

Almost by definition, the Conservatives would have to win seats in Quebec to form a majority government. Having Quebec Tories at the cabinet table would eliminate the perception that they have to pander to the Bloc to stay in power.

"It would essentially sideline the separatists," said Faron Ellis, a political scientist at Lethbridge Community College and onetime activist in the old Reform party, which never managed to expand beyond its western base.

"Just four or five seats coming out of Quebec could be huge (for the Tories). It would fundamentally change the character of the government and of Parliament."

It could also strengthen Harper's hand in his promised negotiations with all the provinces on the so-called fiscal imbalance, a euphemism for provincial demands for ever-greater tax transfers from Ottawa.

Harper would also face delicate talks with the provinces on another topic, his pledge to reduce wait times for health care. Again, his hand would be stronger with a majority.

The situation isn't as clear-cut for the issue that could be Harper's biggest political headache -- same-sex marriage.

His promise of a free vote on rolling back the rights of gays and lesbians would likely be a formality in a minority House, given the opposition to the move among NDP, Bloc and most Liberal MPs.

A Tory majority, however, could change everything -- not least the mindset of Christian evangelicals and others in the party's social conservative wing.

"Harper would have a better shot at keeping his party in line if they're on a tight leash in a minority government," said David Docherty, a political science professor at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ont.

"If they've got a majority you'll have some folks out there who think it's open season. They'll say, 'We can do whatever we want.'"

Some moderate Tories dispute that claim, arguing that electing a majority government -- or even a strong and stable minority -- would necessarily mean broadening the base of the party.

"The backbone would not be people who champion the traditional definition of marriage," insisted one strategist. "We'd have more fiscal conservatives and social liberals in the pack."

Others are far less certain.

Lethbridge's Ellis, for one, said he thinks Harper's handling of the issue will be crucial for his newly minted image as a political moderate.

"It will be one of the litmus tests of whether the more rabid social conservative forces within the party are in check," he said.

"How much of the Liberal fear-mongering was true, and how much wasn't?"

Morgentaler warns against Tory government (CTV.ca)

2006-01-21T19:05:00.000-06:00

Canadian Press

January 21, 2006

TORONTO — Fearing that a Stephen Harper-led government will turn back the clock on women's rights, pre-eminent abortion rights activist Dr. Henry Morgentaler made a blunt appeal to Canadians on Friday: Don't vote Conservative.

"Our rights that have been fought for and won with so much sacrifice over the years are now being threatened," Morgentaler told a news conference in Toronto.

"I want them to know when they go to the ballot box that they have to remember that they cannot vote Conservative if they're concerned about the health and welfare and dignity of women."

While Harper has repeatedly promised that, if elected, he will not criminalize abortion, Morgentaler and other abortion rights activists said Friday there are other measures the Conservative leader could implement to restrict women's access to the procedure.

Those include the introduction of a private member's bill pushing for anti-abortion legislation, and stacking the Supreme Court with socially conservative judges, they said.

Such moves may not immediately mark the return of hazardous back-alley abortions in the country, but they would gradually diminish access to the procedure, they said.

"For pro-choice Canadians, we see here a wolf in sheep's clothing trying to hide an anti-choice agenda from public view that the vast majority of its candidates are committed to," said Carolyn Egan, spokeswoman for the Ontario Coalition of Abortion Clinics.

But Morgentaler and his supporters stopped short of endorsing a specific party, despite concerns their plea could split votes between supporters of the Liberals and the NDP.

"We know that there's a lot of disaffection in the Liberal party," Egan said.

"If you are a disaffected Liberal supporter, then the only thing to do is to vote for the New Democratic Party."

Abortion was decriminalized on Jan. 28, 1988, when the Supreme Court of Canada declared abortion laws under the Criminal Code unconstitutional.

"Since that time, women in this country have been able to avail of themselves of the opportunity to have abortions which are legal and safe," Morgentaler said.

He singled out New Brunswick, a province that doesn't compensate women for abortions in private clinics, as an example Canadians can look to if the Conservatives win Monday.

"This is a foretaste of what we can expect from a Conservative government, which is chock full in its front ranks with anti-abortion people," he said.

Author June Callwood joined in the anti-Conservative chorus, saying it will take generations to regain women's rights if the Tories are elected.

"It takes a decade, it takes two decades, to repair the damage done by one right-wing government of this radical kind," Callwood said.

Harper tries to preserve lead in polls by dodging media as campaign closes (940 news)

2006-01-21T19:00:00.000-06:00

January 21, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - Stephen Harper was trying to run out the clock Saturday and withstand another barrage of Liberal attacks designed to slow the front-running Conservatives in the final days of the election campaign.

But the Tory leader's plan to avoid any questions in the campaign's final hours - particularly those focused on the social issues that are the party's weak flank - was abandoned after a scuffle between a party worker and a television reporter from Quebec.

Tory staffers said Harper wouldn't have time for any more formal news conferences, preferring instead to deliver stump speeches and protect a lead that new polls suggest has narrowed to just seven percentage points.

But that was before Lina Dib, a reporter for the French-language television network TVA, was grabbed from behind by a campaign staffer as she pursued one of the party's local candidates during a swing through Toronto.

That brought an abrupt end to Harper's brief media blackout - and gave Martin fresh ammunition in the dying days of what may prove to be his last election campaign as prime minister.

Martin has been hammering the Conservatives for what he calls a deliberate attempt to keep candidates with controversial views on issues like same-sex marriage and abortion out of the public spotlight.

"Stephen Harper says he wants members of Parliament to play a greater role in Parliament," a jubilant Martin said during a final sprint through London, Ont., before heading to Winnipeg.

"He says he wants them to have a greater say, a greater voice. All the time, that is, except during an election campaign."

The suddenly talkative Harper merely shrugged off the Toronto incident as an issue of jurisdiction and who should field what questions.

"I'm the leader," Harper said as his campaign blitzed vote-rich southwestern Ontario.

"It's my job to answer questions from the national media. The candidates run their campaigns in their ridings. And I think they're doing a good job."

Martin's last-ditch attempts to paint Harper as a scary figure with a hidden agenda appear to have had an impact in the days before Monday's federal vote, eroding what remains a comfortable Conservative lead.

At 36.2 per cent, the Conservatives were still ahead of the Liberals at 29.4 per cent, the NDP at 17.3 per cent and the Bloc Quebecois at 11 per cent, according to a new SES survey commissioned by CPAC, the public-affairs channel.

But the lead has narrowed since earlier in the week, when polls were giving Harper a lead of more than 10 points on the Liberals.

The national random telephone survey of 1,200 Canadians was conducted from Jan. 18 to Jan. 20 and is considered accurate to within 2.9 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Harper said he was feeling confident - but not taking anything for granted.

"Well, we're optimistic. I've said it all along: I think we can win. I still think we can win," he said.

"But I won't believe the polls until I see the numbers on election night."

Harper's hopes for a Quebec breakthrough may have suffered a blow, however, when French networks showed footage of TVA's Dib raging at the party worker who tried to stay her pursuit of local candidate John Carmichael.

"Don't hold me - is that clear?" Dib fumed at the sheepish-looking fellow.

New Democrat Leader Jack Layton, on a cross-country blitz Saturday that began in Vancouver, called Harper's initial refusal to talk to reporters "odd and surprising when you're in the middle of a democratic process."

Layton later took to the skies in what the NDP dubbed a "tarmac tour," with campaign stops at airports in Saskatchewan and Ontario.

Critics say voters have been taking a long second look at Harper since he suggested earlier this week that Liberal-dominated courts, the Senate and even the federal bureaucracy would all serve to reign in his party.

Martin said Harper espouses an ultra-conservative agenda that's completely at odds with the progressive policies and leaders of the Tories of old, a party Martin said is as "dead as disco."

The Tories have been trying hard to keep reporters from talking to candidates that are believed to hold controversial views on social issues.

One week earlier, Harper paid a visit to controversial Ontario Tory MP Cheryl Gallant while the media bus travelled on, its occupants oblivious to where the Conservative leader was headed.

The outspoken Gallant helped sink Harper's hopes in the 2004 campaign when she likened abortion to the beheadings by Islamic terrorists in Iraq.

Moderate Tories 'dead as disco': Martin (cnews)

2006-01-21T18:48:00.000-06:00

By ALEXANDER PANETTA

January 21, 2006

LONDON, Ont. (CP) - Paul Martin launched a last-minute sprint across the country painting his opponents as extreme right-wingers who bear no resemblance to the Conservative party of old.

The coast-to-coast dash pitted Martin against an electoral clock that appears to be ticking on his Liberal government, and racing against a Tory opponent to whom polls suggest Canadians have warmed up.

Asked to name one far-right element in the Tory platform, Martin cited their plans to roll back the Liberals' proposed national day-care plan, Canada's commitment to the Kyoto protocol as well as a recent federal-provincial aboriginal deal.

"You asked for one example. I've given you three," Martin shot back.

His warnings of a right-wing agenda have so far only managed to dent the Tory lead in the polls, but Martin remained determined Saturday to end his final weekend on the hustings with the same stark message.

"People will have to choose between the ultra-conservative, extreme right-wing agenda of Stephen Harper and the progressive, ambitious plan we're offering Canadians," he told a partisan rally.

It was much the same message in Brampton, Ont., when Martin said a Tory government would imperil abortion rights. He delivered the warning - aimed squarely at women voters - flanked by eight of his Toronto-area female candidates.

Conspicuous by their absence were local Liberal candidates who share the anti-abortion leanings of many Conservatives.

Martin has been dogged by questions about the diverse views of his own caucus every time he has raised the abortion issue during the campaign.

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper has repeatedly said he would not introduce abortion legislation and would use his influence to keep the issue from ever arriving for a free vote in the House of Commons.

As for the Liberals' proposed day-care plan, Harper has promised to replace it with a $1,200-per-child annual subsidy.

He also says he would replace the Kyoto commitment - which Canada is already far from reaching - with his own clean-air act, and would revisit parts of the aboriginal deal while heeding most of its principles.

But to Martin, those announcements have been reason enough to travel the country using words like "ultraconservative," "extreme," and "far right" to describe his opponents.

He said modern-day Conservatives have nothing in common with the old Progressive Conservative party that disappeared in the 2003 merger with the Canadian Alliance.

"They used to call them the Tories," Martin said.

"But that party - the party of Bob Stanfield, the party of Joe Clark, the party of mainstream and moderate leaders, the party that was proud to call itself progressive, is no more - it's as dead as disco."

He described the current incarnation of the Conservatives as a "rehashed version of Preston Manning's Reform party" and a "dolled-up variation of Stockwell Day's Canadian Alliance."

Martin accused Conservative Leader Stephen Harper of keeping his candidates in hiding because he doesn't want Canadians to hear what they believe.

"Stephen Harper says he wants members of Parliament to play a greater role in Parliament. He says he wants them to have a greater say, a greater voice. All the time, that is, except during an election campaign."

Harper's lead takes a hit (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-20T06:39:00.000-06:00

With Tory Leader straying from script, poll shows support for his party waning

By STEVEN CHASE and GLORIA GALLOWAY AND CAMPBELL CLARK

January 20, 2006

From Friday's Globe and Mail

The Conservative Party's lead in the polls has narrowed to nine percentage points as voters in Ontario and Quebec have second thoughts about a Stephen Harper government.

The latest poll for The Globe and Mail and CTV by the Strategic Counsel shows national support for the Conservatives has dropped to 37 per cent from 41 per cent, while support for the Liberals has risen to 28 per cent from 25 per cent. Backing for the New Democratic Party dipped one percentage point to 16 per cent.

The race has tightened in the face of a Liberal advertising attack on Mr. Harper and an anti-Tory offensive in Quebec by the Bloc Québécois and Liberals, which have warned of the front-running party's social-conservative leanings, said Allan Gregg, chairman of the Strategic Counsel.

"And we know that in no region of the country are conservative social agendas more repugnant than in the province of Quebec."

The percentage of Quebeckers who told Strategic Counsel pollsters a Conservative majority would be good for Canada has dropped to 55 per cent in Jan. 17-18 polling from 64 per cent in Jan. 14-15 surveys.

The race is tightening in a week in which Mr. Harper has strayed from his carefully scripted campaign, responded to questions about same-sex marriage and raised old Reform Party concerns about a biased judiciary, civil service and Liberal-dominated Senate.

Liberal Leader Paul Martin accused the Conservative Leader yesterday of planning to stack the Supreme Court with politicized judges who would allow for a social-conservative agenda drawn from the "extreme right" in the United States. He insisted that Mr. Harper's remarks show he wants to override the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to ban same-sex marriage and possibly abortion.

"Are we going to find ourselves in the same situation that they are in the United States, where in fact it is not only the competence of a judge that governs, but in fact it is a judge's social views?" Mr. Martin asked.

The national poll of 1,000 people was conducted Jan. 17-18, although some regional surveys took place over a longer period. The margin of error for the national poll is 3.1 percentage points, but higher for the smaller regional samples.

The decline in Tory support dampens chances of a Conservative majority government.

"It looks far less possible today than it even did a few days ago, given the numbers as they stand right now," Mr. Gregg said.

The Tory Leader began the long winter election campaign by saying he would ask Parliament if it wanted to reopen the controversial issue of same-sex marriage. He said he would respect existing homosexual unions if the House of Commons decided to restore the traditional definition of marriage.

But Mr. Harper said yesterday at a news conference in Waterdown, near Hamilton, Ont., that this would not be one of the first acts of a Conservative government.

"I'm not going to want to leave it forever, but it's not one of the top-five priorities [of the party] so I suspect we won't deal with it right away," Mr. Harper said. "But we will ask Parliament's opinion in due course."

Mr. Harper was asked if he feared that the Liberal-dominated Senate would try to block a ban on same-sex marriage passed by the House of Commons. Earlier in the week, he said a Conservative majority government would be kept in check by the judges, senators and Liberals who owe their jobs to the Liberals.

"I prefer that a non-elected chamber respects the decisions of the chamber elected by the population," he said yesterday. "I think an abuse of power by the Senate strengthens my argument that there should be an elected Senate."

Mr. Harper was introduced at the news conference by David Sweet, the Tory candidate in Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Westdale. Mr. Sweet is a former president of Promise Keepers Canada, an evangelical Christian organization that believes homosexuality is a sin.

In a November, 2001, edition of Christian Week magazine, he wrote: "[M]en are natural influencers, whether we like it or not. There's a particular reason why Jesus called men only. It's not that women aren't co-participators. It's because Jesus knew women would naturally follow."

Yesterday afternoon, Mr. Harper shared the stage with Harold Albrecht, the Conservative candidate in Kitchener-Conestoga, at a rally attended by about 800 enthusiastic supporters.

Mr. Albrecht is pastor and founder of the Pathway Community Church. In June of 2004, he wrote in a letter to a Kitchener newspaper: "If one is truly committed to the marriage vows of fidelity, these same-sex marriages would succeed in wiping out an entire society in just one generation."

When reporters tried to question Mr. Albrecht about his views after the rally, Conservative handlers blocked them from getting close. Mr. Albrecht was hustled into a kitchen where he stood alone as the news media were told he was too busy to speak with them.

Egale, a gay-rights organization, says it has examined the websites of 34 new Conservative candidates who are known to oppose same-sex marriage and found that only three posted their views about the issue. Mr. Albrecht and Mr. Sweet did not.

At the Waterdown news conference, Mr. Harper demanded that Mr. Martin and labour leader Buzz Hargrove distance themselves from Mr. Hargrove's suggestion at a Liberal campaign stop Wednesday that Quebeckers should vote for a separatist candidate if that is the best way to defeat a Conservative government.

"I don't care how much the Liberal Party wants to stay in power," Mr. Harper said. "It is absolutely unacceptable, in any way, shape or form, to suggest that people should vote for the breakup of this country in order for the Liberal Party to maintain its entitlements to power."

Mr. Martin, who was campaigning in Toronto, rejected suggestions that Mr. Hargrove's comments indicate he will allow his allies to say anything -- even call for a vote for separatists -- to win.

"I'm very clear that I think that the strongest federalist voice in this election campaign is the Liberals, and I think that Quebeckers ought to vote for the strongest federalist voice," he said.

Alleged Tory Internet scheme sparks call for probe (Canada.com)

2006-01-19T21:18:00.000-06:00

Allan Woods
CanWest News Service

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

QUEBEC -- Elections Canada has been asked to investigate the Conservatives after allegations that the party is overseeing a group that operates partisan on-line web logs.

Canada's election watchdog received a complaint Tuesday morning from a disaffected party member who claims the Tories tried to sway political opinion in cyberspace in the leadup to, and during, the election by setting up the popular "Blogging Tories" website.

The site appears to be a coalition of like-minded individuals who have met in cyberspace to share their political opinions and express their frustrations with Paul Martin's Liberals.

But a Victoria, man, Eugene Parks, and Toronto Tory dissident Carole Jamieson allege the venture may be in contravention of the Elections Act and third-party financing laws. They say it may have "unduly influenced the election coverage and potentially the outcome of this campaign."

"They're using a third-party agency to get elected," said Parks, a former Conservative supporter who now says he is an opponent. "It's pure hypocrisy."

Parks said in an interview Tuesday he was approached by senior Conservative MP Diane Ablonczy in December 2005 after a Tory caucus retreat in British Columbia and asked to head what he described as a pre-election initiative on behalf of the party.

"At the time I was somewhat willing, but my loyalty to the Conservative party was somewhat shaky," he said.

A Conservative party campaign official said Tuesday that there is "no connection" between the federal party and the website and chalked the complaint up to a party member who is still upset about the merger of the Progressive Conservative party and the Canadian Alliance in 2003.

Third-party election financing laws state that it is illegal for a group to spend more than $150,000 during an election period related to a general election. It can also spend no more than $3,000 of that money "to promote or oppose the election of one or more candidates in a given electoral district."

The law also says that the third party cannot bypass the spending restrictions by "splitting itself into two or more third parties."

The Blogging Tories website does not hide its political preference, and even includes some Conservative MPs, including finance critic Monte Solberg, among its members.

But Parks' allegation that the group was set up as a concerted effort by senior Conservatives to win the election casts the website in a controversial light.

"They're trying to make it look like these are individuals rather than a party effort," Parks said.

Parks said he split with the party in June because he was uncomfortable with what he said was a hostile tone among some party members toward French-Canada and aboriginals.

Parks passed on his information, which included e-mail exchanges, to Jamieson, a notorious former aide to former Progressive Conservative leader Joe Clark. Jamieson called for Harper's resignation last September, saying that he did not have a chance of seizing power in an election.

Jamieson confirmed Tuesday that she had forwarded all the information to the chief electoral officer Jean-Pierre Kingsley on Tuesday morning.

Rusty Tory machine creaking in Quebec (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-19T20:48:00.000-06:00

By BRIAN LAGHI

January 19, 2006

OTTAWA BUREAU CHIEF

Conservatives say they may have difficulty cashing in on their new-found popularity in Quebec because they don't know who many of the voters are and they face problems getting some of them to the polls.

The lack of organization will force the party to focus hard on 10 to 12 seats it thinks it can win, but it will have to rely on momentum to take a second tier of seats where it has little or no organization.

An individual familiar with the campaign acknowledged yesterday the party may "leave votes on the floor" because of an inability to identify and deliver supporters to polling stations Monday.

Recent opinion polls have the Tories hovering around 30 per cent in popular support in Quebec, but capturing that level of the vote will be difficult because the spadework required to deliver it has not been done. The Conservatives have been in decline in the province since 1993, save for electing a handful of members in 1997 under then-Tory-leader Jean Charest.

Sources told The Globe and Mail that traditional voter-identification that takes place between and during election campaigns was essentially not done in the province because the Tories ran so far behind the Liberals and the Bloc Québécois in 2004 they didn't think it was worth the investment.

The Tories received just 9 per cent of the vote in Quebec last time around and won no seats there.

According to sources, only those ridings in which the Tories came close were marked for voter identification, a process in which workers phone people in certain ridings to see which ones might support them. Without such identification, organizers don't know who to usher to the polls on voting day.

The Tories also expect difficulty in attracting scrutineers, workers who observe voting procedure to ensure its fairness.

"It's hard to get out the vote, if you don't do your homework," said one Conservative who asked to remain unidentified.

Party officials also had difficulty building lists of supporters because there is no provincial Conservative Party from which to draw information.

The Tories have been co-operating with members of Mario Dumont's Action Démocratique du Québec, but have strong crews only in the dozen or so ridings they feel they can win. Those include constituencies in Quebec City, the Eastern Townships and on the Ottawa-Quebec boundary.

In part to compensate for the organizational shortfalls, party officials have redoubled efforts to buy substantial television, radio and newspaper advertising in Quebec.

The party has recently increased its advertising on the western portion of the Island of Montreal and also spent a substantial amount in the 418 area code around Quebec City.

The Conservatives have some strong prospects for victories in the Quebec City area, but very little in Montreal, sources say, even though they now lead the Liberals in Montreal in the polls.

One source said he expects the party might try to increase its radio ads in Quebec in an effort to get individuals to the polls.

One of the few organizational positives for the Conservatives was left them by former Tory Belinda Stronach, who called on the services of a group of former Progressive Conservatives in Quebec to help her leadership campaign against Stephen Harper.

One of those former PCs said yesterday that the lack of organization would probably have a more significant effect on a provincial campaign, where riding populations are smaller.

However, in a federal battle, a party's message tends to have a greater effect on the outcome, the worker said.

Tory Leader warns of activist judges (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-19T20:44:00.000-06:00

Tory leader says some appointed to bench by Liberals promote social agendas

By GLORIA GALLOWAY

January 19, 2006

From Thursday's Globe and Mail

Montreal — Stephen Harper says some judges appointed by the federal Liberals are activists working to promote their own social agendas, statements that drew heavily from his tenure in the old Reform and Canadian Alliance parties.

The assertions by the Conservative Leader, whose party leads the public opinion polls, mark one of the few times during a tightly scripted election campaign that he has strayed far from the centre of the political highway.

They came a day after he said a Conservative majority government would be kept in check by the judges, senators and federal bureaucrats who owe their jobs to the Liberals.

"The courts are supposed to be independent," Mr. Harper said yesterday when questioned repeatedly by reporters in Toronto about his attempts to reassure those voters who still fear his party may change the Canadian social fabric.

"I am merely pointing out a fact that courts, for the most part, have been appointed by another political party. But courts are supposed to be independent regardless of who appoints them and they are an independent check and balance," he said.

When one reporter asked if he believed judges are activists with their own social agenda, Mr. Harper replied: "Some are, some aren't."

But later, in French, he softened any suggestion that he believes judges are politically partial, "The judges are independent, there is no doubt," he said. "Their independence is well protected by the law."

Mr. Harper's former Reform and Canadian Alliance allies have cried loudly about judicial activism, with many complaining that liberal judges have imposed such things as same-sex marriage upon an unwilling populace.

Liberal Justice Minister Irwin Cotler responded with a scathing attack on Mr. Harper, arguing that his opinions are unfit for a man who aspires to lead the country.

"To me, [it] is irresponsible for a political leader to be impugning the independence and the integrity of the very institutions he should be protecting," he said.

"We need someone who will respect the rule of law, who will respect the independence of the judiciary."

Mr. Cotler said that the suggestion judges are Liberal-biased demeans and insults the judicial system. And he defended his own judicial appointments, saying they have been scrupulously apolitical.

In 2003, after courts in British Columbia and Ontario recognized the legality of same-sex unions, Mr. Harper, who was then the leader of the Canadian Alliance, accused former prime minister Jean Chrétien of stacking the courts with sympathetic judges for that very purpose.

"They didn't want to come to Parliament, they didn't want to go to the Canadian people and be honest that this is what they wanted," he said at that time of the Liberals. "They had the courts do it for them; they put the judges in they wanted, then they failed to appeal, failed to fight the case in court."

While the Conservatives have not promised any changes to the method of appointing judges to superior, appellate and federal courts as well as the Supreme Court of Canada, Mr. Harper says there is a particular type of person who would get those jobs if he were prime minister.

"What we will be looking for is what I call the judicial temperament," he told reporters. "And that is the ability to competently and shrewdly and wisely apply the laws that are passed by the Parliament of Canada."

But Mr. Harper's political foes said they remained concerned about his underlying beliefs and what he might do as prime minister.

In Ontario, Liberal Health Minister George Smitherman, who is gay, said that if the Conservatives emerge victorious after the votes are counted on Monday he will move up his wedding date with his partner.

When asked the about potential interference by a Liberal-dominated Senate into parliamentary affairs, Mr. Harper said he is concerned that the Senate would stymie Conservative government business as it has done in the past.

A controversial Mulroney-era bill on abortion was once blocked by the Senate, causing the government to abandon the legislation.

"The Liberal Senate in the past was extremely unco-operative when their party wasn't in power so it's a worry," Mr. Harper said.

"I hope that better judgment will prevail and the unelected Senate will play the role that historically it has played, which has been a useful technical role, but will not try to interfere with the democratic will of the elected House."

But, even as Mr. Harper was urging the Senate to co-operate with Parliament, Liberal Leader Paul Martin was saying his party's senators would block any attempt by the Conservatives to ban abortion, insisting that attacking abortion rights is what the Tories "have in mind."

The Liberals can expect to have a majority in the Senate for five more years, with 67 of the 105 seats now held by the Grits, compared to just 23 Conservatives.

"It's a position of the Liberal government, that's very clear. And certainly it's the way we would ask all Liberals to vote, senators and MPs," he told reporters at a campaign news conference in London, Ont.

Mr. Harper took his campaign to Liberal-dominated Toronto and Montreal yesterday to convince voters in Canada's largest cities that it is in their interests to be at the cabinet table of a Conservative-led government.

The Tory Leader told a tightly packed rally in a pub in the riding of St. Paul's, where news anchor Peter Kent is trying to upset popular Liberal Carolyn Bennett, that he is paying attention to their issues, including transit, urban violence and problems facing immigrants.

Flanked by former Mulroney cabinet ministers on a stage where Mr. Kent received the endorsement of CanWest vice-president David Asper, Mr. Harper urged Torontonians to take a look at his party.

Klein under wraps for 'six more sleeps,' aide promises (Edmonton Journal)

2006-01-19T20:39:00.000-06:00

Some fear he'll once again shoot from the lip

Kelly Cryderman, The Edmonton Journal

January 19, 2006

EDMONTON - The fact that Albertans haven't seen hide nor hair of Premier Ralph Klein in the last days of the federal election campaign is no accident.

Klein's director of communications, Marisa Etmanski, said the premier has been busy preparing for the upcoming legislature session. But she admitted that she and her staff are also keeping him hidden from reporters until the federal election is over.

"It is not that big of a deal. Are we trying to stay out of it (the federal election)? Yes," Etmanski said Wednesday.

"But it's six more sleeps, you know, then everyone can have him again.

"We think that the federal parties are the ones that should be in the spotlight. They're the ones that should be talking about their platforms and their plans for Canadians."

In most circumstances, Klein can barely contain himself when asked to express his opinion on the political issues of the day. He shocked Tory sensibilities early in the campaign when he said he would bet on another Liberal minority. In turn, Conservative Deputy Leader Peter MacKay suggested that duct tape might be a good way of dealing with Klein.

In the 2004 federal election, Klein's ongoing talk of reconfiguring Alberta's health-care system was used by Liberal Leader Paul Martin to suggest that only his party could stand up to provincial leaders like the premier who would try to dismantle Canada's public system.

Klein last spoke to the media in Calgary on Jan. 9, when he mused about federal Conservative Leader Stephen Harper reopening the issue of same-sex marriage if he becomes prime minister -- another dangerous issue for Conservatives.

Shortly after that, Klein headed off for a short ice-fishing holiday in Northern Alberta.

He attended a cabinet meeting Tuesday this week and, unusually for him, did not talk to reporters. He has private meetings in Edmonton and Calgary for the rest of the week, his staff say.

One federal Alberta Tory said perhaps Klein and his staff have finally got the message that the premier is annoying "the federal people, so knock it off.

"It's his people bowing to what he's hearing from the feds outside, but our party is not telling Premier Klein to do anything. I can guarantee you that."

Etmanski said the premier will be "thrilled" if the Conservatives win Monday's election.

"He said they've run just an excellent campaign," she said.

"He said it's one bet that he wanted to lose."

Toronto an obstacle for Conservative tide (Reuters)

2006-01-19T20:37:00.000-06:00

January 19, 2006

TORONTO (Reuters) - Stephen Harper's Conservatives have made sharp gains in the polls in the run-up to the January 23 election and now look set to challenge the traditional Liberal dominance of Toronto, home to nearly one-sixth of the country's voters.

The Conservatives have been gaining ground steadily outside their Western Canada power base since the start of the year, grabbing support in Liberal-dominated Ontario and also in Quebec, which typically splits votes between the Liberals, who have been in power for 12 years, and the separatist Bloc Quebecois.

But with nearly 50 of the 308 parliamentary seats to be decided by the 4.6 million people in the Greater Toronto Area, Conservative leader Stephen Harper will likely need a breakthrough in the region if he wants the 155 seats necessary for a majority government.

Toronto has typically been a tough sell for federal right-wing parties, due partly to a high proportion of immigrant voters who typically turn to the Liberals or the left-leaning New Democratic Party.

But pollsters say the Conservatives are well ahead in the wealthy suburban areas that surround Canada's largest city, the so-called "905" region, -- named for its telephone area code -- and are making up ground in the core "416" area, whose 23 seats have been either Liberal or NDP since 1993.

Perhaps sensing he's close to a breakthrough, Harper was campaigning in central Toronto on Wednesday in the dying days of the campaign.

"I want Toronto, and I want the great spirit of this city, to be part of the truly national government we are asking Canadians to give us," he told cheering supporters in the affluent riding of St. Paul's, which has been Liberal since 1993, but which is hotly contested this election.

Conservative supporters note that some electoral districts in Toronto embraced a provincial right-wing government as recently as 1999, but observers say that on a federal level, the Conservatives could still be tough sell in the city's core.

"The Liberals have massive leads in these constituencies," said Nelson Wiseman, political science professor at the University of Toronto.

"The Liberal vote in 416 is going to shrink dramatically. The issue is, will it be enough?"

Another issue, he says, is that a lot of the Liberal votes from the last election could go to the NDP, which was hurt in 2004 from soft support bleeding off to the Liberals to keep the Conservatives out of office.

In 2004, Harper suffered from voter concerns that he harbored a hidden right-wing social agenda, prompting Canadians to give the Liberals a minority government despite a government spending scandal that severely eroded their popularity.

This time, Harper has softened both his image and rhetoric, while the Liberals still have the reek of scandal, this time from a federal police investigation into whether the government leaked sensitive tax policy information to market players ahead of a crucial announcement in November.

Also of concern to Toronto voters has been an alarming rise in gun-related deaths over the past year, including a downtown shootout on Boxing Day that left a 15-year-old girl dead and pushed the issue temporarily to the top of the campaign agenda.

All three national parties have come out with competing tough-on-crime platforms.

But some doubt that Toronto voters are ready follow the lead of other regions that have embraced Harper, particularly as the Conservatives appear to edge closer to majority government status.

EKOS Research President Frank Graves said polls showed the Conservatives were running about even with the Liberals in Toronto last week, but that more recent numbers suggest the Conservatives may be falling back a bit.

"The stuff we're seeing early in the week here suggests that... the concept of a Conservative majority, the increasing plausibility of that, is having a chilling effect," he said.

Provinces spat over Harper's mystery promise (CBC)

2006-01-19T20:25:00.000-06:00

January 19 2006

CBC News

A dispute has erupted between Saskatchewan and New Brunswick over a financial promise Conservative Leader Stephen Harper may – or may not – have made during the election campaign.

Premier Lorne Calvert said this week that Harper promised to change Canada's equalization formula to a system that's friendlier to Saskatchewan. Conservative candidates in the province are also repeating the pledge for a new approach to equalization that would benefit wealthy provinces.

But New Brunswick Premier Bernard Lord opposes that change, and doubts Saskatchewan has been promised anything of the sort by the Conservative leader.

Lord has been an excited backer of Harper through the entire election campaign. He's embraced Harper at rallies and endorsed his program of change for Canada.

Equalization is New Brunswick's most important federal government program. The program helps Canada's 'have not' provinces pay for basic services like health and education. More than 20 per cent of New Brunswick's entire revenue comes from equalization and any change in payments would have a dramatic effect on the province's ability to serve its citizens.

The Canada Election Act prohibits radio, TV and internet from distributing election results into an area where people are still able to vote. The polls across the country will all be closed by 9 p.m. CT.

The equalization formula is under presently under review in Ottawa, and this week, Calvert and Conservative candidates said a Conservative government would change equalization to exempt provinces' non-renewable natural resource revenues when calculating payments to provinces.

"The Conservative party and its leader have made a very clear commitment to the province that if they form government, non-renewable resources will be excluded from the equalization calculation and that in essence solves our long term problem," Calvert told CBC News.

Exempting resources such as oil and gas from the equalization formula makes resource-rich provinces like Saskatchewan, British Columbia and Newfoundland appear poorer than they are and eligible for more equalization payments, at the expense of provinces without oil and gas like New Brunswick.

Bernard Lord is stiffly opposed to that kind of formula. Last year, New Brunswick Finance Minister Jeannot Volpé outlined the province's opposition in this official presentation on equalization to the federal government. "The removal of resource revenues from the program," Volpe told federal officials, "would have considerable adverse consequences on New Brunswick."

Thursday, Lord said he doesn't believe Stephen Harper has promised Saskatchewan anything on equalization. "These words come from Lorne Calvert, who I respect, he's a friend of mine, he's the NDP premier of Saskatchewan, and not from Mr. Harper. What Mr. Harper has said is these things will have to be negotiated after the fact."

But Saskatchewan Conservative incumbent MP Tom Lukiwski says just the opposite. "We've consistently stated that if we are elected into government we will be revising the equalization formula to remove the non-renewable natural resources which would result of course in Saskatchewan retaining 100 per cent of its oil and gas revenues among other things," said Lukiwski. "I think it's fair to say if we make those changes under current circumstances with current prices Saskatchewan would be $2 to $2.5 billion wealthier each and every year, so its a very significant program for Saskatchewan."

But the New Brunswick premier is adamant. Lord doesn't believe equalization promises have been made by Conservatives in Saskatchewan – even though clearly voters and politicians in that province do.

Are voters really buying Harper's paste-on smile? (Yorkregion.com)

2006-01-19T20:19:00.000-06:00

January 19, 2006
Debora Kelly

What's changed?

If you were to judge by the polls and national media, only the chore of the vote Jan. 23 stands between the shiny new Stephen Harper and his stick-to-the-script Conservatives and their majority throne on Parliament Hill.

Of course, you'll recall just prior to the June 2004 election, the story was similar. We were then well aware of the Liberals' entrenched patronage, shameless arrogance, unrestrained waste and utter disregard of what matters to ordinary Canadians.

Nothing's changed.

At that time, supposedly outraged Ontarians showed just how low we can go by returning the Liberal government to power.

When it came to putting pencil to ballot, voters here -- York Region elected five Liberals -- saw little alternative or hope in a Conservative government led by "scary" Mr. Harper.

What's changed? Mr. Harper?

This time around, he is successfully managing the message that was meticulously strategized in the last year; calmly championing moderate policies and muzzling loose-cannon candidates -- the anti-gay, anti-immigrant, anti-abortion Reform/Alliance crew still populating the ranks -- so as not to spook voters.

Gone are the plans to cut immigration, support two-tier health care and reject multiculturalism and bilingualism.

Are we buying the make-over? (Please don't tell me you fell for that silly paste-on smile during the leaders debates.) A lot of voters I talk to, particularly women, are not.

Myself, I am still troubled by the revealing chauvinistic reaction to Belinda Stronach's defection.

Mr. Harper remains who he was, albeit a craftier campaigner. And while Mr. Harper is no hockey dad, by any means, he isn't Darth Vadar.

The Conservatives remain a party of disparate elements, yet there is merit in some of their carefully crafted policies.

What has changed?

This time around, more voters see the Liberals' rabid attacks for what they are; desperate attempts by a decrepit party to fight off inevitable change.

Their arrogance led them to gravely underestimate not only the Tories, but voters.

Like last time, there is willingness to give the Tories a chance -- as a minority government, anyway.

Like last time, the desire for change is palpable -- the Liberals need time to heal, to rebuild, to seek a leader who doesn't dither on vision, is a strong message.

Like last time, there are many undecided voters -- plenty of whom are embarrassed Liberals -- knowing we need change, not yet convinced by the Tories and loath to cast a "strategic" NDP vote.

Like last time, a Conservative sweep in York Region isn't a given.

On a final note, I urge you to do what you can to learn about your local candidates, rather than blindly cast a partisan vote.

Pierre Trudeau said MPs are nobodies 50 yards away from Parliament Hill; our reality today is most MPs are nobodies on the Hill, but with an important role in the constituency as ombudsman and lobbyist.

We need a government, by the way, that will do more than simply promise to fix the "democracy deficit".

If I may be blunt, based on what our reporters and editors have seen in this campaign, there are some candidates who are decidedly undeserving of the job, party ticket aside -- don't send another unmitigated idiot to Ottawa, please.

This political saga must be played out -- if Mr. Harper doesn't win a majority, his own future as leader will be questionable -- if Canadians are to have someone, something, to vote for, rather than against.

Tories seeking to hire some Liberal staffers (CTV.ca)

2006-01-19T20:08:00.000-06:00

Canadian Press

January 19, 2006

OTTAWA — Concerned about a lack of experience within their own ranks, Conservatives are quietly approaching some Liberal aides about working for a Stephen Harper government.

Glenn Bradbury, executive assistant to Liberal MP Dan McTeague, said he's been approached twice in the past week by Conservative MPs who've asked him to consider switching sides should Harper emerge victorious from Monday's election.

Bradbury wouldn't disclose the names of the Tory MPs but said they aren't the only Conservatives putting out feelers to Liberal aides. He said he knows of one other political aide in the Foreign Affairs department who has also been approached by a Conservative operative.

"They were very discreet, no pressure, just would I give consideration because they don't have many people who've had experience. I've been on the Hill for 18 years,'' said Bradbury.

"I was quite touched by it but I don't forsee it happening I'm afraid.''

Whether or not the Liberals lose power, Bradbury said he'll probably continue working for McTeague, currently parliamentary secretary to the Foreign Affairs minister with special responsibility for Canadians abroad, assuming the Toronto-area MP wins re-election.

Harper has studiously refused to talk openly about a transition team or the possible make-up of a Tory cabinet. Premature speculation about such things in the 2004 election was deemed presumptuous and contributed to a last-minute decline in Tory fortunes.

Tory campaign spokesman Yaroslav Baran adamantly denied anyone on the Harper team is making overtures to Liberal staffers.

"Nobody wants to get their hopes up yet,'' he said. "Maybe it's being talked about but not by the people that matter.''

But Goldy Hyder, one of the Conservative campaign spin doctors, said he too has heard that some Liberal aides have been approached. And he said it makes perfect sense. "Whoever forms the government needs good staff ... Personally, my own view on these things is it would be a good signal to send,'' he said.

Hyder said informal overtures to Liberals are "driven by a systemic reality'' that the current crop of Tory staffers is neither large enough nor experienced enough to fill all the positions that will be required should the Conservatives form the government.

"Part of it is driven by necessity. You've got to fill a lot of staff positions quickly.''

Those with experience from the Brian Mulroney and Joe Clark eras, including Hyder himself, are probably too old or too settled in private sector jobs to want to go back to an insecure, high-pressure government job, he said.

Hyder noted it will be particularly hard to lure people away from their current jobs if the Tories manage to win only a minority government, which could last only a matter of months.

Moreover, Harper's promised Accountability Act will likely make staff recruitment even more difficult.

Harper has promised to introduce legislation that would prohibit ministers and their staffs, as well as senior public servants, from lobbying the government for five years after leaving their posts.

A number of Harper's top strategists and spin doctors, including Baran, Hyder, Geoff Norquay, Ken Boessenkool and Tim Powers, are registered lobbyists. They would not be precluded from taking posts in a Harper government but once they left government, they wouldn't be able to return to their old jobs or any other job that involved lobbying the government for five years.

Hyder said there are lots of Liberal ministerial aides who've been involved in office administration, policy or communications but are not particularly partisan. Those would be the kind of staffers the Tories might try to persuade to work for them.

From the Liberal perspective, Bradbury said there are plenty of aides who have families to feed and mortgages to pay who may be tempted to cross over. He observed, however, that there would be "no return'' for any Liberal who crossed to "the other side.''

The evolution of Stephen Harper and his party (CTV.ca)

2006-01-19T20:05:00.000-06:00

Bill Doskoch, CTV.ca News

January 19, 2006

Imagine a Canadian political party that proposes radical change: stop regional development; cancel universality for social programs (including old age security); restrict immigration; and hold binding national referendums on issues such as capital punishment and abortion …

In Canada, there was such a party in our recent history -- the Reform Party. And Stephen Harper, the Conservative Party's leader, was once its policy chief.

Harper cut his political teeth in Ottawa working for a Progressive Conservative MP. But believing then-Prime Minister Brian Mulroney wasn't doing enough to move Canada in a truly conservative direction, he left the Tories.

After a chance meeting with Reform leader Preston Manning, Harper became active in his Western-based, grassroots movement. But by 1997 he once again left over differences with Manning.

After a break from politics, Harper returned in 2002 to head Reform's successor, the Canadian Alliance, and was instrumental in merging that party with the Progressive Conservatives.

The new Conservative Party of Canada lost the federal election in 2004 when the Liberals successfully painted Harper and his MPs as scary extremists. In response, Harper has now remade himself as a Conservative moderate. Today he's even taking advice from Mulroney, and some of the former PM's key associates have joined him on the campaign trail.

During the 2006 election campaign, Harper's Conservatives announced some major centre-right policies that appear to be quite mainstream. However, others, including the Liberal Party, warn the hard-right policies of the Reform and Canadian Alliance Parties still lie beneath the surface.

"I don't believe Stephen Harper's changed as much as the party tries to suggest he's changed," Steve Patten, a University of Alberta political scientist who's studied the Reform Party, told CTV.ca.

"He still drifts off into Reform Party territory some days, as he did when he suggested the courts may become opposition to a government he forms, like an American Republican who's always complaining of Democrats stacking the Supreme Court," Craig Oliver, CTV's chief political correspondent, adds.

Patten said the core values held by the founding Reform-Alliance members still dominate the party.

"It's a matured version of the Reform-Alliance strain of the party," he said. "Harper, although he has the same core values he had back in the late 1980s or early 1990s, doesn't approach politics or the political world in the same way."

While the Conservative leader still opposes same-sex marriage, Harper has softened official policy, saying government should extend civil union benefits to gays and lesbian couples. Harper also said indirectly on Jan. 14 that he would extend his proposed childcare benefit to children of gay and lesbian couples.

During the second English-language leaders' debate, Harper said a Conservative government would enshrine property rights in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Patten explained it's an idea Canadian conservatives of various stripes have long dreamed of. For Reformers, "that was even more central to their notion of how rights should be defined and protected," he said.

Here are some other examples of Conservative policies proposed in their platform that are similar to policies of the Reform and Canadian Alliance parties.

Law and order: The Conservatives want mandatory sentences for gun-related crimes and would try 14-year-olds as adults for violent crimes or repeat offences. That's somewhat more moderate than the Reform Party, which would have seen 10-year-olds tried as adults. The Tories also want to toughen up parole eligibility and scrap the gun registry. As well, the Tories say they would "enact effective deportation laws," which was an important part of Reform justice policy.

Regional Development: Unlike the Reform Party, the current Conservatives would continue regional development agencies (Harper has apologized over the course of this campaign for saying in 2002 that Atlantic Canada had a "culture of defeat").

Senate reform: The Conservatives have said they would appoint elected senators as a first step. A cornerstone of the old Reform Party was the Triple-E Senate -- equal, effective and elected.

Medicare: The Tories stand behind the principles of the Canada Health Act. The Reform Party would have made medicare a spending priority, but would have cut any strings on the money and allowed provinces to pursue private care.

Quebec: Harper has said he'll address the fiscal imbalance, respect provincial jurisdiction and give Quebec a slightly bigger presence on the world stage. Reform, which had a decentralized vision of Canada, saw all provinces as equal. It would have given them all powers to protect their linguistic and cultural uniqueness.

Fiscal conservatism: Reform was aggressive in making deficits a political issue, but felt deficits should be dealt with through spending cut. The Alliance pushed for tax cuts. Targeted tax cuts are a key part of the Conservative platform in 2006.

While the Reform Party had a strong social conservative streak, William Johnson, author of Stephen Harper and the Future of Canada, said Harper personally is not a social conservative.

"He wants to appeal to social Conservatives because he said, again consistently, that for the Conservatives to come to power they have to have a coalition between the economic Conservatives and Libertarians -- which he is -- and the social Conservatives."

Harper also believes moral issues should be a matter of individual conscience, not party policy, he said.

Patten said that while Harper has sidelined some of the more extremist people in his caucus, "the party has maintained its hard ideological commitment to the kinds of things people like Stephen Harper have always believed in."

Johnson concurs, saying that because Harper did not make same-sex marriage and abortion a party issue he has in effect marginalized the social conservatives.

"Because the vote will be a free vote, and he will vote one way, yes, but the Bloc, and most of the Liberals and NDP almost to a person would oppose anything that limited abortion or same-sex marriage, it's not going to go anywhere."

"So his position has been consistent, and there's no hidden agenda. He's a very upfront, what-you-see-is-what-you-get man."

But Patten said what Red Tories saw in the wake of the merger drove many to abandon the party.

For example, Keith Martin (originally elected as a Reform MP) and Scott Brison (originally elected as a Progressive Conservative), both joined the Liberal ranks. Prominent Progressive Conservatives such as Andre Bachand, Rick Borotsik and Joe Clark left politics altogether.

However, others like former Mulroney aide Hugh Segal, who had been highly critical of Reform, are now advising the Conservative leader.

Harper has described his current party as having four main pillars: Red Tories, social conservatives, economic conservatives and reformers.

But, what kind of government will be created by such a mix?

"You'd need a crystal ball!" laughed Patten.

That being said, he adds that while Harper has promised he has no hidden agenda and doesn't want radical change, he may have no choice.

"There'll be all sorts of pressures for him to do something radical. There are members of his party who have been waiting a long time to undo Liberal and Progressive Conservative policies they disagree with," Patten said.

And while Harper assures Canadians there are a number of factors that would keep his government in check, including a Liberal senate, Liberal courts and a civil service appointed by the Liberals that may not deter him.

"I believe Stephen Harper is the kind of person who would rather leave his mark on Canada than win two terms in a row," Patten said.

"If there's a majority, people should expect real change."

Harper hints at replacing MacKay as deputy (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-18T20:54:00.000-06:00

By BRIAN LAGHI

January 18, 2006

OTTAWA BUREAU CHIEF

Stephen Harper opened the door yesterday to replacing his current deputy, Peter MacKay, with an MP from Quebec should the Conservative Party win a government next week.

Mr. Harper gave the indication during a television interview after rallies in the province of Quebec. Asked whether Mr. MacKay, the party's deputy leader, had given his okay to a second-in-command from another region, Mr. Harper demurred, but said the cabinet is a different thing from the current opposition list.

"I'll just say this. There's obviously a big difference between a cabinet -- if I got a chance to form it -- and a shadow cabinet," Mr. Harper told the CTV Newsnet program Mike Duffy Live.

"The cabinet obviously would have to be representative of the regional balance of the country. Ultimately, the prime minister makes decisions on composition of the cabinet. As I say, I'm not prime minister yet and I haven't really turned my mind to those decisions."

The choice of deputy will be a tricky one for Mr. Harper. Mr. MacKay, the former leader of the Progressive Conservatives, is a crucial representative of the PC movement, which joined Mr. Harper's Canadian Alliance to form the new Conservative Party.

Former PCs might be upset if the deputy is not one of them and Mr. MacKay has been the biggest symbol for the party. But Mr. Harper may feel obliged to install a deputy from Quebec, given the traditional duality of the country.

Liberal Leader Paul Martin said last night it was a bit early for Mr. Harper to speculate about a cabinet. "Mr. Harper showed exactly the same arrogance last time. And I would say to him that the vote will be Jan. 23, and you do not name a cabinet before you are elected.."

Who'll stab Harper in the front? (Toronto Star)

2006-01-18T19:58:00.000-06:00

January 17, 2006

JIM COYLE

If the nation's polling soothsayers are correct, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper is about to enjoy the best fortnight or so of his career.

There will be the final week's triumphant coast to the electoral promised land and the applause of adoring crowds. There will be the intoxicating euphoria of election night. There will be that august and humbling moment — and those who get there always say it's humbling — when he's sworn in as Canada's next prime minister.

After that, of course, it's all downhill.

Journalists eager to get ahead of the pack are already churning out profiles about who might be in a Conservative cabinet, who will serve as backroom powers behind the throne, who will put ideas in the leader's head and words on his lips.

But such journalists are not nearly forward-looking enough for us. We're way ahead of them.

We're already looking for Stephen Harper's Tom Wappel. For his Carolyn Parrish. For his David Dingwall. For his Scott Reid. We're looking for who it is who might make him rue the day (should it come to pass) that he ever got elected.

And if political history is any guide, there are all kinds of them out there.

Who, eager to share the stage and bask in the glory with him a week hence, will in short order be the zealot denouncing him for timidity? Which disgruntled backbencher will — first in corridor whispers, then from the front pages — be enumerating his flaws and shortcomings? Which erstwhile friend or strategy guru will be serving up to an astonished public self-destructive utterings akin to being ``entitled to my entitlements'' or disparaging the electorate's taste for ``beer and popcorn''?

These are the questions that simply can't be asked too early. For in getting to government, Harper will have had merely to vanquish his enemies. Staying there will mean keeping a leash on his friends, a challenge of a greater magnitude altogether.

After all, electoral tides are powerful things that often wash ashore some very weird fish. Just as Mr. Harper was apparently surprised to learn recently of the legal difficulties of one of his candidates in British Columbia, he is likely to soon discover some less-than-pleasant facts about others elected under his banner and name.

If Harper doubts this, if he thinks mere good intentions preclude him from having gathered into his clubhouse the odd wacko or two, let him consult a moment or two with former premier Bob Rae about the mixed blessing of surprise victories, especially majorities.

Such challenges are magnified, moreover, when one comes to government having campaigned against corruption and promising to restore honesty to government. Set the purity bar too high, and the standard for what passes for scandal becomes very low indeed.

What Rae would surely tell Harper is that the most burdensome among his group will be the true believers — like a Mel Swart or a Peter Kormos — who will serve as an in-house truth squad refusing to let him stray a step from undertakings made.

Alas, there is also certain to be, somewhere in his pack of giddy Conservatives promising to fly right, a Peter North (the Rae tourism minister who used his business card as a pickup tool in singles bars) or a Shelley Martel (a Rae cabinet minister who attempted to extricate herself from political difficulty by taking a lie-detector test to prove she'd been lying when she said something she shouldn't have).

In this game, with its egos and treacheries and ambitions, self-sabotage is almost a certainty. It crosses all party lines.

Just ask former Ontario premier Mike Harris how pleasant it was having backbenchers like Morley Kells and Chris Stockwell and Gary Carr — dismayed at being overlooked for cabinet — relieving themselves from outside the tent inwards in the aftermath of his 1995 victory.

Such self-sabotage crosses more than party lines. It crosses borders, even oceans.

In the U.S., there have been the Newt Gingriches and William Bennetts, pious moralizers who, off the clock, were dumping an ailing missus for a new model, or squandering millions in Vegas.

In the U.K., be it a Conservative or Labour government in power, there usually turns out to be a cabinet minister with a mistress on the side and a predilection for dressing up in lingerie or having his bottom paddled.

No one wants to rain on Harper's parade before it's left the starting blocks, but is he absolutely sure he has the stomach for (should the polls be right) the pain, the embarrassment, the betrayal, the fall from glory that almost certainly lies ahead?

Somewhere out there, sir, is your Sheila Copps or Buzz Hargrove. Somewhere out there is your Peter C. Newman, aiming to seduce your innermost thoughts onto his tape recorder.

Even worse, while you're dealing with all these headaches, somewhere in the shady corners of your own government, after the euphoria has passed and when difficult days arrive, there might be someone playing Paul Martin to your Jean Chrétien, an ambitious soul. Skulking and scheming. Biding his time.

Morgentaler asks all parties to support abortion rights (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-16T22:30:00.000-06:00

January 16, 2006

Canadian Press

Montreal — Dr. Henry Morgentaler is warning voters not to trust Stephen Harper when it comes to abortion rights.

"I don't trust the Conservative party and I don't think women in Canada or people who love women in this country should trust the Conservative party as far as abortion rights are concerned," he said Monday.

Mr. Harper has pledged that a Conservative government would not revisit the abortion issue or change the law.

But Dr. Morgentaler dismissed that as a "tactical manoeuvre, a good manoeuvre." He predicted a Tory government would eventually make it more difficult to obtain the procedure.

"Maybe he'll do this for a year or two," Dr. Morgentaler said of Mr. Harper's pledge not to change the status quo.

"There might be a private member's bill that the government could accept. Then they'll push it through there."

The doctor said he fears what would happen to women's rights if the Conservatives win a majority Jan. 23.

"There are many people in the higher echelons of the Conservative party who are terribly anti-choice," he said.

Dr. Morgentaler said he would like to see "a commitment from all the parties that they will not touch the abortion issue and that they will not re-criminalize abortion."

He added that he would like the federal government to make it easier for women to have access to abortion in provinces where access is very difficult.

Dr. Morgentaler, who started doing abortions in 1968, made his comments after testifying in a class-action lawsuit aimed at getting Quebec to reimburse women who have had abortions in private clinics or specialized women's centres.

He is part of court cases in Manitoba and New Brunswick that are trying to get compensation for women for abortions in private clinics.

He was particularly harsh in discussing New Brunswick Premier Bernard Lord's stand on the issue, calling his government "reactionary."

Earlier in the day, Dr. Morgentaler told Quebec Superior Court it would be "criminal" for the provincial government to not reimburse women who had abortions in private clinics.

The lawsuit argues the payments are guaranteed under the provincial health insurance law. Procedures done in hospitals are covered.

Nadia Genois of the Women's Health Centre of Montreal said later a victory in the case is vital.

"The cause is very just," she said. "It's important that all women can have access to abortions, free and legally and also with a quality of care."

Tories struggle in Toronto's Liberal strongholds (CTV.ca)

2006-01-16T22:26:00.000-06:00

January 16 2006

CTV.ca News Staff

Although the Conservatives may be leading the polls in much of the country, downtown Toronto is still proving to be a virtually impenetrable fortress for the blue wave.

While Conservatives are leading in national polls across the country, in the core of Toronto the numbers are swapped: Liberals are solidly in front with 40 per cent support. Conservatives are behind with 27 per cent, and the NDP is a strong third with 25 per cent support. The Greens trail with eight per cent. (See bottom of story for poll details.)

At stake are 23 ridings in Canada's largest city, and all but one is now in Liberal hands. Conservatives have been shut out of Toronto for the past four federal elections. Currently, NDP Leader Jack Layton holds the only non-Liberal seat in Toronto.

But the wide-open national race has Tories and New Democrats fighting hard to claim some of those ridings as their own.

Even popular, long-standing MPs such as Defence Minister Bill Graham are fighting desperately to hold onto their seats, braving the bitter cold to pound the pavement and shore up support with voters.

"My gut feeling with a week to go is it's going to be a hell of a fight," Graham told CTV.

And although the Conservatives are making inroads in Toronto, actually winning a seat would represent a seismic shift in voting trends.

"We haven't won a seat here in four elections in a row, but people are smiling and taking our literature and that's a big difference from a month ago," said an upbeat Lewis Reford, who is running against Graham in the Toronto Centre riding.

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper has certainly seen the value of campaigning in the city, and has made regular stops in the GTA.

"We're going to remind the Liberals that in Toronto the Maple Leafs are blue," Harper said during a recent campaign stop.

More likely, however, the New Democrats will be the party to weaken the Liberal stranglehold. If Toronto voters are planning to punish the Liberals and change loyalties, they are much more likely to send their vote towards the NDP than the Tories.

"They know the NDP is the alternative and is the better choice," said Olivia Chow, who is bidding for an NDP seat.

"We're just not finding the Conservatives are a factor in these ridings," said her husband, Jack Layton.

The Liberals have taken it for granted that they can expect a strong showing in Toronto, said Layton. "They viewed Toronto seats as one more entitlement, part of their culture of entitlement," Layton said.

Allan Gregg, managing partner with The Strategic Counsel, said there are four seats in Toronto that the Liberals could lose, but none of them is likely to fall into Tory hands.

Layton is doing his best to capitalize on the situation and take advantage of the Liberals' misfortune, said Gregg.

"So when Layton … focuses exclusively on the Liberals and ignores the prospect of a Conservative win, concedes a Conservative win, he's basically trying to pick the corpse of the Liberal party," Gregg said.

416 vs 905

Outside downtown Toronto, a ring of suburban communities known for its area code of 905 shows stronger support for the Conservatives.

The latest poll results show the race is tightening up slightly across Ontario with the Conservatives down two points to 38 per cent and the Liberals down just one point to 34 per cent.

In the Greater Toronto Area, which includes the downtown 416 ridings plus the suburban 905 ridings, the two lead parties are in a virtual tie. The Conservatives are unchanged at 37 per cent, while the Liberals dropped four points to 36 per cent, from a poll taken Jan. 11-14. The NDP has risen three points to 19 per cent and the Green Party is up one point to eight per cent.

Those numbers represent an incredible drop in voter support in the past few weeks, and since the last election, for the Liberals. In pre-Christmas polls, the party still had 50 per cent support, and in the 2004 election they captured 55 per cent of the vote in the GTA.

Technical notes on poll

Results are based on nightly tracking among a proportionate national sample of Canadians 18 years of age or older. Findings have been rolled up and analyzed over a three-day period. Interviews were conducted between Jan. 12, 14 and 15.

For the tracking poll, the sample size and margin of error (with the margin of error in brackets) for each region are as follows for the popularity and momentum questions:

* Canada: 1,500 (2.5)
* Quebec: 370 (5.1)
* Rest of Canada: 1,129 (2.9)
* Ontario: 568 (4.1)
* GTA (416/905): 236 (6.4)
* Outside GTA: 332 (5.4)
* Prariries: 246 (6.3)
* British Columbia: 200 (7.0 per cent)

Here are sample sizes for the Jan. 14-15 polling (margin of error in brackets):

* Canada: 1,000 (3.1)
* Quebec: 247 (6.3)
* Rest of Canada: 753 (3.6)
* Ontario: 379 (5.0)
* West: 297 (5.7)

Q. (party support) If the election was being held tomorrow, do you think you'd be supporting the (ROTATE LIST) Liberal candidate in your area, Conservative candidate in your area, the NDP candidate in your area, or the Green Party candidate in your area or (QUEBEC ONLY) Bloc Quebecois candidate in your area?

Q. (party support) In that case, which party's candidate in your local area would you be leaning towards at this time? Would it be the (ROTATE LIST) Liberal candidate in your area, Conservative candidate in your area, the NDP candidate in your area, or the Green Party candidate in your area or (QUEBEC ONLY) Bloc Quebecois candidate in your area?

Question on abortion ban draws Tory, Grit candidate support (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-15T20:36:00.000-06:00

By BILL CURRY

January 14, 2006

From Saturday's Globe and Mail

Ottawa — Dozens of Conservative and Liberal candidates have offered an anti-abortion lobby group a written pledge to support a law banning abortion if elected, indicating that the highly divisive issue could be revived in the next Parliament.

The pledges come even though Conservative Leader Stephen Harper has said the issue would not be pursued and Liberal Leader Paul Martin has said only that his party would protect women's right to abortion.

The issue has been dormant since the Conservatives adopted a position at a policy convention in March, 2004, repeated in the party's election platform, that “a Conservative government will not initiate or support any legislation to regulate abortion.”

But many Conservative candidates are making a different pledge.

The Campaign Life Coalition has posted on the Internet the responses it received from candidates of all political stripes to a nine-question survey dealing with abortion, same-sex marriage, euthanasia and research on human embryos.

Although the organization is accusing Conservative Party headquarters of urging candidates not to respond, many MPs and candidates provided answers and the numbers suggest an appetite to reopen the debate after the Jan. 23 vote.

When asked, “If elected, will you support measures to introduce and pass a law to protect every unborn child from the time of conception (fertilization) onward?” 18 Conservative MPs replied Yes, as did 24 Tory candidates, 10 Liberal MPs and two Liberal candidates.

Liberal MP Ray Bonin did not say whether he would vote to ban abortion, but answered Yes to the question: “If elected, will you support legislative or regulatory measures to explicitly exclude abortion as an insured health service under the Canada Health Act?” Most of the individuals who said they would support a ban on abortion also said they would support removing it as an insured service.

Mary Ellen Douglas, president of Campaign Life, said yesterday she is optimistic the large number of responses will mean MPs will work together across party lines in the next Parliament to outlaw abortion.

“I'm encouraged by the Liberals and Conservatives who have signed favourably. The thing is, we have pro-abortion Conservative candidates. So it's not like if the Conservatives win we're ecstatic here. We need candidates in all parties and then we'll see what we have to work with after the 23rd,” she said.

“That's what we're hoping for in this election, that there be that core in each party that you can work with, and then you can get somewhere. . . . We won't rest until there actually is a law to protect the unborn.”

Ms. Douglas said her organization will push the MPs who signed favourably to support “incremental” measures, such as ending public funding for abortions and banning abortion pills. More than a dozen Tory candidates have told the group that party headquarters told them not to answer the survey, she added.

“I think this is very sad. This is an open party that's talking about free votes and then telling candidates not to sign a questionnaire.”

Mr. Harper's spokesman, William Stairs, said a Conservative government would oppose any private member's bill aimed at changing the status quo on abortion, as would the Bloc Québécois, the New Democratic Party and most Liberal MPs.

“The position that was taken was that we would not support abortion legislation, and given that the other three parties are against abortion legislation, I don't see how abortion legislation would make it through the House of Commons,” he said.

Liberal MP Alan Tonks, who responded to the survey by saying he would support a ban on abortion and a prohibition on abortion-inducing drugs, said Mr. Martin has stated that matters of conscience are free votes.

“Generally speaking, I opt on the side of life. I don't support carte-blanche abortion,” Mr. Tonks said. “If there was a motion that was presented to review and send to committee, whatever the nature of the change being asked, I would always support it going to the committee.

“But what I would do would be very much dependent on how it cross-referenced with the kind of principles that I've outlined.”

Mr. Tonks said he suspects euthanasia is more likely than abortion to be raised in the next Parliament.

“We've crossed the bridge on the abortion issue. There's been a national debate. There's still disagreement about how that issue was resolved, but I think before that comes up, whether it's a Liberal or Conservative government, there will be other life issues that will come up first.”

Earlier this month, it was reported that the president of the Conservative Party, Don Plett, said in an e-mail that a backbench MP likely would introduce anti-abortion legislation if the Conservatives were to form the next government.

“When we form a government, we can rest assured that there will be a private member's bill on this,” he wrote in a November e-mail to a party member in Quebec.

Canada has essentially had no law on abortion since the Supreme Court ruled that the Criminal Code provisions dealing with the procedure violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Economist washes hands of new Tory agenda (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-15T20:21:00.000-06:00

By DENNIS BUECKERT

January 15, 2006

Canadian Press

Ottawa — A prominent economist commissioned by the Conservatives to assess the financial soundness of their election platform says major items were omitted from the version he was given.

Paul Darby, deputy chief economist of the Conference Board of Canada, originally concluded that Stephen Harper's Conservative platform “is affordable in each fiscal year from 2005-2006 through 2010-2011.”

The Conservative party promoted that conclusion last week as evidence its election platform had been “independently verified” by the Conference Board, an Ottawa-based think-tank.

But Mr. Darby says the version of the platform he was given to vet didn't include a Conservative health-care guarantee which states patients will be transported to another jurisdiction if they can't get timely care at home.

It also omitted a Tory platform promise to redress the so-called “fiscal imbalance” between Ottawa and the provinces.

Mr. Darby wouldn't comment on whether the timely health-care guarantee would bear a significant cost.

“Talk to Harper,” he said. “It is not in the platform I received from them.”

It's also not clear what the Conservatives expect to pay to redress the fiscal imbalance — something the federal Liberals have argued doesn't really exist.

For years, the provinces have complained the federal government has an unfair share of the tax base and that they should therefore be given more “tax room” to cover their responsibilities in health and education.

Mr. Darby said he does not believe that either the health-care guarantee or the promise of fiscal rebalancing were serious commitments from the Conservatives.

“Those are two items that are not in what I was presented to analyze,” he said. “I don't think, frankly, that those are in the platform, they're just under discussion.

“Those items were not costed, which leads me to believe that they're something that they're having under consideration that they're not committed to.”

But Conservative finance critic Monte Solberg said both items are serious commitments.

The costs weren't included yet because they are still subject to discussions with the provinces should the Tories win power, he said.

“We're reluctant to put any numbers in precisely because it has to be negotiated,” Mr. Solberg said.

Despite those holes, a Conservative statement says the party's platform is “fully budgeted — it maintains a balanced budget, every year, with money left over.”

Add the Conservatives: “It has been independently verified by the Conference Board of Canada ... is fully costed — it covers all our commitments.”

The questions being raised by Mr. Darby suggest none of the Conservative numbers should be trusted, said Liberal Finance Minister Ralph Goodale.

“What would the auditor general say if the government kept two sets of books and hid crucial expenditures while claiming to have the auditor's verification?,” Mr. Goodale said in an interview from Regina.

“It's slight of hand, it's hocus-pocus.”

2006-01-14T16:06:00.000-06:00

Canada would be a different nation (Toronto Star)

2006-01-14T15:59:00.000-06:00

January 14, 2006

As Canadians prepare to go to the polls, many are pondering what Canada might look like if the Conservatives under Stephen Harper are elected.

While it is impossible to foresee all the issues a new Conservative government might face in the future, or predict how it might address them, we can look back in time at some of the significant national issues this country has faced in recent years, and we can say with some confidence how the Tories would have dealt with them.

It is instructive to recognize that Canada would be different today, had the Conservatives been in a position to act on their past campaign promises and platform. And that should come as no surprise.

Harper ran for the Tory leadership vowing to "create a country built on solid Conservative values, not on expensive Liberal promises, a country the Liberals wouldn't even recognize." And while his views on specific issues have evolved, "I don't think my fundamental beliefs have changed in a decade," he told reporters this week. Harper is a conviction politician, who truly does believe in changing the nation's course.

Tomorrow, the Star will focus on what Canada will be like if the Conservatives implement the campaign platform they unveiled yesterday. But today, we are focusing on what would have been.

Canada would take more cues from the United States.

Canadian troops would likely have joined the American war on Iraq, which was waged under false pretences, to eliminate weapons of mass destruction that did not exist. Harper felt we should be "shoulder to shoulder" with our closest ally.

Canada would not have signed the Kyoto accord to curb global warming.

And we would have joined the controversial U.S. missile defence system.

Parliament itself might look very different.

Harper would have changed the dynamic in Parliament by appointing senators only after they had been elected provincially. Over time, this would create two competing power centres in Parliament, with the House of Commons championing the national interest and a Senate with more political legitimacy pulling for the provinces.

Ultimately, parliamentary gridlock might be a real risk.

Ottawa would be less activist.

Conservatives believe as an article of faith in smaller, less activist federal government, and a looser federation. Unlike the Liberals, the Conservatives also would not have promoted a new national social program, such as the proposed child-care network.

Canada would be a less progressive society.

It is hard to imagine Harper would have named a progressive pioneer, such as Madam Justice Rosalie Abella, to the Supreme Court. And a Conservative government would not have passed a law allowing same-sex couples to marry in Canada.

Rather, many Conservatives would have pushed for a far more restrictive abortion law, and for tougher pornography laws.

Canada's rich-poor gap would be more pronounced.

In the 2004 election, the Conservatives vowed to give Canadians the lowest taxes in the world, lower even than in the United States, where there is a more pronounced rich-poor gap. The Tories believe lower taxes will attract business investment, but we firmly believe they would actually lead to more polarization of the rich and poor. Generally, the Conservative preference for cutting taxes over providing services has traditionally favoured the more affluent. Moreover, the poor in Canada, who rely more heavily on services for health, education, child care and shelter, get shortchanged. Ottawa would have had to pare support for services as federal revenues shrank.

Toronto would be worse off.

Harper showed no great enthusiasm for a "new deal" for Toronto, and other cities, that involved giving them a multi-billion-dollar package of gas tax revenues, a goods and services tax break and other assistance. Nor would funding for transit infrastructure have been a major priority.

Liberals, Conservatives and New Democrats will disagree on whether Canada would have been better or worse off under these different policies that the Tories would have pursued. But there is no debating that the country would have looked different, had the Conservatives been in a position to champion their agenda.

Canada would have a more pro-American foreign policy today. In Parliament, national-provincial tensions would be more keenly felt. Ottawa would be less active providing national social programs. Society itself would be less progressive. The rich-poor gap would likely be wider. And cash-strapped major cities would be receiving less federal help.

Tomorrow we will look at the current Conservative platform, which was fully unveiled yesterday, and how it proposes to reshape the country.

Tory win = swift change (Toronto Star)

2006-01-14T08:34:00.000-06:00

Platform signals party would shift course of government

January 14, 2006.

SUSAN DELACOURT, BRUCE CHAMPION SMITH AND ROBERT BENZIE
STAFF REPORTERS

OTTAWA—If the Conservatives win this election as the polls predict, Canadians will notice the difference almost immediately.

All the signs point to Stephen Harper making changes that would significantly shift the course of federal government in ways that go beyond mere cosmetics, both advocates and critics agree.

The Conservatives' campaign platform, delivered by a relaxed-looking Harper in Oakville yesterday, is a blueprint for an entirely new government — one looking increasingly likely to take over from Prime Minister Paul Martin and his Liberals after the vote on Jan. 23.

The blueprint will form the main contents of a first budget and throne speech for a future Conservative government.

Cast ahead just a few weeks from now, if Conservatives win the election, as pollsters now are starting to predict.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper and a team of largely inexperienced, but enthusiastic ministers emerge from their swearing-in at Rideau Hall and sit down to the task of unravelling 12 years of Liberal rule. Governor-General Michaëlle Jean, only months after dancing with Martin in the halls of Parliament at her own swearing-in, reads the new throne speech in a Senate filled with Liberal appointees.

Then the new finance minister — Alberta's Monte Solberg, perhaps, or maybe Ontario's own former finance minister Jim Flaherty — delivers a budget, likely by March so that provinces can get on with releasing their own budgets.

The GST will fall by one percentage point, to 6 per cent and there will be tax credits for transit passes and for children's sports fees. The national network of federal-provincial child-care deals will be scrapped. The gun registry will be dismantled. People in the lowest income bracket will find that their tax rate, just recently cut to 15 per cent, will climb back to 16 per cent and that the basic personal exemption, just increased by $500, will be clawed back by $400.

The measures were months and months in the planning, and now Conservatives are within striking distance of putting their best-laid policy plans into effect.

Tory MPs and candidates, smelling the very real scent of imminent power, are sticking closely to the same, strict script and are resisting any attempts by the media to pull them off their message.

Harper is now in a position to dangle hope in front of them — realistic hope.

"I believe for Canada the best is yet to come," Harper said yesterday.

Conservative candidate Tony Clement, who is running against Agriculture Minister Andy Mitchell in Parry Sound-Muskoka, says Canadians can expect visible change from a Harper government — and most visible, he says, would be the law-and-order changes.

A new sheriff is coming to town, in other words.

"The real difference (from the Liberals) is going to be on the crime and justice issue," said the former Ontario cabinet minister.

Clement said the "absolute fiasco" that has been the Liberals' $2 billion gun registry illustrates the government's misplaced priorities.

Gun-control advocates would agree that this will be the most visible — and worrying — change of the Harper regime.

In emails circulating late this week, various gun-control proponents were conveying anxiety about Harper gutting an initiative that they credit for a steady reduction in gun crime in Canada since 1991 — even if Toronto has seen a rash of handgun violence.

Harper is not vowing to do anything beyond the current, loophole-filled handgun ban.

The fact that Harper is now realistically able to envision victory is a product of deep preparation, as was yesterday's platform launch.

While others, especially Liberals, were counting the Conservatives out, the Tories were building a governing machine.

"All of these things have been carefully considered and fully budgeted. We've worked on them for months. We didn't make them up in the middle of a campaign or the middle of a debate," Harper said, taking a jab at Martin's surprise announcement on constitutional rights in this week's TV debates.

"We worked hard on them because we are asking the people of Canada to trust us with their money, to trust us with the results of their own hard work."

Martin lit into the Tory document yesterday, calling it "incompetent" and saying it threatens to undermine Canada's credibility in the eyes of the international community and markets.

Then he attacked Harper for not attaching a dollar figure to major commitments like resolving the fiscal imbalance and refusing to specify where he would trim program spending to achieve his promises.

"It reminds me of the kind of documents that I first looked at when I became finance minister in 1993 and looked at the kind of documents the Conservatives actually circulated," Martin said.

The Conservative's platform, titled "Stand up for Canada," outlines $44.9 billion in tax savings and $30 billion in new spending. The biggest ticket in the platform is the $32.3 billion cost of the Tories' signature promise — cutting the GST immediately to 6 per cent from 7 per cent and eventually to 5 per cent in five years.

Liberals, however, are keen for Canadians to notice what's not on the Tories' to-do list. Issuing what Finance Minister Ralph Goodale described yesterday as a "victim's list," Liberals rattled off a long series of programs and policies that will go by the wayside if they are defeated on Jan. 23.

The "victims," as Goodale put it, include: the Kyoto air quality accord; the aboriginal agreement from the November summit in Kelowna; the personal tax cuts and a range of packages to assist industries such as forestry.

Harper, who has been skeptical of the Kyoto accord to reduce greenhouse gases, announced that his government would seek a "made-in-Canada" solution.

He promised a "clean air act" to reduce the pollutants that cause smog and encourage "new technologies" and public transit to curb greenhouse gases.

The platform also says the Conservatives are committed to meeting the spirit of the November agreement to improve the lives of aboriginal people, but makes no promise on spending the $5.1 billion to make it happen.

The Conservatives say they'll also replace the Indian Act with "modern" legislation and pursue settlement of outstanding aboriginal claims.

To pay for their promises, the Tories will scrap child-care deals signed with the provinces over the last year by the Liberals, a move saving $4.8 billion.

That has sparked concern in Toronto where officials worry about the impact on new daycare centres that are just opening — and relying on the federal funding.

But yesterday, Harper suggested it was the city's tough luck.

"I'm not responsible for the City of Toronto budget ... The agreements the federal government signed are only guaranteed funding for one year," Harper said.

As well, the Tories say they'll go hunting for $22.5 billion in savings from government department and agencies.

Canada's armed forces and the Indian affairs department would be spared any funding rollbacks. Transfers to the provinces, health care, money earmarked for municipal infrastructure and programs such as Canada Pension Plan and employment insurance will also avoid spending caps.

But spending in all other federal departments would be capped at the rate of inflation, plus the rate of population growth.

"It will establish financial discipline and save billions," Harper said. "We have to make choices but I'm telling you there are no draconian measures."

Faced with a political opponent tarred by images of wasteful spending, Harper touted the values of integrity and portrayed the Conservatives as careful spenders.

"We've seen literally billions go to waste, mismanagement and the benefits of a few friends," Harper said.

"Our government must always see tax dollars, not as a large pile of money but as an incredible amount of public trust," he said.

With files from Sean Gordon

With victory in sight, Harper platform preserves social programs, cuts taxes (National Post)

2006-01-14T08:07:00.000-06:00

John Ward, Canadian Press
January 13, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - Ahead in the polls and with campaign momentum on his side, Stephen Harper is trying to reassure voters that a Conservative government can preserve social programs and cut taxes in a balanced budget.

His Liberal foes, who are running attack ads portraying him as a hard-eyed, American-style right-winger, dispatched Finance Minister Ralph Goodale to scoff at Harper's budget figures, calling them "hocus-pocus make-believe."

The Tory leader distributed the full Conservative platform Friday. It's a blue-bound, 46-page document that outlines plans to pay for seven weeks of campaign promises and includes a last financial goodie - a pledge to eliminate taxes on capital gains that are re-invested within six months.

This, the platform says, isn't just a favour to the rich.

"Canadians who invest, or who inherit cottages or family heirlooms, should be able to sell these assets and plow their profits back into the economy without taking a tax hit," says the document.

Overall, the platform promises $30 billion in new spending and $45 billion in tax cuts over five years, with an accumulated surplus of $23 billion, a cushion to support efforts to mend the so-called fiscal imbalance with the provinces.

Harper said he generally accepts Liberal financial projections for the next few years and his first budget would be within a billion dollars of what the Liberals have said they would spend.

He said he will preserve social programs and improve health care while offering modest tax cuts and reining in government spending.

The Tory leader would shift money around for some campaign promises, moving $2 billion from the Kyoto climate-change fund to pay for transit pass tax credits and taking $4.8 billion allocated to the Liberal child-care program to cover the costs of payments directly to parents.

Federal departments - with the exception of Defence and Indian Affairs - would see their spending growth tied to inflation and population growth. Those two departments would see faster increases.

Planned hikes in employment insurance benefits, seniors benefits, and scheduled transfers to the provinces for things like health care and equalization would go ahead.

Goodale was scornful.

He said Harper's revenue projections are $4 billion higher, and spending plans are $26 billion lower, than what financial analysts would deem reasonable.

"He must have more tax increases in mind if he's going to fill this $30-billion hole, or there are more program cuts than we already know about . . . or they will run a deficit," Goodale said.

"Or, which is the likely possibility, they will do all three."

Harper said he will work with the provinces to produce a long-term solution to the fiscal imbalance, but refused to dicker in mid-campaign.

He said Tory budgeting is flexible enough to cover the billions a deal will cost.

That drew a swipe from Prime Minister Paul Martin.

"He's started to bring out his money and his projections and the money is not there," Martin said in French to about 100 supporters crowded into a Liberal campaign office in the southern Ontario riding of St. Catharines.

"It's clear he has just duped the provinces, he has just duped Quebecers."

Later, during a news conference in Hamilton, a stern-faced Martin attacked the platform as "not competent" and a relic from the days when Brian Mulroney was still prime minister.

"It reminds me of the kind of documents I first looked at when I became finance minister in 1993, and looked at the kind of documents that the Conservatives actually circulated," Martin said.

It was a time, he said, when Canada's finance department lacked credibility in financial circles around the world.

"The reason for that was the kind of lack of clarity, wishful thinking, perhaps even deliberate ambiguity with which the financial projections of the Canadian government proceeded." Martin himself offered some modest spending plans Friday, saying his government would create a $25 million "heroes fund" to help the families of police, firefighters and other public-safety workers killed in the line of duty.

He also promised $140 million to pay for new tools, training and support for first-responders and a tax deduction to allow volunteer emergency workers to claim up to $1,000 in clothing, travel and training costs.

NDP Leader Jack Layton rejected the whole Tory program.

"The Conservative platform is wrong for working women. Wrong for working men. Wrong for working families," he said in a speech in Saskatoon.

"They deserve better than to be bribed with the money they work hard to earn. I reject the Conservative platform, because I believe it is time working families were at the front of the line. Not the back."

He said Tory tax cuts will squander the government's ability to improve social programs.

Harper, demonized in recent Liberal TV ads as a man with a hidden agenda of hard-right policies, has been fighting that image - and he kept at it Friday, releasing the platform in a breezy, easy style.

He took the high road: "Our opponents offer a campaign of fear. I am asking Canadians to choose a positive agenda that speaks to our potential and resides in each and every one of us."

Flashing a crooked grin and working the stage without a podium, he said the document stresses values which he believes most Canadians share.

"These are: integrity, families, respect for hard work and achievement and a Canada strong and free."

He portrayed himself as a cautious fellow.

"I don't measure progress by the level of emotion or by the intensity of the sales pitch," he said. "I measure it by achievement, one step at a time. I believe it's better to light one candle than to promise a million bulbs."

The platform includes pledges to introduce a new Clean Air Act, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, tighten up government accountability, strengthen the hand of the auditor general, get tough on crime, boost the armed forces.

There's a promise of a $500-million investment over five years in university-based research and an increase of $425 million in foreign aid over five years.

Harper also promised fixed election dates, steps toward Senate reform and free votes in the Commons on everything except budgets and spending estimates.

With a $75-billion platform, the Conservatives would outspend the NDP, Liberals (National Post)

2006-01-14T07:59:00.000-06:00

CanWest News Service
January 14, 2006

It turns out the Conservatives, who were the last national party to release their cost numbers, are the big spenders among the major parties in the election campaign, making $75-billion worth of promises for the next five years. That is more than even the NDP, which pledged $71-billion. Only the Green party, which is still trying to land its first MP, came up with a more expensive grocery list, with $96.85-billion of new government policies and measures. The Liberals tallied $68.5-billion in spending, starting with the November mini-budget, the unofficial start of the campaign, while the Bloc Quebecois, the first party to release its numbers after the writ was dropped, came in at $55.8-billion.

Conservatives: Muffled, but how Moderate? (The Tyee)

2006-01-13T15:46:00.000-06:00

Candidates have denounced abortion and 'the gay agenda.' And vowed to 'change laws to reflect biblical values.'

By Tom Barrett

January 11, 2006

One of the biggest differences between this election and the 2004 campaign, is that this time around, Conservative candidates have been virtually silent on social conservative hot-button issues.

This time, the Conservatives have run a remarkably disciplined campaign, so much so that critics have accused the party of muzzling its more outspoken candidates.

Candidates like Darrel Reid running in Surrey, who not too long ago said: "I think every Christian's under an obligation to change laws to reflect biblical values."

The discipline is especially impressive in light of the fact that the Conservative party still contains divisions between former Reform-Alliance members and members of the old Progressive Conservative party, said David Laycock, a political science professor at Simon Fraser University.

Laycock said that, following the 2004 campaign, Harper "read the riot act to people like Cheryl Gallant," the Ontario MP who had said in the middle of the campaign that the beheading of an American in Iraq by terrorists was "absolutely no different" from the practice of abortion.

'Just hasn't come up'

Laycock, author of The New Right and Democracy in Canada, noted that there are a number of socially conservative candidates running for the Conservatives in B.C.
The Tyee's Election Central Superblog

"I haven't seen any coverage of their rather distinctive views on social policy questions in the daily press," he said. "It just hasn't come up. And you would think it would."

Given the party's pledge to settle social and moral issues through free votes in parliament, the beliefs of individual Conservative candidates is very important, Laycock said.

"Given the kind of change that would be introduced - the contrast between the Liberals and the Conservatives on this question - it really has received an astoundingly small amount of coverage."

Laycock said that's because the Harper campaign's "policy-a-day" strategy has kept the media's attention focussed on other issues. At the same time, the Liberals have been "astonishingly ham-handed and incoherent," he said.

He said it's worth asking if the party's candidates' social views reflect the views of the general population in B.C.

"There isn't a social conservative majority in this province by a fairly long shot, even outside the Lower Mainland."

Loose tongues in '04

The current disciplined Conservative campaign contrasts sharply with the party's first run at power in 2004. In addition to Gallant's comments on terrorism and abortion, the party had to deal with Gallant's call to strike down the law that protects homosexuals from hate propaganda.

During the campaign, Conservative health critic Rob Merrifield talked about making third-party counseling compulsory for women seeking abortions. Conservative language critic Scott Reid promised to cut bilingual services.

Then a documentary film surfaced in which Abbotsford MP Randy White promised that a Conservative government would use the constitution's notwithstanding clause to override court decisions that irked social conservatives.

This string of outbursts, climaxed by the revelation of White's "the heck with the courts" comment at the end of the campaign, may have helped reverse the Conservatives' lead in the polls, producing a Liberal minority government. Certainly, the comments played into the image - cultivated by Liberal attack ads - that the Conservatives were too extreme.

'Shunning media'

This time, candidates like Gallant are keeping their mouths shut.

The Ottawa Citizen has reported that Gallant "is shunning the media as much as possible, discouraging reporters and photographers from accompanying her as she campaigns, and agreeing to interviews only in carefully managed situations in which she attempts to limit questions to the Conservatives' official platform."

As well, she's been avoiding all-candidates meetings, communicating largely by press release, according to her opponents.

Several Conservative candidates in Nova Scotia appear to have been muzzled, as well.

The Halifax Chronicle Herald reported earlier this week that Rakesh Khosla and Paul Francis are keeping mum about attending a meeting of clergy opposed to same-sex marriage.

"We've been told by Ottawa that we don't talk about that," Khosla campaign volunteer Paula Henderson told The Chronicle Herald. "That's a dropped subject."

"The fact that they're telling their candidates not to talk about this is incredible," said Fisheries Minister Geoff Regan, who is being challenged by Khosla in his Halifax-area riding. "The Conservatives are muzzling their candidates. How many others are there with an agenda they don't want to talk about?"

'Muzzling' denied

A Conservative party spokesperson replied that no one is being muzzled. "There are only so many hours in the day," he said. Candidates "seek advice from others as to which media inquiries in the run of the day they can respond to," he said.

The meeting in question was organized by the Pro-Marriage Network, a group "dedicated to preserving and promoting traditional marriage in Canadian society." About 110 clergy from Pentecostal, evangelical and Roman Catholic churches across Nova Scotia attended the meeting, which was intended to support candidates opposed to same-sex marriage.

Rondo Thomas, the Conservative candidate in the Ontario riding of Ajax-Pickering, has also been loudly opposed to same-sex marriage. Thomas, a minister and vice-president of Canada Christian College, has argued that the federal government will eventually force churches to perform same-sex marriages.

In 2003, he said this about legislation to recognize same-sex marriages: "As it stands, the proposal would allow me to marry my mother, my daughter, my sister or my granddaughter. When we try to change God's laws, the end result has to be total anarchy."

Apparently, Thomas hasn't made any similar comments during this campaign.

Although B.C. has several socially conservative candidates, party spokesperson Colin Metcalfe said the party has no strategy to muzzle them.

"There's nothing that's being directed by the party or the campaign to the candidates," he said. "I'm coordinating communications for B.C. and I've been on daily calls with Ottawa and there's never been a directive to me for that type of strategy. Our candidates are available to the public. That's the whole point of campaigning."

Focus on the Family ties

In some cases, what's kept B.C. Conservatives' social positions from becoming a campaign issue is the sense that their opponents have similar values.

Cindy Silver, for example, is the Conservative candidate for North Vancouver and the former staff lawyer for the right-wing fundamentalist group Focus on the Family Canada. She describes herself as being "pro family" and against same-sex marriage, but also says she has "an open mind on abortion."

In any event, complaints about her social conservative views have been blunted by the fact that her Liberal opponent, MP Don Bell, attends the same Alliance church as Silver.

Similarly, Multiculturalism Minister Raymond Chan has been described as a fundamentalist Christian. Earlier this week, the Vancouver Sun ran a story repeating claims that Chan said last April that he favoured using the notwithstanding clause in the constitution to eliminate same-sex marriage. Chan denies having made such a statement.

(Harper has said he would not use the notwithstanding clause, which allows governments to override the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, to overturn the right of gays and lesbians to marry. Most legal scholars, however, say that it would be impossible to revoke this right without using the notwithstanding clause.)

It is ironic that Chan is on the defensive on this issue, given that his Conservative opponent, Darrel Reid, is the former president of Focus on the Family Canada. Focus Canada is an offshoot of the American Focus group, run by Dr. James Dobson, one of the most powerful right-wing religious leaders in the U.S.

Reid was supported in his bid for the Conservative nomination by DefendMarriage (B.C.). Following his victory, the riding president quit, complaining that the Conservatives were "getting dangerously close" to being overtaken by the religious right.

Divorce laws 'biggest disaster'

An article last July by The Vancouver Sun's Doug Ward reported that during his time as president of Focus Canada, Reid stated that the "liberalization of divorce laws was the biggest disaster to hit Canada, short of common-law marriage." He also said "I think every Christian's under an obligation to change laws to reflect biblical values."

In 1997, Reid defended a statement made during a radio broadcast that "gays are using the AIDS agenda to push the gay agenda on to our country right now."

The Conservatives are counting on a large group of social conservatives within the Richmond Chinese-Canadian community to carry Reid past Chan.

Probably the best-known social conservative in the B.C. party is former Canadian Alliance leader and Okanagan-Coquihalla MP Stockwell Day. Day, who was defeated by Harper for the leadership of the Canadian Alliance in 2002, seems assured of a seat in any Conservative cabinet, possibly as foreign affairs minister.

While in the Alberta provincial cabinet, Day opposed protecting gays from discrimination under the provincial human rights code. He also supported a group that lobbied the provincial government to stop funding abortions except in cases where pregnancy posed a threat to a woman's life.

Veteran political reporter Tom Barrett is a contributing editor to The Tyee.

`Not ready,' for majority insider says (Toronto Star)

2006-01-13T09:25:00.000-06:00

Some strategists prefer minority
Harper vows to boost aid for cities

January 12, 2006
SUSAN DELACOURT
IN OTTAWA

Privately, and perhaps surprisingly, some Conservative strategists are saying they're hoping they don't find themselves with a majority government after the Jan. 23 vote.

"We're not ready for that," one Tory confided this week.

A minority government would keep more radical or hard-right elements of the party in check, for one thing. Stephen Harper wouldn't be under pressure to use his majority to ram through new marriage legislation or other social-conservative policies, another strategist explained.

As well, minority government would give Canadians a chance to see more of Harper as a broker between interests — an image he tried to push while leader of the opposition, but not enough to totally erase the impression of him as a rigid ideologue.

Tories are also worried about finding qualified staff, for a majority or minority.

Thanks to Harper's promise to ban former political aides from lobbying or government relations for five years, few people in mid-career in those businesses will be willing to jump into work with a new Tory government.

That could mean that when Conservatives go looking for political staff, they will have to look to older veterans dating back to the years of Brian Mulroney's government, people near retirement, for instance, or to relatively inexperienced rookie staffers who aren't worried about losing their jobs and careers when the government collapses.

Yesterday, in Fredericton, Harper said his party would honour Ottawa's decision to share five cents a litre of federal gas tax revenues with municipalities.

"This is an important commitment," Harper said. "We support continuing to fund improvements to our municipal infrastructure."

But in a change that could set up a funding tug of war between potholes and transit, he said the Conservatives would "expand" the new deal for cities pledge, allowing big communities to use the funding to build and repair roads and bridges.

Under Liberal rules, larger cities have been restricted to spending the federal cash on environmentally friendly investments, like transit and water treatment.

Harper spoke to a meeting of New Brunswick road builders and pledged $2 billion in new funding over five years for roads, highways and border crossings. The funding would eventually rise to $600 million a year. Meanwhile, the Conservative leader, who has been slammed by Liberals for his past views on topics such as Canada's ties with the United States and the state of Canadian federalism, said his views have matured over time.

"I think I am a normal, thoughtful person. I think over the course of a decade, people's views evolve somewhat and situations change," he said.

On a day when the Liberals and New Democrats unveiled their platforms, the Conservatives postponed their own platform release to tomorrow.

Harper, Martin spar over property rights (CBC)

2006-01-13T09:12:00.000-06:00

January 12, 2006
CBC News

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper is brushing off Liberal arguments that his call for charter-protected property rights would open the door to striking down laws that protect workers, children, unions and the environment.

Harper said during a leaders debate on Monday that he would like to see the Charter of Rights and Freedoms include property rights.

On Thursday, he said, "It's not a high priority."

But the Liberals are trying to use it as an example of how closely aligned the Tory leader is with the conservative movement in the United States.

Liberal Leader Paul Martin said property rights is the "shrine at which the U.S. conservative movement bows."

He said enshrining those rights in the Constitution would allow the government to attack a range of laws.

"If property rights were enshrined in the Constitution then probably you would not be able to ban handguns," Martin said.

Harper said he has no desire to strike down those kinds of laws.

"We believe the Charter of Rights should reflect the right to own property, the right not to be deprived of property without due process of law and just and timely compensation."

Harper accused of ACOA flip-flop (Chronical Herald)

2006-01-13T09:00:00.000-06:00

Liberals say Tory leader has never been behind program
By STEPHEN MAHER Staff Reporter

Stephen Harper changed his tune on ACOA on Thursday, and denied that he was doing so.

In a campaign appearance in Halifax, Mr. Harper said a Conservative government would support the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency.

The Liberals are calling the move a mid-campaign flip-flop aimed at burnishing Mr. Harper’s reputation in the region, where he has never been popular.

For his part, Mr. Harper said he said the same thing in the last election campaign, but that seems not to be the case.

"What we said in the last campaign is that we’ll have the auditor general review all loan and grant programs in the Government of Canada to make sure we’re getting value for money," he said. "I also said in the last campaign, and we’ll say again, that we support ACOA."

Here’s what Mr. Harper said in the last campaign, on June 2, 2004: "Then there are tens of millions of dollars in corporate welfare given out not just by Industry Canada, but by the so-called regional development agencies, ACOA and Western Economic Diversification (Canada)."

The Conservative campaign office could not provide an example of Mr. Harper speaking in support of ACOA during that campaign.

Last year, Mr. Harper wanted to scrap ACOA’s loans to businesses but keep it as a regional business-boosting body and infrastructure agency.

About 42 per cent of ACOA’s $438-million annual budget is loans to businesses, money that critics say too often goes to friends of the government. The Liberals say the loans are vital to job creation in hard-pressed communities.

"I want to see these industrial subsidy and industrial development policies change, because I think they’re just corporate welfare and they don’t work," Mr. Harper told The Chronicle Herald in March 2004. "And they pick winners and losers. Actually, they seem to inevitably pick losers. So I think those kinds of programs do have to go."

In 2002, when he was leader of the Canadian Alliance, Mr. Harper said he would move "dramatically and very rapidly" to kill ACOA and similar programs, which he considered rife with "cronyism."

"You make your connections with the government . . . and government officials," he told the Saint John Telegraph-Journal. "That’s how business gets done. I think that kind of thing over a long period of time is linked to a culture of defeatism."

On Thursday, he denied saying in the last campaign that he wanted to end loans to businesses.

"So what you just said was not the policy I ran on last time and not the policy I’m running on this time," he said. "We believe there’s an important role for ACOA and we’ve been clear on what that is and we’re going to maintain the budget of ACOA."

Mr. Harper did not say if the agency would continue to give loans to businesses — which was the question — and his director of communications did not give a clear answer later.

"It’s not as simple as saying will you give money to business, because it’s sort of a multifaceted thing," said William Stairs. "My understanding of this is that it’s an integrated approach and that you’re using all different aspects of ACOA to further the economic development of our region."

The party’s ACOA critic, Greg Thompson of New Brunswick, told The Canadian Press on Thursday that the Tories would put decisions about business funding in the hands of a private-sector board.

Mr. Harper has never supported ACOA in the past, says Joe McGuire, the agency’s minister.

"He’s in election mode and he’s not going to say anything negative against ACOA for political purposes," he said.

Mr. McGuire said Atlantic Canadians ought to be suspicious.

"It’s a pretty big bite to chew on in the middle of an election campaign, as a brand spanking new policy on regional development agencies," he said. "It’s a lot to ask people to believe. It truly is a total flip-flop."

Mr. Harper was joined on the stage at the Delta Halifax by Halifax candidate Andrew House, not the crowd of candidates who usually act as his backdrop. The candidates for Halifax West and Sackville-Eastern Shore were not present. Rakesh Khosla and Paul Francis have been dodging media questions about their opposition to same-sex marriage, and a campaign volunteer told this newspaper last week they were under orders from the national party not to speak on the subject.

Mr. Harper came to Halifax to announce a $200-million tax credit for developers who build housing for "low-income city dwellers."

Before the news conference, Mr. Harper visited briefly with Jordan and Anna Braun, a Spryfield couple with a 14-month-old baby, to promote the policy and to give the photographers travelling with him a chance to take a picture.

Harper signals Tories would turn back on Kyoto (CTV.ca)

2006-01-13T08:56:00.000-06:00

Canadian Press

January 13, 2006

OTTAWA — Conservative Leader Stephen Harper is saying "No" to Kyoto, "Maybe" to missile defence, and "Sort of" to aboriginals.

And that has Liberals shouting: "We told you so."

Harper signalled Thursday that he would turn his back on the Kyoto climate-change accord and renegotiate a recent $5-billion federal-provincial deal with natives.

And he left the door open to joining the controversial U.S. missile defence system, while promising to hold a free vote in Parliament before signing on.

The Liberals, who have been painting Harper as a pro-American, right-wing extremist, jumped on his statements.

Environment Minister Stephane Dion said abandoning Kyoto would be a "tragedy" that would undermine the global effort to curb climate change.

"We will send a signal to the forces of progress that Canada is not with them anymore, we are with the resistance," he said.

Indian Affairs Minister Andy Scott said Harper's election would mean a step backward for aboriginals and destroy 18 months of work.

Harper, speaking in Halifax, said he'd abandon Kyoto because its emission-reduction targets can't be met and he'd set Canadian-made targets instead.

He said he supports the principles of the November native agreement, which included big-money pledges for housing, education and health care. And he said he will honour a $2-billion compensation plan for decades of abuse in residential schools.

"But in terms of details and budgets, we're going to want to develop our own plans in consultation with the provinces and with native organizations."

On missile defence, Harper told Radio Canada that he would wait for a formal, written offer from the Americans before deciding whether Canada should participate.

"If the Americans propose such an arrangement, and if we come to the conclusion that it's in the country's best interests, it's my intention to turn this treaty over to Parliament for a free vote," he said.

Earlier Thursday, Harper moved to staunch a controversy involving a Conservative candidate in B.C.

Derek Zeisman has been charged with trying to smuggle a car and 112 containers of alcohol into Canada - not exactly the kind of news the leader of a law-order party wit a big lead in the polls likes to hear.

Harper announced that Zeisman will not be allowed to sit as a Conservative MP if elected. But he added that it's "too late in the campaign legally for me to withdraw the candidate or change the candidate."

Harper said the party didn't know of the charges until this week, but Zeisman insisted in a newspaper interview that officials did know.

The Liberals meanwhile sent out a news release Thursday saying Harper spoke last March in Richmond, B.C., at a fundraising dinner for a far-right group that speaks out against gay marriage and abortion.

The party also said the Canadian Alliance for Social Justice and Family Values Association published a caricature on the cover of its July/August issue which portrayed Paul Martin as a Nazi receiving an award from Adolf Hitler for "the destruction of Canada's foundational institution (family)."

Don Plett email on Private Member Bill

2006-01-12T23:47:00.000-06:00

The Insider has received the original text from the Don Plett email on abortion:

****************

-----Original Message-----
From: Don Plett [mailto:donplett@.net]
Sent: Sun, 20 Nov 2005 11:43
To: Gilles Lavoie; Ray Novak
Cc: Ian Brodie; Doug Finley; National Council / Conseil National
Subject: Re: Stockwell and abortion.

Gilles
When you use the term presumably this tells me that you did not hear the
comments, and as such you do not have the right to accuse. And even IF he
made these comments he was speaking at a Right to Life Rally. What would you
expect him to say? Our policy is that all MPs have the right to their
opinion, not just those who are not in favour of the right to life. In fact
when we form Government we can be rest assured that there will be a private
members bill on this. So I strongly suggest that you don't make more of it
then necesary especialy if you were not at the function to hear the comments
personaly. Best Regards Don

-----Original Message-----
From: "Gilles Lavoie"
Date: Sun, 20 Nov 2005 11:07:11
To:"Conservateur-Ray Novak"
Cc:"ianbrodie" , "Doug Finley"
, "National Council / Conseil National "

Subject: Stockwell and abortion.

Hi Ray,

l'm told that Stockwell participated in Montréal to a pro-life convention.
He presumably said that we should reopen the debate on abortion.This is
contrary to our platform and l would like Stephen to be made aware of that statement.

As we discussed with Stephen at National Council, most of us are afraid that
such statement may derail the campaign. l'm confident that someone, somewhere will find a
diplomatic way of talking to our candidates and MPs and make sure that these
kinds of statements
do not occur again.

Best regards, Gilles

Tories deny abortion agenda (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-12T23:45:00.000-06:00

Official expects private member's bill; Harper's office says it

By GLORIA GALLOWAY

January 11, 2006

MONTREAL -- A backbench member of Parliament would likely introduce anti-abortion legislation if the Conservatives form the next government, the party's president said.

"When we form a government, we can be rest assured that there will be a private member's bill on this," Don Plett wrote in an e-mail in November to a Conservative Party member in Quebec.

However, William Stairs, a spokesman for Conservative Leader Stephen Harper, said yesterday that he doesn't know how his party could make its stand against abortion legislation more clear.

"The bottom line remains that a Conservative government won't support abortion legislation," Mr. Stairs said. "If a Conservative government won't support it, I don't see it going anywhere."

Anonymous members of the party have circulated an exchange of e-mails between Mr. Plett and Gilles Lavoie, a Quebec member of the party's national council, its governing body. Mr. Lavoie had written to Mr. Harper's executive assistant, Ray Novak, and other Conservative officials to complain that British Columbia MP Stockwell Day had made anti-abortion statements at a rally in Montreal.

A resolution adopted at a party convention in Montreal last winter stated that a Conservative government would not support abortion legislation and Mr. Lavoie said he wanted Mr. Harper to be aware of Mr. Day's statements.

"As we discussed with Stephen [Harper] at national council, most of us are afraid that such statement may derail the campaign," Mr. Lavoie wrote. "I'm confident that someone, somewhere will find a diplomatic way of talking to our candidates and MPs and make sure that these kinds of statements do not occur again."

Mr. Plett, who is close to the Conservative Leader, responded to Mr. Lavoie's request. In an e-mail dated Nov. 20, 2005, he chided Mr. Lavoie for complaining about comments he had not heard first hand.

"And even if [Mr. Day] made these comments, he was speaking at a right-to-life rally. What would you expect him to say? Our policy is that all MPs have the right to their opinion, not just those who are not in favour of the right to life," Mr. Plett wrote. "In fact, when we form government, we can be rest assured that there will be a private member's bill on this. So I strongly suggest that you don't make more of it than necessary."

Mr. Day was listed on the official pamphlet of the National Pro-Life Conference as speaking on the topic of commitment and responsibility of politicians in the service of life and the family.

Mr. Plett did not immediately respond to questions yesterday about his e-mail to Mr. Lavoie.

Conservative Senator Marjory LeBreton, who is advising Mr. Harper, said she and many other party members believe it is a woman's right to choose. Ms. LeBreton said there would be opposition to anti-abortion laws within Conservative ranks, "starting with people like me."

She noted that even non-controversial private member's bills, which are chosen for debate in the House of Commons through a lottery, rarely make it to the House "so this would never survive." There were no such bills on abortion in the last session of Parliament.

And if such a bill was introduced and was one of the few that actually made it to the floor of the House, a Conservative government that has promised its MPs they can vote freely on the issue would not have much control over its progress. It would all come down to the number of MPs from all parties who wish to revisit the abortion issue -- and there are certainly Liberal MPs who would like to.

There has effectively been no law against abortion in Canada since 1988 when the Supreme Court ruled that the section of the Criminal Code dealing with the procedure violated the right to security of the person contained in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The Conservative Party has been leading in public-opinion polls, putting more distance between itself and the Liberals every day that the campaign draws closer to the finish line. But the party experienced similar success in the 2004 election until the Liberals convinced a large number of voters that Mr. Harper had a "hidden agenda" on social issues such as abortion.

Stronach outlines reasons for quitting Tory party (CTV.ca)

2006-01-12T23:35:00.000-06:00

January 11 2006

CTV.ca News Staff

Belinda Stronach, a Liberal MP and cabinet minister, has issued a statement calling Stephen Harper's Conservative Party ideological, narrow and intolerant.

The statement said she left the Conservatives and joined the Liberals last year for those reasons.

Stronach, who is the Liberal Human Resources Minister, issued the statement in response to a Wednesday Globe and Mail story which suggests a Tory backbench MP would put forward a private member's bill to change current abortion laws.

The story was based on a November email from Conservative Party President Don Plett to a party member in Quebec.

"When we form a government, we can be rest assured that there will be a private member's bill on this," Plett wrote, as reported by the Globe based on emails circulated by anonymous Liberal Party members.

Conservatives have quickly dismissed the email, upholding Conservative Leader Stephen Harper's stance that a Tory government wouldn't change abortion laws.

The email was part of an exchange between Plett and a member who complained about anti-abortion comments allegedly made by MP Stockwell Day at a pro-life rally.

Plett reminded the member that MPs are allowed to hold their own opinions on the subject and said that when the Tories form a government, a Private Member's Bill on the issue will probably be brought forward.

Such a bill would not likely make it to the floor of the House of Commons for debate, and if it did it would probably be subject to a free vote by all MPs, in the event of a Tory government in office.

Stronach, who was elected as a Tory and once made a bid for the leadership of the Conservative Party before crossing the floor to the Liberal side, said the email underlines the fact Tory promises can't be trusted. She followed a Liberal trend during this election, suggesting it's evidence of Harper's hidden right-wing agenda.

"Just beneath the surface of the safest campaign planning lies the real heart of the Stephen Harper Conservative Party -- ideological, narrow, intolerant," said Stronach in the statement. "Mr. Harper himself has not changed since the days not long ago when he was an outspoken neo-con ideologue, who ran a right-wing organization and admired the Republican right in the U.S. more than his own Canadian political culture."

Conservatives hold there is no hidden agenda.

"The bottom line remains that a Conservative government won't support abortion legislation," William Stairs, a spokesman for Harper, told The Globe. "If a Conservative government won't support it, I don't see it going anywhere."

A day earlier, Stronach attacked Conservative Justice Critic Vic Toews and Ajax-Pickering candidate Rondo Thomas. Both have made news lately for controversial statements that seem not to mesh with Harper's policies.

Toews has been reminded of comments he made in a 2003 interview with U.S. Christian radio, where he was critical of judges who would change laws to favour same-sex marriage. Toews also seemed to advocate use of the notwithstanding clause to reverse same-sex marriage legislation – something Harper has pledged not to do.

The Liberals have also circulated footage of Thomas speaking at an anti same-sex marriage rally. Thomas uses battle jargon and urged his supporters to go to battle against those who wanted to change the traditional definition of marriage.

Harper often describes the Liberal Party as a "culture of entitlement." Stronach tweaked the expression and said there is a "culture of conspiracy in Mr. Harper's Conservative Party."

Stronach said Harper's Conservatives make secret deals with scary social conservative interest groups. Those groups will quickly become vocal in influencing the government if a Conservative government is elected, she suggested.

"Mr. Harper leads a group trying to convince Canadians to let them run the country, but, with them, come all kinds of other people who stay in the shadows until January 24 with agendas not on the ballot."

The Liberal candidate for Windsor-Tecumseh, Bruck Easton, is also the former national president of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. He praised his new boss, Liberal Leader Paul Martin, as a man with integrity who doesn't shirk from problems but "faces them head on."

Harper's views, which Easton said fall far outside mainstream Canadian values, were his reasons for leaving the party, he said.

Harper says candidate Derek Zeisman won't be allowed to sit as a Tory if he wins (Gazette)

2006-01-12T23:14:00.000-06:00

Canadian Press
January 12, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - Stephen Harper says a Tory candidate dogged by a smuggling controversy won't be allowed to sit as a Conservative MP if he wins election.

Derek Zeisman, who is running in the B.C. constituency formerly held by retiring Conservative MP Jim Gouk, is to appear in court next month. In July 2004, Zeisman was crossing into British Columbia from the United States when Canada Customs charged him with attempting to smuggle in a 1989 Mercedes-Benz and 112 containers of alcohol.

He is also accused of lying to customs officers about the incident.

"As a consequence of that, I will say today that this candidate, Mr. Zeisman, will not be sitting as a Conservative should he be elected," Harper said at a campaign appearance in Halifax.

"He'll have to get this matter resolved and until it gets resolved he cannot sit as a Conservative.

"It's too late in the campaign legally for me to withdraw the candidate or change the candidate."

He said Zeisman should have owned up to his legal troubles before seeking the nomination.

Zeisman is currently in hospital following a serious car accident five days before Christmas.

Harper hints at ditching Kyoto accord (Calgary Herald)

2006-01-09T12:46:00.000-06:00

Climate change agreement not effective, says Harper

Jason Fekete, Calgary Herald; With files from Allan Woods, CanWest News Service
January 08, 2006

A Conservative government would likely abandon the Kyoto accord on climate change in favour of a new global agreement that would see the world's largest emitters shooting for more "modest" targets, Tory Leader Stephen Harper hinted Saturday.

Whether a Conservative regime withdraws from the current Kyoto agreement or extends it beyond 2012 will depend on negotiations with the global community and its largest emitters -- including the U.S., which pulled out of the treaty, Harper said in a phone interview with the Herald.

However, Canada and most of the world have already "de facto" pulled out of the agreement because the Kyoto targets won't be achieved, he said from Ontario.

"We don't want to see an accord where only Canada is asked to do anything, or Canada and a handful of other countries," Harper said. "An effective global accord has got to cover the big emitters -- which the Kyoto accord does not."

Harper's comments came the same day that Liberal Leader Paul Martin assailed him for turning his back on the environment and climate change.

"Stephen Harper seeks to move us toward a society in which we all fend for ourselves, a Canada that would turn away from its shared responsibilities on global warming and the environment," Martin said.

"Mr. Harper would withdraw from Kyoto."

Since the election campaign began, Harper has been conspicuously quiet on Kyoto and his party's environmental platform.

On Saturday, he indicated his party will seek a new climate change blueprint that incorporates large emitters such as the U.S., China, India and Brazil.

"We've been always frank that we've thought the (Kyoto) targets wouldn't be met," he said. "Now we have to work on something that will actually get something done."

The Tories will look at implementing a more "modest" plan that includes collaboration with the provinces, said Harper, adding his party's environment platform will be unveiled soon.

In Montreal, Martin used a campaign stop to promise $1 billion over the next decade to clean up the Great Lakes, the St. Lawrence River and Lake Winnipeg -- and to paint Harper as having "no interest" in the environment.

Half the money will go toward remediating contaminated sites. The platform also includes $200 million for research into the effects of human activity on the ecosystem.

The Kyoto accord commits Canada to slash greenhouse gas emissions to six per cent below 1990 levels by 2012.

Emissions have soared 24 per cent in Canada since 1990 -- more than in the U.S. -- largely due to growth in oil and gas production. Alberta's total greenhouse gas emissions have jumped 34 per cent since 1990.

Federal Environment Minister Stephane Dion, also in Montreal, said Canada has the "toughest" targets of any Kyoto signatory, but the government has been "preparing the ground" in the past several years.

He said that work will allow the country to effectively meet its requirements within the four-year window -- between 2008 and 2012 -- when countries are required to come into compliance.

Harper and the Tories have said Kyoto is "flawed" and that they prefer a "made-in-Canada" approach to improving the environment that would focus on investing in new technologies that could then be exported to other nations.

A Conservative government wouldn't focus solely on carbon dioxide in any new agreement, he said. Rather, his party would implement a clean air act with targets for a range of pollutants, including sulphur dioxide and nitrous oxide.

The Liberals, NDP, Bloc Quebecois and Green party all support Kyoto and have called for emission reduction targets to be extended beyond 2012.

All parties have been too vague or broad on their plans to deal with climate change, and Canada's response to Kyoto has been slow, Pierre Alvarez, president of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said in a recent interview.

That's created uncertainty for industry and doubts that Canada can meet its treaty commitments.

"Do we need to go harder and faster, yes," Alvarez said. "That applies to the whole economy."

Last month at the United Nations climate change conference in Montreal, 157 countries agreed to an action plan that sets no new targets, but calls for binding commitments to reduce greenhouse gases beyond 2012.

While Canada has been slow in cutting greenhouse gas emissions, the Conservatives shouldn't pull out of Kyoto unless they're able to provide their own concrete action plan, said John Drexhage, director of climate change and energy at the International Institute for Sustainable Development.

"I can understand the skepticism (on Kyoto) given Canada's track record and that we're so far off our target . . . but don't throw the baby out with the bath water," Drexhage said.

Canada should continue to give Kyoto a chance, he added, seeing that even the U.S. has agreed to begin discussions on how to address climate change in post-2012.

Withdrawing from Kyoto would smear the world's perception that Canada has a green thumbprint, he said.

"It would be looked on with a lot of dismay."

Political animal can't hide neo-con spots, Linda McQuaig argues (Toronto Star)

2006-01-09T12:35:00.000-06:00

January 8, 2006

In January 2001, Stephen Harper and five others published an open letter in the National Post urging Alberta to beef up its fight with Ottawa by building a "firewall" around itself and take greater control over its own affairs.

Complaining that tax revenues from Alberta were subsidizing other Canadians, the "firewall letter" sounded downright hostile to the rest of the country.

Its attitude is typical of a group of right wingers, centred around U.S-born academic Tom Flanagan of the University of Calgary. This "Calgary school," with which Harper is very closely allied, peddles a Canadian version of Paul Wolfowitz-style neo-conservatism, and it likes the idea of using oil-rich Alberta as a right-wing battering ram against the more socially democratic vision of Canada that prevails in much of the rest of the country.

Certainly, the authors of the "firewall letter" don't sound much concerned about fostering national unity — presumably something we'd expect in a prime minister.

If the "firewall letter" had been published during this campaign, Harper would almost certainly be heading for a crushing defeat, instead of perhaps poised to become prime minister.

I bet most Canadians don't know about the letter, or have forgotten what's in it. After all, people don't have time to go looking up what Harper wrote years ago.

The media have time, but little interest. Instead, the media treat the campaign as a horse race, fixating on polls, offering voters little more than their own reflection in the mirror.

So, despite the "firewall letter," the Conservative campaign has largely gotten away with spinning Harper as a strong defender of Canada and Canadian sovereignty — and independent of Washington.

Carefully out of sight is Harper's attack on Ottawa two years ago for not joining the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Harper even stirred the waters of anti-Canadian feeling south of the border by denouncing Ottawa's decision in an interview with U.S. TV channel Fox News, and also in The Wall Street Journal.

No wonder Harper was recently lauded in the Washington Times as "pro-Iraq war, anti-Kyoto, and socially conservative ... the most pro-American leader in the western world."

Also gone from sight is Harper's suggestion three years ago that Canada was becoming a "second-tier socialistic country." Now, according to Harper, this is a "great country."

Is Harper showing a willingness to compromise?

Not likely.

As fellow right-wing Albertan Ted Byfield once noted in an interview with the Walrus magazine: "I don't think (Harper) knows how to compromise. It's not in his genes. The issue now is: How do we fool the world into thinking we're moving left when we're not?"

No problem.

With a co-operative media, Harper has managed to render largely invisible his links to a cabal of right wingers determined to transform Canada in the way their American counterparts transformed the U.S. — despite widespread Canadian revulsion for George W. Bush's America.

But, enough of that. Back at the horse race; it's neck and neck ...

Stand up for family values, Mr. Harper (Toronto Sun)

2006-01-08T16:29:00.000-06:00

By MICHAEL COREN

January 7, 2006

I have to confess that I didn't think the Conservatives would be performing as well as they are doing. They've made mistakes, but nothing close to as many as the Liberals. Suddenly the Big Red Machine is less oily and smooth than greasy and stuck.

Yet Stephen Harper is still obsessed with appeasing those who cannot be appeased. I speak of the social engineers who are obsessed with dictating the nature of the family, marriage and childhood. Social and moral radicals, hardly any of whom would ever consider voting Conservative.

But Harper has been told by his advisers that he must avoid social issues at all costs if he is to have any chance of winning the election. For people whose belief system is not defined by the polls, this is startlingly odd and irrational behaviour.

On the same-sex marriage issue, for example, numerous surveys from a variety of sources have shown that a mere 30% of Canadians favour gay marriage. The remaining 70%, the vast majority, are either absolutely opposed to the concept or prefer some form of civil union that allows homosexuals a recognized partnership but one that is visibly and obviously different from a marriage.

This would mean that it would be not only politically acceptable but morally essential for any party leader to raise the issue in an election campaign. Harper, however, will only offer the minimum -- he will allow a free vote on the question in The House of Commons.

Even this was enough to provoke the usual suspects, who became hysterical at the very idea that a Canadian leader would allow other Canadian politicians to discuss the future of Canadian marriage in the Canadian parliament.

Only complete submission will satisfy the zealots. So the Tories should ignore the screams and discuss the notwithstanding clause. After all, it was written into the Charter of Rights not because it looked pretty but so that it could be used.

We're not speaking of the nuclear button here, but of a valid and sensible employment of a central aspect of Canadian democracy. An essential part of the same Charter that has become a fetish to Paul Martin.

The abortion issue is similar: If it is seen to be merely about medical choice, then it is of limited importance and should be of little concern to most voters. But if it is, as I believe, about life and death, it is of central significance to the 50% of Canadians who are opposed to abortion.

Many of them, by the way, are ethnic voters in urban ridings who routinely vote Liberal but might vote Conservative if the party made more noise about moral issues and exposed the opposition for what it is and says.

I say again, the HALF of Canadians who object to abortion. I also guarantee that many people reading this column question my numbers or simply refuse to believe them. The reason is that most of Canada's media are vehemently socially liberal.

Harper has enjoyed noticeable success with his response to the extremist policies of the Liberals on the issue of daycare.

Now he should move on to solidify this base with a pronounced defence of marriage, family, children, life and community. Not only because it is good politics but because it is plain good.

Tory minority government would be stable: Harper (CTV.ca)

2006-01-08T16:21:00.000-06:00

January 8 2006

Canadian Press

OTTAWA — Although he's taken pains to insist the outcome of the election is up in the air, Stephen Harper has already drawn up a "small list" of advisers who could help him keep a fractious minority Parliament together.

The Conservative leader also suggested in a weekend interview with The Canadian Press that a Tory minority government would be more stable than the one which crumbled Nov. 29 following months of legislative paralysis and bitter, partisan feuding.

It's another sign of growing confidence in the Tory camp, despite their strategy of not looking too eager for power.

One of the principal people on Harper's calling list, should he win, is John Hamm, Nova Scotia's retiring Tory premier, who has used a mixture of country charm and political cunning to survive 29 months in a minority position.

Former prime minister Brian Mulroney is also rumoured to be on the list of advisers but Harper refused to confirm that.

Mulroney's shadow isn't very far from Harper in this campaign. Senator Marjory LeBreton, a former Mulroney adviser, is part of the campaign team and former chief of staff Hugh Segal is also hanging around.

Harper was more interested in steering the conversation back to Hamm, whom he described as "a model of integrity."

"Dr. Hamm is somebody I've been talking to regularly in recent times and a little bit about minority Parliament," he said.

"He's been a good adviser. He's one of a fairly small list of people whom we would consult with on a regular basis in a minority situation."

Harper declined to say what kind of advice he's received from Hamm so far, other than to admit it was thoughtful.

In a message clearly aimed at his rivals, particularly NDP Leader Jack Layton, Harper said he's willing to make compromises in dealing with them.

"I have a history, in terms of reuniting the (Canadian) Alliance and the Conservative party in being able to bring people together without asking people to sacrifice their most fundamental beliefs," Harper said.

"That's what you have to do in a minority Parliament. You do have to make compromises, but they can't be compromises that ask your own party or other parties to stand on their heads and swallow themselves whole."

Implementing his party's five key priorities, which include a comprehensive crackdown on crime, cutting the GST, an annual child-care benefit, a patient wait-time guarantee and a federal Accountability Act to help clean up the federal government, is his starting point.

If elected, he's willing to enterain Liberal and NDP ideas as long as they fall within the Conservatives' "general philosophical framework."

Harper said he takes encouragement from the fact Hamm has managed to find so much common ground with New Democrats _ something that might be transplanted to the federal level.

In recent days, the Conservative leader has been reaching out to the NDP, but Layton was quick to slap down any notion of co-operation. Harper dismissed the rebuke, saying the NDP leader is electioneering and pushing his own agenda.

Harper says he would govern on an issue-by-issue basis, without a formal coalition, if given the chance. Hamm used a similar approach, cutting deals with opposition parties on an individual basis in order to get his way.

Harper suggested he would have an easier time in Parliament because there are different combinations and parties with which to choose alliances.

Tory promises would result in $12.4-billion deficit over five years: Liberals (Macleans)

2006-01-08T16:08:00.000-06:00

January 8, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - Conservative election promises made so far would result in a deficit of at least $12.4 billion over five years, the Liberals said Sunday.

Prime Minister Paul Martin, feeling increasing pressure to halt Conservative momentum, used a mix of bravado and sarcasm to cast doubt on the promises made by Tory Leader Stephen Harper.

"I'll be very interested to see how Mr. Harper is going to pay for them," he said during a news conference at the Sun Youth centre in Montreal.

For the third straight day, reporters were more interested in how Martin would capture voters' imaginations with just two weeks left in the campaign.

That's when the prime minister, hailed as a deficit-slaying former finance minister, finally pulled out the big rhetorical guns after letting Harper dominate since the campaign began.

"I know these numbers," he said of his rival's tax-cut and spending plans.

"And I know that we've got a very strong economy because we've stayed out of deficit. And I'll be very, very interested in how his numbers add up.

"I can tell you that a government which would willingly go back into deficit is a government willing to sacrifice the tremendous growth that we have seen in our economy."

The Liberals say a Harper-led Tory government would have to rack up huge deficits or slash programs to realize their vision of a smaller government.

The five-year deficit of $12.4 billion would be through the 2010-2111 fiscal year.

And the Liberals argued that Harper's plan to redress the fiscal imbalance could bring the deficit to between $23.4 billion and $53.4 billion over the five-year period.

Martin also heaped scorn on Harper's plan to repeal a new Liberal tax cut for those earning less than $35,595 a year. The Tories have said they'll undo the reduction to 15 per cent from 16 per cent implemented in the November economic update, in favour of tax measures that will be of greater benefit.

Harper's flagship tax plan is to cut the GST to five per cent from seven per cent - a move roundly dissed by economists. Critics point out that a reduced goods and services tax is of greatest help to those who can afford to spend the most.

The Conservatives responded to the Martin and Liberal comments by saying their platform is affordable through to 2011, and offered a letter from the Conference Board of Canada to back up their claim.

"In each year there is enough fiscal room to pay down at least $3 billion a year in debt, as in the (government's) fiscal plan," wrote Paul Darby, the board's deputy chief economist.

The Conservatives say they will release their platform later this week.

"The Conservative plan includes balanced budgets, annual debt repayment, and a package of tax reductions far more generous than that offered by any other party," Tory finance critic Monte Solberg said in a statement.

Former Tory MP fighting same-sex marriage (Canada.com)

2006-01-08T16:05:00.000-06:00

Canadian Press
January 08, 2006

FREDERICTON - Former Conservative MP Elsie Wayne, who once advised Canadian gays and lesbians to "shut up" about their lifestyle, has marched back into the political arena under the banner of Christian outrage.

Wayne, the MP for Saint John, N.B., from 1993 until her retirement in 2004, has been named Atlantic chairwoman of the group, and she is promising to re-ignite the gay rights debate with her blunt views about homosexuals and their place in Canadian society.

"Why would anyone do this to Canada?" she says of the decision to allow same-sex marriage in this country.

"Look at the future for our young people, for heaven's sake.

What kind of message are we sending to them?

It's no wonder (U.S.President) George Bush doesn't want to do business with Canada anymore.

I don't blame him. At least he has moral standards."

After a lengthy and divisive debate, MPs voted last June to alter the traditional definition of marriage and allow same-sex couples to wed.

At least 3,000 same-sex couples have married since the legislation was passed.

But Wayne and other members of Vote Marriage Canada insist the issue remains a sore point with many Canadians.

The group is urging people to vote for candidates who support a free vote in the Commons, whatever their political stripe.

Gay and lesbian activists say Wayne's return to the national stage could be bad news for Conservative Leader Stephen Harper, the only federal leader calling for a free vote on the issue.

"While this may appeal to Mr. Harper's base of support, he is trying to look more moderate and mainstream," says Laurie Arron, director of advocacy for Egale Canada, a national organization fighting for gay rights.

"Canadians do not want to reopen the issue. This is actually a negative for Mr. Harper."

Arron says it's too late to turn back the clock.

"The only reason to symbolically exclude same-sex couples from marriage is to say that we're morally inferior to opposite-sex couples," he says.

"That's not equality. That's not first-class citizenship. That's second-class citizenship."

Pat O'Brien, founder of Vote Marriage Canada, says the same-sex marriage controversy is quietly simmering on the back burners of the current federal election campaign.

"It is an issue," says O'Brien, a former Liberal MP who quit the party to sit as an independent because of his opposition to the Liberal legislation.

"The polls show that people want the issue revisited in a free vote in Parliament."

A recent poll by Leger Marketing-Sun Media of 2,013 Canadians found that 55 per cent wanted the same-sex issue to be decided by parliamentarians.

Wayne says she is convinced a national referendum on the marriage question would produce overwhelming support for the traditional definition.

"We have a lot of people in this country who are for marriage being between a man and woman and nothing else," she says.

"The fact of the matter is that Paul Martin just listened to a few loudmouths on this issue.

He hasn't listened to Canadians."

Wayne's controversial views on homosexuality often landed her in hot water when she was an MP and deputy leader of the Conservative Party.

She says Canadian society is founded on Christian values and there is no place in that value system for people who have made what she considers a lifestyle choice to live as gays and lesbians.

"If you want to live that lifestyle, go live it. But don't ask us to change marriage. Just shut up about it," she says, repeating comments she once made in the House of Commons.

Harper tap-dances around tax plan leak (London Free Press)

2006-01-08T16:00:00.000-06:00

January 8, 2006
By MICHELLE MACAFEE, CP

OTTAWA -- Low- and middle-income earners found themselves at the centre of a tax-cut tug of war yesterday, with Stephen Harper and Paul Martin desperate to yank them across the electoral line to embrace their plans for enriching household coffers.

Harper, the Conservative leader, was forced to explain his plan to reverse Liberal personal income tax cuts that took effect Jan. 1 after it was revealed in a TV report Friday.

But he made no apologies, saying the move is part of a broad tax plan that would substantially reduce taxes for everyone.

"We have a tax-reduction plan, the Liberals have a tax-reduction plan," Harper said at a campaign stop in New Hamburg, where he was rolling out a tax promise involving charities.

"We'll be doing our plan, not their plan."

The Liberal government increased the basic personal exemption by $500 in last November's fiscal update and trimmed the tax rate at the bottom income bracket to 15 per cent from 16 per cent.

The Conservatives say they would allow Canadians to get their rebate for 2005 before raising the rate on the lowest tax bracket back to 16 per cent in their first budget and reducing the basic personal exemption by $400.

Martin wasted no time highlighting the distinction at a news conference yesterday, saying it is yet another example of differing visions for Canada.

"They intend to go to the Canadians who need that money most and they intend to increase their taxes," Martin said in Montreal, where he rolled out a plan to spend $1 billion to help clean up the St. Lawrence River and the Great Lakes.

"That is a very different value system than the one that motivated us when we brought in that tax cut."

Killing a tax cut might at first glance seem like political folly, especially given the emphasis the Conservatives have placed on wooing middle-class voters, especially in seat-rich Ontario.

But Harper insisted his tax plan -- a two-per-cent cut in the GST, select personal tax and business tax cuts -- would "mean far less tax than what you're paying under the Liberals."

NDP Leader Jack Layton said he was shocked to hear of Harper's plan and said it shows he has no other way to pay for his earlier tax-cut promises.

"The fact this has come forward should give every Canadian citizen pause as to what kind of an agenda is here and certainly it's the wrong way to go," Layton said after a rally in Vancouver.

Both campaign war rooms pumped out news releases to try to bolster their leader's claims.

The Liberals agreed that a typical family of four earning $60,000 a year would save $500 in GST on a one-time purchase of a mini-van under the Tory plan. But, they added, Martin's plan would give the same family $3,300 in tax savings over the five years it might take to pay off the car loan.

The Conservatives rebuffed Martin's repeated claims that a Harper-led government would create a "fend-for-yourself Canada," saying the Liberal tax plan forces the poor to fend for themselves because most of the federal taxes paid by low-income people are consumption taxes, such as the GST.

Harper wouldn't discuss specifics of the personal income tax cuts a Tory government would favour, or when they would be implemented. Those details will come later in the campaign, he said.

He did say that when all his tax proposals are laid out, they will save taxpayers two-thirds more than the $29 billion in Liberal cuts.

Harper did add one small tax detail yesterday, pledging to remove the capital gains tax on charitable stock donations to encourage Canadians, especially the wealthy, to be more generous.

He downplayed the notion this is a break for the rich, arguing the charities are the real winners if more people give.

Letter may haunt Harper (Edmonton Sun)

2006-01-08T15:52:00.000-06:00

By DARCY HENTON, LEGISLATURE BUREAU

Stephen Harper and his Conservatives may be poised to take power, but their last hurdle could be a firewall.

The infamous "firewall" letter to Premier Ralph Klein that Harper signed as president of the National Citizens Coalition in 2001 could still come back to haunt him in the final weeks of the election campaign.

While Conservatives say the letter is a dead issue, one Calgary political scientist says Canadians should give that missive and other Harper writings a read before they make him prime minister.

"He still stands behind the firewall," said Keith Brownsey, a professor at Calgary's Mount Royal College. "I don't think his views have changed on that one bit."

Brownsey says he believes Harper has every intention of implementing the ideas set out in the letter - basically the view that Ottawa should stay out of the affairs of the provinces.

The letter, signed by six right-wing Albertans, including Harper and one of his current campaign advisers Tom Flanagan, urged Klein to establish an Alberta pension plan, an Alberta police force and to strenuously assert the province's jurisdiction.

"It is imperative to take the initiative, to build firewalls around Alberta, to limit the extent to which an aggressive and hostile federal government can encroach upon legitimate provincial jurisdiction," the authors urged Klein in apparent frustration over the way the Liberals demonized Alberta during the 2000 federal election.

Brownsey says Harper has professed the belief that the federal government should be focused almost exclusively on a core set of national tasks - like criminal law, contract law and the military - and leave much of the other responsibilities to the provinces.

"If Stephen Harper is anything, he's an ideologue," he said. "He's held these views for most of his adult life. He won't change now."

While the Conservatives have dismissed Brownsey's claims as worn-out scare tactics, the professor warned that Canadians could see Harper's Conservatives shut down national bodies like the CBC, the CRTC and the National Research Council and decentralize other programs.

He said it's also likely the end of federal environmental regulations and the end of efforts to implement the Kyoto accord on greenhouse gas emissions.

"It's really quite fascinating what they would do," he said. "I don't think people have quite grasped the dismantling of Canada that will occur."

Brownsey also reiterated the concern raised by the federal Liberals last election that the Conservatives will erode the Canada Health Act.

"Ralph gets a free rein to do whatever he wants in health care. With the aid of the Bloc, the Conservatives will dismantle the Canada Health Act or leave its interpretation so vague it's meaningless."

But Tory MP Jason Kenney scoffed at the claims.

"Sure we're going to streamline government, but that doesn't mean shutting down the core functions," he said.

"We're not talking about re-arranging the Constitution, but respecting the spirit of the original constitution, which is not dictating to the provinces how to run every program in their jurisdiction."

Faron Ellis, who teaches political science at Lethbridge Community College, doubted the Liberals will be able to make much hay out of the firewall, but he suspected they may take a run at it.

"I'm still waiting for desperate Liberals to try all they have left, but I'm not so sure it wouldn't backfire," he said. "If the best that they can do is compete against Stephen Harper as he was five years ago ... the Conservatives will say: 'Bring it on.' "

He pointed out that Harper was not the sole author of the letter and the only one that is still pushing that agenda is right-wing Alberta provincial MLA Ted Morton, a provincial Tory leadership contender.

"It was an idea that was developed awhile ago and everybody except Ted Morton has moved on."

But Ellis said Harper and his party do hold the belief that the provinces should have more autonomy.

"Is there going to be less federal government intrusion into provincial jurisdiction? I would certainly believe that would be the case."

Kenney said the firewall concept isn't part of the Conservative party platform, but the party does believe in "flexible federalism."

"We believe that the federal government should work with - rather than dictate to - the provinces," said the MP for Calgary Southeast.

"We would bring a different spirit and attitude to provincial-federal relations. We would try to fix the fiscal imbalance where most provinces ... don't have the resources to finance their huge responsibilities in health care, education and other areas."

Leaders battle over tax cuts (Globe and Mail)

2006-01-07T22:35:00.000-06:00

By CAMPBELL CLARK and BILL CURRY AND STEVEN CHASE

Saturday, January 7, 2006

Montreal, Que., New Hamburg, Ont. and Vancouver — Paul Martin and Stephen Harper were fighting Saturday over who would cut the most taxes as the Liberal leader charged the Conservatives would actually raise taxes by scrapping personal income-tax cuts that are already in effect.

NDP leader Jack Layton meanwhile, vowed to fight to keep Martin's tax cuts because they help low-income earners.

In a new attack aimed at turning the focus away from allegations of scandal, the Liberal leader said that Mr. Harper would hit middle-income Canadians the hardest by scrapping personal tax cuts.

"That tax cut went into effect on the first of January," Mr. Martin said. "That tax cut is there they are already benefiting from it."

"Now we have learned from the Conservatives that they intend to increase taxes on middle-income families, on low-income families, on working families."

Mr. Harper's spokesman confirmed the party would reverse that one Liberal tax cut, bringing the lowest tax bracket back to 16 per cent from 15 per cent. That costs federal coffers about $3-billion in foregone revenue a year.

Mr. Layton, whose party backed this tax cut in the House because it helps lower-income families, vowed to fight a Tory government's attempt to rescind this reduction. "We would defend it," he told reporters in Vancouver.

The Tories also plan to temporarily raise other taxes too, party sources said. The Conservatives will chop the basic personal amount — the income that Canadians can earn tax-free — by $400. This would reverse most of a $500 increase to the basic personal amount introduced by the Liberals last November.

But Tory sources said the party would boost the basic personal amount in later years so that by 2009 it would reach the same level that the Liberals plan to reach by that year.

The Liberals plan to boost the basic personal amount to $10,000 by 2009. Tory sources their plan will increase the BPA to the same level by then.

Mr. Layton jumped on the Tory tax hikes, saying they should force voters considering voting Conservative to think again.

"This to me is shocking," Mr. Layton said. "The fact that this has come forward should give every Canadian citizen pause as to what kind of agenda is here and certainly is the wrong way to go."

But the Conservative leader, who was speaking at a southwestern Ontario Ford dealership, would only speak of the change indirectly.

Mr. Harper said it is misleading to focus on only one part of the Conservative tax plan when the total package of tax cuts will be much larger than the Liberals once they are fully announced.

"We're going to be doing our plan, not their plan and our plan will on balance save Canadians a lot more money than their plan," he said.

"What the Liberals are trying to do is comparing two things saying because this element is in this one and not in that one that somehow their tax cuts are more. This is just wrong."

The Liberal government announced a $30-billion package of personal income tax cuts in their pre-election mini-budget issued in November. Some were retroactive, and take effect for the 2005 tax year, while others went into effect on Jan. 1.

One cut that is now in effect is a reduction of the lowest tax bracket from 16 to 15 per cent. On Dec. 1, a Tory press release said they would "suspend" the cut for 2006.

"They intend to go to those Canadians who need that money most, and they intend to increase their taxes. And they intend to do this to pay for a whole series of promise which they've not costed," said Mr. Martin.

Neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives have released a formal platform outlining the estimated total cost of all their campaign promises, however. Mr. Harper said that would be coming shortly.

Mr. Harper said his two percentage GST cut, which is his party's largest tax cut, would help the more than seven million Canadians who do not pay income taxes.

"Only our tax package helps the 30 per cent of poorest Canadians who don't pay any personal income tax. Those people get absolutely no benefit whatsoever under the Liberal plan and that's one of the reasons why our plan in total is so much more generous than theirs," he said.

Conservative MP Jason Kenney said once all of the party's tax measures are released it will be clear how much larger they are than what the Liberals are proposing.

"We're talking about 80 per cent more tax relief," he said.

Harper says he'd repeal Liberal income tax cuts (Toronto Star)

2006-01-07T22:23:00.000-06:00

January 7, 2006
CANADIAN PRESS

OTTAWA — Conservative Leader Stephen Harper says his government would reverse Liberal tax cuts for low-income earners passed just before the election was called.

But Harper suggested he'll offer his own tax package for middle- and low-income Canadians on top of the two-per-cent cut in the GST promised last month.

He offered few details during a campaign stop in New Hamburg, Ont.

The Liberal government's pre-election fiscal update last November increased the basic personal exemption by $500 and trimmed the tax rate at the bottom income bracket to 15 per cent from 16 per cent.

The Conservatives would allow Canadians to get their rebate for 2005 before raising the rate on the lowest tax bracket back to 16 per cent in their first budget and reducing the basic personal exemption by $400.

Liberal Leader Paul Martin is accusing Harper of planning to increase the tax burden for middle- and low-income families in order to pay for campaign promises he hasn't properly costed.

Party spending promises: Costing them all out (CBC News)

2006-01-07T08:52:00.000-06:00

With campaign promises dropping like holiday candy on an unsuspecting electorate, Reality Check is doing its best to keep up with the many tax breaks and spending initiatives raining down. At this juncture, all we can say for certain is that the next few years are going to require either a super-booming economy or some very creative accounting to keep up with any of the main party platforms currently being proposed.

In the Nov. 14 fiscal update, the governing Liberals projected federal surpluses totalling $54.5 billion by fiscal year 2010-11. Many economists believe that is a reasonable estimate but the four sitting parties in the House of Commons may not. As of today all of them have put forward five-year plans that exceed that amount.

The NDP appears to have the most expensive set of campaign promises at the moment but there is some confusion on this front. When Reality Check called the Conservatives before Christmas to inquire about the costs of their tax cuts, the party's media representatives confirmed, on two occasions in fact, that a Harper government would keep the reduction in the tax bracket for low-income earners that has just been enacted for Jan. 1. That measure was in the Liberal's November mini-budget and is projected to cost the treasury $23 billion over six years (it's retroactive) when the top-up to the basic personal exemption is added in. Adopting it put the Tories well into the lead in our initial campaign promises sweepstakes.
Spending

Now, however, a policy spokesman with the Conservative campaign called back to say the party will be keeping the reduction only for the 2005 tax year should they assume office. We take him at his word on this. But it should also prove very interesting to see the first Stephen Harper budget attempt to raise the rate for the lowest income tax bracket back up to 16 from 15 per cent, and also lower the basic personal exemption at the same time. If it's a minority parliament after Jan. 23, it is hard to imagine which of the other parties would back the Conservatives on such a move.

So, for those with their calculators at the ready, here is our updated list of the cost of the campaign pledges. We promise to have a final one by voting day.

NDP: tax cuts $40.8 billion ($17.3 billion of that is its proposed new child tax credit) and $30.8 billion in promised spending for a total of $71.6 billion over five years.

Conservatives: tax cuts $58.4 billion (at least $31.7 billion of that is the promise to cut the GST by one and ultimately two percentage points within five years) and $7.1 billion in spending for a total of $65.5 billion.

Liberals: tax cuts $33.4 billion and $26 billion in spending for a total of $59.4 billion. (This total doesn't yet include the just promised 50/50 sharing of some undergrad tuition to kick in a few years down the road; the party hasn't fully explained yet whether this is new money or a repackaging of what was promised in November.)

The Bloc: $55.8 billion, a platform that breaks down over three years, not five like all the others.

There will undoubtedly be more promises as the ballot box comes more clearly into view. Still, these totals should be taken with a drop of caution. They represent best estimates of new plans and directions but not necessarily brand new spending. Some, perhaps many of these plans will come about by shifting priorities within departments, and the Conservatives in particular have not clearly said yet which of the old programs they intend to keep, and which will be tossed aside to make way for all the costly new ideas.

(More...)

Tory plan would scrap Liberal tax cut on low income earners (CBC News)

2006-01-07T08:45:00.000-06:00

A Tory plan to raise personal income taxes on low income earners is part of an overall tax strategy that will result in more tax relief for Canadians, Tory MP Jason Kenney said Friday.

Kenney was reacting to a CBC News story that revealed part of the Tory tax plan if they take power is to reverse a Liberal tax cut introduced before the election.

"Our priority is broader and deeper tax relief than what the Liberals are willing to offer," Kenney told CBC News Online.

Last November, before calling the election, the Liberals cut personal income taxes – a one per cent reduction to the lowest tax bracket, from 16 to 15 per cent, and an increase of $500 to the basic personal exemption.

The cuts will mean a tax rebate for 2005, as less tax is being knocked off Canadians' paycheques for 2006.

The Conservatives voted against those tax cuts in November, but they became law. Late last year, Conservative Leader Stephen Harper's staff told CBC Online the Conservatives would let the tax cuts stand if they win the election.

But the Conservatives called CBC this week to say that while they would allow the Liberal tax cut to stand for last year, meaning Canadians will still get that tax rebate, they intend to immediately raise personal income taxes if they are elected later this month.

The Conservatives say a Stephen Harper government would raise the rate on the lowest tax bracket back from 15 per cent back to 16 per cent in their first budget, probably in April. As well, the basic exemption, income on which no tax is charged, would be dropped by $400 in the same budget.

A Tory official acknowledged to CBC News that would likely mean taking back the money taxpayers are saving on their paycheques for the first four months of this year.

The Tories refused to be interviewed on camera for the story. But Kenney later told CBC News Online Friday that this information is not new and referred to Harper's Dec. 1 news release regarding the GST cut.

"We would suspend [the Liberals] future measures in order to deliver broad-based and responsible tax relief, which will ultimately save Canadians more in their taxes and will be affordable in terms of the delivery of federal services," the release said.

"The immediate result of cutting the GST will be $4.5 billion back in the pockets of ordinary Canadians. When the GST cut is fully implemented, the total benefit will be much greater," the release said.

Kenney said they voted against the Liberal tax cuts because they disagreed with their fiscal priorities, adding they would have "spent smarter and cut taxes deeper."

The Tories have also said that their own tax package has not yet been fully announced.

Tories silence candidates (ChronicalHerald)

2006-01-07T08:38:00.000-06:00

Pair told not to talk about same-sex meeting volunteer

January 6, 2006

By STEPHEN MAHER Staff Reporter and Our Staff

The Conservative party has told two Halifax-area candidates not to talk to reporters about a meeting of clergy opposed to same-sex marriage that they attended Wednesday.

"We’ve been told by Ottawa that we don’t talk about that," Paula Henderson told The Chronicle Herald on Thursday. "That’s a dropped subject."

Ms. Henderson is a campaign volunteer for Rakesh Khosla, the Tory running against Fisheries Minister Geoff Regan in Halifax West.

Paul Francis, the Conservative candidate for Sackville-Eastern Shore, also attended the meeting and he too refused to comment.

"We’re actually referring all inquiries on that meeting to (Tory spokesman) Rob Batherson," said Jeff Alexander, communications director for Mr. Francis.

The party seems to be afraid of what its candidates will say, Mr. Regan said.

"The fact that they’re telling their candidates not to talk about this is incredible," he said. "The Conservatives are muzzling their candidates. How many others are there with an agenda they don’t want to talk about?"

Nobody is being muzzled here, countered Mr. Batherson.

"Candidates are free and clear to comment on any subject they feel fit to do so," he said.

"There are only so many hours in the day and they seek advice from others as to which media inquiries in the run of the day they can respond to. I’m amazed that Mr. Regan is so desperate as to intervene in this debate. He should focus on his campaign."

The meeting Mr. Khosla and Mr. Francis attended was intended to encourage Canadians to vote for candidates opposed to same-sex marriage.

About 110 clergy members from Pentecostal, evangelical and Roman Catholic churches across Nova Scotia attended the meeting of the Pro-Marriage Network, a group spearheaded by former Tory MP Elsie Wayne and former Liberal MP Pat O’Brien. Among the clergy attending were Archbishop Terrence Prendergast and Bishop Colin Campbell.

Mr. Francis and Mr. Khosla won contested Tory nominations after receiving the backing of a Christian organization, and The Herald mentioned this in a recent article. Mr. Francis, minister of the Gateway Community Church in Lower Sackville, complained, saying he was not affiliated with the group and that if it was endorsing him, it was without his knowledge.

Mr. Khosla had to skip a debate of Halifax West candidates at Sir John A. Macdonald High School in Hubley to attend the meeting.

The student who organized the event said he is disappointed that Mr. Khosla didn’t show up and angry that the Tories are blaming the organizers for not giving them enough notice.

"He agreed in early December to come to the debate," said Jonathan Williams, a 17-year-old student.

Mr. Khosla was the only candidate who didn’t attend. Organizers said they had expected him to be there until an hour before the meeting, when he cancelled without giving a reason.

The Tories said the students did not provide enough information about the format of the debate until the night before, but the students said that’s an excuse.

"We’re obviously disappointed," Jonathan said. "He said that he was not there because he was not informed. That was a little insulting."

Jonathan said Mr. Khosla doesn’t seem to care about young people.

"It illustrates that this Conservative candidate values same-sex marriage far more than he values the youth vote," he said.

Jim Hnatiuk, the Christian Heritage candidate for South Shore-St. Margarets, said it’s odd that the Conservatives seem nervous about discussing this issue, since many Nova Scotians are keen to vote for a candidate who stands up for traditional marriage.

"It’s a big issue on people’s minds, so I’m surprised that they wouldn’t want to be more open about this," Mr. Hnatiuk said. "It’s certainly an issue to Canadians."

Mr. Hnatiuk says he is running to give voters in that riding a candidate who supports the traditional definition of marriage, since Tory MP Gerald Keddy voted for the Liberal government’s same-sex marriage bill.

Is he a changed man? (Toronto Star)

2006-01-07T08:33:00.000-06:00

The packaging of the Conservative leader is certainly different this time and some positions appear to have softened. But, in essence, he's the same old Stephen Harper

January 7, 2006
THOMAS WALKOM

Has Stephen Harper really changed?

The Conservatives don't like to put it that way. They would prefer to say that Liberal attempts to demonize their leader are no longer working and that, finally, Canadians are beginning to see the real Harper.

Nonetheless, the overarching theme of the increasingly successful Conservative election campaign is one of reassurance.

In both style and substance, Harper is trying to tell voters Ñ particularly in Ontario Ñ that the man who once called for a "firewall" around Alberta to protect it from the depredations of the rest of Canada has mellowed.

"He's presenting a friendlier face to our fellow citizens in Ontario," says University of Calgary political scientist Barry Cooper, a long-time Harper ally and sometime confidante.

"I think he hasn't changed his mind exactly, but packaged things so the rhetoric seems more friendly. The packaging has changed so it's not as scary."

In effect, Harper's message is: I'm moderate; I'm normal; I'm just like you.

Even the Conservative leader's notorious lack of charisma has been turned to advantage. The Harper of Conservative television ads is hardly exciting. Indeed, he is still very much a stiff.

(More...)

Liberals still have support in region (Toronto Star)

2006-01-07T08:30:00.000-06:00

Survey indicates swing to the right
But in the coffee shop, ambivalence

January 7, 2006
GAIL SWAINSON
STAFF REPORTER

Reyes Werner sees no reason to switch. Neither does Dave the retired printer.

These 905-belt residents say they will vote Liberal on Jan. 23, despite an upswing in Tory fortunes in the region reflected in a Toronto Star poll this week.

The poll shows the Tories edging ahead in the Liberal-dominated areas around Toronto. In the 2004 election, Liberals captured 18 of the 23 seats in Peel, Durham, Halton and York regions, with an average margin of victory of 21 per cent. Conservatives won the remaining five.

The latest poll, conducted by EKOS Research Associates for the Star and La Presse, suggests the Conservatives are favoured by 41 per cent of 905-area voters, with 37 per cent for the Liberals and 20 for the NDP.

But informal conversations with seven voters yesterday in Richmond Hill and Vaughan turned up only one unshakeable Tory supporter. Mortgage broker Don Vanbodegom says he always has and always will vote Conservative.

"I like the things the Tories stand for," Vanbodegom said as he sipped coffee in a Vaughan Tim Hortons shop.

He agreed with companion Catherine, a Toronto developer, that leader Stephen Harper was driving away voters. "I think more people would vote Conservative if the leader was Peter MacKay," he said.

Catherine, who wouldn't give her last name, said she is a disaffected Tory voter who will swing back as soon as the Conservatives ditch their current leader. "There's something about Harper. I just don't trust him and I don't know why," she said. "The last Tory leader I really liked was Mike Harris."

Dave, a retired printer who lives in Richmond Hill, generally thinks of himself as a Conservative but said he'll probably vote Liberal "because I really like Martin." He didn't want to give his last name because "then everyone will know how I vote."

"The Liberal party isn't as good as Martin, but I believe he can change things around," he added. "I just don't like Harper."

Werner, a confirmed Liberal voter, agreed her party of choice "has made mistakes."

But "I like their policies on health care and education and I like the way Martin has responded to issues of violence in the city," said the early childhood educator from Maple.

NDP supporter Julius Olajos, a Richmond Hill engineer, said he cast his vote strategically last time, voting Liberal to help shut out the Tories. Not this time.

"I just don't think the Liberals have offered us anything of any real social value," said Olajos.

Harper has seen this picture before (Toronto Star)

2006-01-07T08:23:00.000-06:00

Polls say he's ahead, just like last time
January 7, 2006

It used to be known as the Curse of Sports Illustrated. The minute an athlete appeared on the magazine's cover, something bad was bound to happen.

Stephen Harper got nicked by a political version of the curse in the last election. When the old, sure-footed Paul Martin disappeared up his own fundament in a campaign of startling ineptitude, voters took a longer look at the man running to replace him. Suddenly, Harper was the flavour of the week. Poll numbers jumped, and Maclean's put him on its cover with his trademark vulpine grin and the killer line: "How do you like the sound of Prime Minister Stephen Harper?"

Uh-oh. Cue the curse.

Turned out, on reflection, that many people, especially in Ontario, really didn't like the idea of Harper, PM. What they saw was a politician of steely mind, firm purpose and heavy tread, unleavened by charisma or a sense of humour. To his credit, Harper had accomplished the small miracle of uniting conservative forces once again into a force capable of challenging Canada's Natural Governing Party. For that alone, he deserved the thanks of a grateful nation (no, really).

But from thanks to election victory is a long step. Once they got an earful from helpful Liberals about how truly, scarily right wing Harper was, enough turned away to deny him power.

And now, remarkably, here we are once more, thundering into the stretch of a campaign in which Harper's numbers again indicate the possibility of Conservative government. Where's the curse when the Liberals really need it?

They're working on it. This week, the Mike Harris bogeyman was dragged from the broom closet and sent out to terrorize the widows and orphans. The hope obviously is to get voters once again to contemplate the awfulness of Harper the Hun and leap back into the arms of the NGP.

Will the tactic work as neatly as in 2004? Maybe not. This time Harper has run a surprisingly deft, even nimble, campaign, full of policy and aimed squarely at Canadians who "work hard, pay their taxes and play by the rules." It's not a flashy slogan, but it sure has legs.

Harper has even identified himself to political radar operators in Quebec. In a major statement in Quebec City, he vowed to keep Ottawa's nose out of provincial matters, rectify the so-called fiscal imbalance between the two levels of government and allow the provinces (i.e. Quebec) a larger international presence.

Pundits here have given Harper good marks for his open-minded federalism (and mercifully let drop his claim to be inspired by René Lévesque).

It would be very healthy for the country if Harper's breakthrough had electoral consequences. Leaving the Liberals as the only defenders of federalism here turns every election into a mini-referendum — and it would be awkward, to say the least, if Harper had to form a government without a single elected member from Quebec. A few Tory seats, even a single, solitary MP, would make an important difference.

One real problem for Harper here is his personality. Quebecers demand more than ideas from their politicians. They like oratory, passion and a feeling of camaraderie — though they don't go as far as Filipinos, who expect their leaders to deliver karaoke serenades at state banquets.

Brian Mulroney would have been as at ease in Manila as he was in Baie Comeau. He told his best jokes in French. Harper doesn't seem to tell jokes in any language.

Would you like to have a beer with this guy? It's an important question. Quebecers like their leaders to pass the tavern test. Who could be more fascinating company over a few draft than René? And even if they were sitting there sipping Rémy Martin, you'd rejoice in some time spent with Pierre Trudeau or Robert Bourassa or Jacques Parizeau.

Harper, unfortunately, has all the charisma of the worthy Stéphane Dion, whose passion is the Constitution. The two men would be perfect company on a desert island, passing the coconut as they dissected the notwithstanding clause.

Harper's biographer, the veteran journalist William Johnson, rates his man superior to any leader on the federal scene since Trudeau; high praise, indeed. But he finds "a harshness, a lack of humour, humanity and moderation" in the Tory leader's makeup.

"He is someone you can admire without really liking," Johnson writes in Stephen Harper and the Future of Canada. It's a formula which worked for Margaret Thatcher, but Harper is still a long way from Iron Lady status.

One notable characteristic is his scorn for, and distrust of, journalists. Almost incredibly, he refused to be interviewed for the book.

"But," as Johnson points out, not unreasonably, "a man who is obviously arrogant and despises journalists can't be all bad." Maybe we'll find out.

Tory cabinet would be short on governing experience (Canada.com)

2006-01-07T08:13:00.000-06:00

Andrew Duffy
CanWest News Service

January 06, 2006

OTTAWA -- If the Conservative party can translate into votes the recent gains they've made in public opinion polls, Tory Leader Stephen Harper could soon be selecting his first cabinet.

That cabinet will be more dependent on western MPs than any other since the 1980s, when Brian Mulroney placed party stalwarts such as Joe Clark, Don Mazankowski, Jake Epp and Pat Carney in key portfolios.

As well, it will be short on governing experience -- several Conservative MPs and candidates have served in cabinets before --and thin on representation from Quebec. Tory candidates are expected to mount serious election day challenges in only three Quebec ridings.

"I think he'll want to have a good balance between his parliamentary veterans, who deserve a reward for hanging in there, and the folks coming in from the provinces who have actually governed," University of Windsor political scientist Heather MacIvor said of a potential Tory cabinet. "There is no substitute for governing experience, there just isn't. So many people will be learning on the job that you just have to put the veterans in there."

Harper will have to rely heavily on fellow Albertans.

Monte Solberg (Medicine Hat), who has served as a finance critic for more than eight years, is the obvious candidate for finance minister. First elected in 1993, he has become a respected figure in the House of Commons for his sharp questioning of the government's bookkeeping and taxation policies.

Diane Ablonczy, a Calgary lawyer who came to Parliament Hill in 1993 under the banner of the Reform Party, is the leading candidate for the health portfolio.

Like Solberg, she earned widespread praise for her work as a health critic of many years.

Harper's most difficult decision about his cabinet is likely to rest on another Albertan, former Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day.

Day, who served as finance minister in the provincial cabinet of Alberta Premier Ralph Klein, will hold a senior position in any federal Conservative cabinet, but the critical question that Harper must answer is: Should he be foreign affairs minister?

"The problem with Day is that he's made some rather injudicious comments about the Middle East and you could be borrowing trouble if you put him in that portfolio," said MacIvor.

Day, who represents a B.C. riding, could be moved to an economic portfolio if Harper decides to play it safe.

Atlantic Canada would have at least two senior ministers: Peter MacKay and Loyola Hearn.

MacKay would likely assume the senior post now occupied by Liberal cabinet minster Anne McLellan, who serves as deputy prime minister and public safety minister.

Hearn, a former education minister in the Newfoundland and Labrador legislature, would likely be tapped to fill the post of fisheries and oceans.

Harper will also be able to draw on the experience of two former Manitoba cabinet ministers, Brian Pallister and Vic Toews, if they're re-elected.

Toews, the party's justice critic, could be a problematic choice for justice minister, however, because of his recent court admission that he violated Manitoba's provincial elections act in a 1999 campaign.
Other senior ministers could come from Ontario, where the Conservatives have fielded several candidates with cabinet pedigree.

Garth Turner is the only Tory candidate with federal cabinet experience. Turner served briefly as national revenue minister in the cabinet of former prime minister Kim Campbell.

Turner, a national director with the Vancouver-based environmental group, the Sierra Legal Defence Fund, would be a good candidate for the post of environment minster.

Three senior members from former Ontario premier Mike Harris' cabinet are also standing for election. Tony Clement, Jim Flaherty and John Baird all handled major portfolios in the Harris government and will likely do the same in any Harper cabinet if elected.

"Tony Clement would, I think, because of his background be a perfect health minister, which would allow Ablonczy to take foreign affairs," said MacIvor.

If voters give him the opportunity to craft a cabinet, Harper's most significant challenge will be in securing sufficient representation from Quebec.

The party has three star candidates who may win a seat: Lawrence Cannon, Maxime Bernier and Josee Verner. But even if those candidates lose on Jan. 23, one or two could still find themselves in cabinet --appointed directly by Harper.

The alternative is to draw on Conservatives in the Senate for Quebec representation. Senator Pierre Claude Nolin, who has become Harper's Quebec lieutenant, is almost certain to be named to the cabinet in some capacity.

Harper's cabinet list will likely include a contingent of promising young MPs, those such as James Rajotte, Scott Reid, Rona Ambrose and Peter Van Loan.

But MacIvor said Harper will not be able to gamble heavily on inexperienced MPs because the Conservatives will likely be governing in a highly volatile Parliament.

"Who knows how long this government will last? And you want to be able to go back to the people in 12 or 18 months, and say: 'Hey, we did good, give us a majority this time.'

"You cannot be fumbling and bumbling and generally embarrassing the entire country."

Harper jumps in front (StarPhoenix)

2006-01-07T08:06:00.000-06:00

Tories picking up votes in Ont., could form minority gov't: poll

Mark Kennedy, CanWest News Service

January 07, 2006

OTTAWA -- Stephen Harper's Conservatives are poised to win a minority government and Prime Minister Paul Martin's Liberals face defeat at the polls on Jan. 23 unless they can turn momentum back in their favour, a major new poll has found.

The nationwide survey, conducted by Ipsos Reid for CanWest News Service and Global National, shows the dramatic shift in political fortunes for the two parties is the result of a change in how Ontarians plan to cast their vote.

It also shows Jack Layton's New Democrats are on the verge of winning additional seats and Gilles Duceppe's Bloc Quebecois could solidify their electoral fortress even further from last year's election.

Ipsos Reid combined its latest polling data and actual voting results from the last election to compile a seat projection on how many ridings the parties would win if a vote was held now. The projection:

The Conservatives would win 129-133 seats. That's a sharp rise from the 99 they won in 2004, but still short of the 155 needed for a majority government.

The Liberals would win 87-91 seats, a steep decline from the 135 they secured in the last vote to hang on to power.

The NDP would take 27-31 seats, up from the 19 they won last time.

The Bloc Quebecois would win 56-60 seats, up from 54 in the last election.

"Quite clearly, the Liberals have to go through a major retooling if they're going to have any success," Ipsos Reid president Darrell Bricker said in an interview Friday.

"The Liberals are losing right now because they're losing in Ontario. They've got to do something to get Ontario back."

Indeed, Bricker said most of the riding turnovers are occurring in that single province. He said that according to the projection, the Tories could see Ontario riding victories "in the high 50s or low 60s" compared to the 24 that went their way in 2004. The Liberals, who won 75 Ontario ridings, could be reduced to victories "in the mid-30s." The NDP, which won seven seats in the last vote, could move up to 10 in the province.

According to the new poll conducted Jan. 2-5, the Conservatives have the support nationally of 35 per cent of decided voters, while the Liberals stand at 31 per cent. The NDP is supported by 18 per cent of voters, the Bloc Quebecois is at 12 per cent and the Green party is at five per cent. Among all Canadian voters, 12 per cent are undecided or refused to say who they would vote for.

The picture is most stark in the electoral battleground of Ontario, the Liberal stronghold the party has relied upon for the last four elections to secure victory. But now, the tide is turning in the province. The Conservatives have the support of 39 per cent of decided Ontario voters, compared to 34 per cent for the Liberals, 20 per cent for the NDP and six per cent for the Green party.

In Quebec, the Tories are also gaining favour, although likely not enough yet to make a dent. The Bloc is supported by 45 per cent of voters, compared to 23 per cent for the Liberals and 19 per cent for the Conservatives. The NDP stands at nine per cent while four per cent support the Green party.

Voter volatility remains high in British Columbia, where the Conservatives have 35 per cent (up seven points from a week ago), the Liberals have 33 per cent (unchanged), the NDP has 24 per cent (down 10 points), and the Greens have seven per cent (up by two points). Ipsos Reid surveyed 2,004 adult Canadians by telephone for the survey. A sample of this size has a margin of error of 2.2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

The poll comes at a critical juncture of the contest that began Nov. 29. Harper's Tories appear to have run an effective campaign from the start -- producing daily promises on policy initiatives throughout the race, and more recently, unveiling sharp-edged TV ads that criticize the Liberals' ethical record in the wake of the sponsorship scandal.

Martin's Liberals spent the first month lying low, waiting until this week to start unveiling many of their major promises. But they have had difficulty controlling the news agenda, and have been on the defensive -- apologizing for the "beer and popcorn" quip of Martin's senior aide, and reeling when the RCMP announced over the holidays it was launching a criminal investigation into an alleged government leak about the taxation of income trusts.

"The Tories are the party with momentum," said Bricker. "They continue to climb on a national basis. The Liberals continue to decline, pretty much, on a national basis. And the NDP, who saw a bit of an evaporation of their vote at the end of the last campaign, seem to be holding to their support."

Voters like Tories without Harper (Vancouver 24hrs News)

2006-01-07T07:51:00.000-06:00

By SEAN HOLMAN, 24 HOURS

January 6, 2006

Think the Conservatives are doing well on the campaign trail right now?

Well, the results of an exclusive national poll conducted for 24 hours by Strategic Communications Inc., shows 44 per cent of those surveyed think the Tories' election chances would improve if wannabe-prime minister Stephen Harper wasn't leader, with 18 per cent saying his party would do much better without him.

By comparison, 37 per cent didn't think Harper's removal wouldn't make a difference.

"Clearly, this poll shows there remain some significant reservations about Mr. Harper," said University of Victoria political science professor Norman Ruff. "But I think these have been steadily diminishing since October."

The reason: "Familiarity. Harper was still a new figure in 2004. So there's more familiarity (with him now)."

And, when it comes to issues other than same-sex marriage, "he's become much more centrist" so "he's starting to grow on Canadians."

But national fixture Paul Martin is still better known, says Ruff. So it's not surprising, he says, that the same poll shows most think Martin is the best front man the Liberals can get.

Of the 808 polled, 33 per cent said their chances would be "much better" or "somewhat better" if he weren't in charge, with 44 per cent of the opinion that a change in leadership wouldn't make a difference.

And, despite his reputation for stuttering and dithering, Martin topped the survey when respondents were asked which federal leader they would rather be stuck in an elevator with.

Twenty-six per cent said the Liberal chieftain - four percentage points more than New Democrat Jack Layton and seven points higher than Harper.

The survey, which was conducted between Dec. 27 and Jan. 3, is considered accurate within 3.4 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Election air war a one-sided attack so far, and risky for Tories: experts (Ottawa Citizen)

2006-01-04T07:45:00.000-06:00

Michelle Macafee, Canadian Press

January 03, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - The take-no-prisoners air war most pundits and politicians had predicted would establish a negative tone for the second phase of the election campaign has so far proven to be a rather one-sided attack.

But the Conservative decision to come out swinging first this week with a new TV ad exploiting the Liberal sponsorship scandal is a calculated risk the Liberals will almost certainly counter well before the Jan. 23 vote, political and advertising experts say.

While it was the Tories who warned in an earlier ad that the Liberals would go negative after the holidays, the first two Liberal ads of the year are instead focused on leader Paul Martin's record, with nary a mention of the Conservatives or leader Stephen Harper.

Historically, negative ads are risky because they serve to shore up existing support, not necessarily woo new votes, said Alan Middleton, a professor of marketing at York University's Schulich School of Business.

But the Conservatives face the additional challenge of switching gears in the middle of a campaign that so far, the media and political observers alike have largely described as policy-driven and gaffe-free.

"I'm intrigued by this timing to go on the attack," Middleton said.

"I think they've decided just going on their record and what they stand for may not be enough to get them over the hump - which is a majority of people saying, 'OK, let's give the Conservatives a chance' - so they have to worry people about the current incumbent."

Negative ads are common in close races because they can influence soft support and reach voters who might not follow the campaign through the news, said Jonathan Rose, who specializes in political communication at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont.

Rose described the 30-second Tory spot as "a pretty visceral and powerfully negative ad that has all the elements of American negative campaigning."

It's also successful, he said, because it avoids character assassination.

The ad relies on an ill-advised sound bite from Martin himself - "the Liberal party is not corrupt," he's heard to say repeatedly - as ordinary Canadians react with disgust to quotes from Justice John Gomery's report into the sponsorship scandal.

Rose said he doesn't expect the Tory approach to backfire. Instead, he said he expects the Liberals will be forced to move past their own "vacuous" ads, which cram a long list of issues and achievements into a 30-second spot.

"Obviously their New Year's resolution is to stay positive, and they seem to be doing that," Rose said. "But given the race is a statistical dead heat, there's no question we'll see the Liberals respond."

Neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives will tip their hand about upcoming TV ads, although both parties are expected to release several more during the final three weeks.

Conservative incumbent Jason Kenney, who is also helping out with the party's campaign strategy, said the latest Tory ad is straightforward, factual and a response to the negative comments Martin has been making about Harper.

"We're going to be very deliberate about this," Kenney said. "We're not in the game of running a smear campaign against individuals, but we do believe accountability is a central issue."

The Liberals say their ads mirror the party's focus on their values, their record and the Liberal plan for the future, while the Conservatives are sending a mixed message by running negative ads.

"The gap between what Stephen Harper and the Conservatives practice and what they preach is as wide as the St. Lawrence," said Liberal spokeswoman Amy Butcher.

Tories focus attack on PM (Canadaeast.com)

2006-01-04T07:33:00.000-06:00

Pundits say timing of Conservative ad strategy change 'intriguing'

January 4, 2006

OTTAWA (CP) - The take-no-prisoners air war most pundits and politicians had predicted would establish a negative tone for the second phase of the election campaign has so far proven to be a rather one-sided attack.

But the Conservative decision to come out swinging first this week with a new TV ad exploiting the Liberal sponsorship scandal is a calculated risk the Liberals will almost certainly counter well before the Jan. 23 vote, political and advertising experts say.

While it was the Tories who warned in an earlier ad that the Liberals would go negative after the holidays, the first two Liberal ads of the year are instead focused on leader Paul Martin's record, with nary a mention of the Conservatives or leader Stephen Harper.

Historically, negative ads are risky because they serve to shore up existing support, not necessarily woo new votes, said Alan Middleton, a professor of marketing at York University's Schulich School of Business.

But the Conservatives face the additional challenge of switching gears in the middle of a campaign that so far, the media and political observers alike have largely described as policy-driven and gaffe-free.

"I'm intrigued by this timing to go on the attack," Middleton said.

"I think they've decided just going on their record and what they stand for may not be enough to get them over the hump - which is a majority of people saying, 'OK, let's give the Conservatives a chance' - so they have to worry people about the current incumbent."

Negative ads are common in close races because they can influence soft support and reach voters who might not follow the campaign through the news, said Jonathan Rose, who specializes in political communication at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont.

Rose described the 30-second Tory spot as "a pretty visceral and powerfully negative ad that has all the elements of American negative campaigning."

It's also successful, he said, because it avoids character assassination.

The ad relies on an ill-advised sound bite from Martin himself - "the Liberal party is not corrupt," he's heard to say repeatedly - as ordinary Canadians react with disgust to quotes from Justice John Gomery's report into the sponsorship scandal.

Rose said he doesn't expect the Tory approach to backfire. Instead, he said he expects the Liberals will be forced to move past their own "vacuous" ads, which cram a long list of issues and achievements into a 30-second spot.

"Obviously their New Year's resolution is to stay positive, and they seem to be doing that," Rose said. "But given the race is a statistical dead heat, there's no question we'll see the Liberals respond."

Neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives will tip their hand about upcoming TV ads, although both parties are expected to release several more during the final three weeks.

The Harper Party Tab

2005-12-26T23:52:00.000-06:00

Ever wonder about the cost of Harper's campaign announcements?

Here is a running tab of what has been costed and announced so far (more or less in order of announcement:)

1% immediate cut in GST: $4.5 B (additional 1% approximately $4.0 B)
Announcement on healthcare wait time reduction: COST NOT INDICATED
Gander, Nfld forecasting announcement: COST NOT INDICATED
Childcare tax cut/subsidy: Avg $2.2 B per year ($11 B over 5 years)
Fisherman Assistance announcement: COST NOT INDICATED
Small Medium Business Opportunity Plan: COST NOT INDICATED
Apprenticeship & Post Secondary Assistance plan announcement: COST NOT INDICATED
Seniors Retirement Assistance plan: Avg $460 M per year ($2.3 B over 5 years)
Cancer Care announcement: Avg $50 M per year ($250 M over 5 years)
Military spending announcement: Avg $400 M per year ($2.0 B over 5 years)
B.C. Plan announcement: Avg $100 M per year ($500 M over 5 years)
Quebec Plan announcement: COST NOT INDICATED
Farm Support plan: Avg $500 M per year ($2.5 B over 5 years)
Arctic Defence plan: Avg $1.1 B per year ($5.3 B over 5 years)

Total Cost to date: Average $9.3 B per year, $32.5 B over 5 years
Estimated surplus for 2005/2006: $8.2 B* (Of course, never final when dealing with Liberals)

2005-12-24T20:54:00.000-06:00

Harper: The new height of hypocrisy (Hamilton Spectator)

2005-12-24T19:59:00.000-06:00

By Dianne Rinehart
December 24, 2005

* The reason why the Conservative Party is unable to budge the polls may be quite simply found in the electorate's distrust of its leader

When politicians call an election that nobody wanted and that no one really expects will change things, it isn't too surprising that hypocrisy reigns supreme.

Still one comment this week made me howl with disbelief: Stephen Harper saying Canadians would not tolerate a "Liberal opposition" that would not co-operate with a Conservative minority government.

Hello? Like we wanted to tolerate a Conservative party that did not co-operate with a minority Liberal government? Like we wanted an election before the holidays? Like any of the opposing parties are running on anything other than a thirst for power?

Pl-e-e-ease! Nobody gave the electorate a choice, but the Conservatives surely had one. And that was to make Parliament work hard for Canadians -- not for the Tory party. Or Harper.

Call me naive but Harper's hypocrisy left me outraged.

Here is a man who cosied up to the Bloc Quebecois to bring down the government, but says a Conservative minority government would not join forces with the Bloc Quebecois to maintain power. "It's simply unworkable to work with a party that isn't committed to the fundamental institutional structures of the unity and the same basic kind of core values as other federalists," he told The Globe and Mail.

Interesting. Who else would he be joining forces with to maintain power in a minority House? Certainly not the NDP, whose natural coalition partners are the Liberals.

So how disingenuous of him is it to suggest he wouldn't be counting on Bloc votes for support?

And how would that coalition play in the rest of the country?

"Joining with the Bloc to defeat the government is one thing," notes political scientist and McMaster University professor Henry Jacek. "Holding power with the Bloc is another."

No wonder Harper is in denial. His ploys with the Bloc are already costing him votes in B.C., says Jacek.

And what would a Conservative-Bloc coalition achieve for Canada? Decentralization, notes Jacek, power to Quebec which the Conservatives would then have to offer the other provinces -- along with a share of the federal surplus. But it would never be enough for a sovereigntist party, he notes. To maintain power: "They're then going to have to keep offering the Bloc more."

Decentralization is putting it mildly. Harper offered Quebec it's own separate voice on world bodies, such as UNESCO, this week.

Think it doesn't matter that Canada's voice on the world stage might be weakened? Imagine, then, a world where Quebec representatives voice different views than their Canadian counterparts at human rights and economic conferences. For example, would Quebec , perhaps looking out for its own economic interests, have sided with Britain against former Conservative prime minister Brian Mulroney's insistence of a Commonwealth-wide economic boycott of South Africa during the apartheid era, a stand that helped defeat that former evil empire?

No, it's important that Canadians speak as one to the world.

How far is Harper willing to go to woo Quebec? How about his sinister suggestion that Prime Minister Paul Martin would rather see the Parti Quebecois win power in Quebec so the Liberals can stand up for Canada. Does a comment, as Jacek points out "totally lacking in credibility", help Canadian unity?

So why go there? He's desperate, says Jacek. "They started out with a game plan (daily policy announcements) and it didn't work. ... Now they're really unhinged and unfocused because they're so frustrated."

John Wright, a senior vice-president with the polling firm Ipsos-Reid, says Harper's negative affect on Conservative party fortunes is astonishing and suggests the Conservative's only electoral hope is to reinforce the notion that Harper could be reined in by Parliament in a minority government situation.

Dianne Rinehart is a former magazine editor and news correspondent in Ottawa, Vancouver, Toronto and Moscow.

Tory campaign failing to gain traction with voters (Globe and Mail)

2005-12-24T10:05:00.000-06:00

By BRIAN LAGHI

Saturday, December 24, 2005

From Saturday's Globe and Mail

Stephen Harper's policy-heavy election campaign is no better at capturing voters' imaginations than the Liberal effort, according to a new poll that also finds less gloom about the direction of the country than when the election was called.

A mid-campaign poll for The Globe and Mail-CTV News shows that Canadians actually like the Liberal campaign marginally better than the one run by the Conservatives, despite positive reviews of the Tory effort as mistake-free and heavy on ideas.

According to the survey conducted by The Strategic Counsel, 25 per cent of Canadians say the Liberals are running the best campaign, up six percentage points from Dec. 5-6. By contrast, 23 per cent think the Tories have the best campaign, down from 26 per cent, while 16 per cent of Canadians think the NDP is making the best effort, up two points. The survey also found that the number of Canadians who think the country is on the wrong track is declining.

The poll of 1,000 Canadians was taken Dec. 21-22 and is accurate to within 3.1 percentage points 95 per cent of the time.

Allan Gregg, chairman of The Strategic Counsel, said a strategy of not focusing on criticism of the Liberals may be contributing to the Tories stall.

"[The Conservatives] have to get that general protest sentiment back up there," Mr. Gregg said. "The cornerstone of any opposition party is unhappiness with the status quo. It's the oldest cliché in the book, but it's true. Governments defeat themselves."

Mr. Gregg said the Liberals may have found their game simply by fighting back every time the Tories lay out a policy proposal.

"They're not doing much on the initiative front, but they're very effective in their counter-punching," he said.

The results appear to run against the grain of some commentators who have criticized the Liberals for running a relatively quiet campaign focused on their record rather than announcing new policy ideas. The Tory campaign has announced almost daily policy prescriptions, while the Liberals have criticized them for being too ideological.

The poll also found that fewer Canadians believe the country is going in the wrong direction. Of those surveyed, 38 per cent say they believe the nation is on the wrong track, down from 43 per cent who said the same thing when the election was called last month. Forty-five per cent said the country was on the right track, down two points from the election call.

Mr. Gregg said the lack of work getting done in Parliament in the fall may have contributed to a greater sense that the country was on the wrong course.

The reduction of misgivings may also stem from the fact that the Liberals have been unimpeded in their plan to persuade Canadians that the country's economy is humming along and that voters shouldn't jeopardize that by switching governing parties. The sponsorship issue, for example, has barely been mentioned by the Conservatives.

On the question of momentum, voters think the Liberals have the most heading into the second half of the campaign. The two major parties were tied in momentum at the beginning of the campaign.

The poll comes as the Liberal lead widened nationally, although the shift is still within the margin of error.

The survey found that 36 per cent of voters prefer the Liberals, up from 33 per cent Thursday, compared to 29 per cent for the Conservatives, who are down one point. The NDP is at 17 per cent -- down one -- while the Bloc Québécois has also dropped a point to 13 per cent. The poll sampled 1,500 voters and is accurate to within 2.5 percentage points.

And, for the first time since the campaign started, federalist parties together (The Liberals, NDP and the Conservatives), have more momentum than the Bloc Québécois. The momentum numbers are often a precursor to changes in voter intent, Mr. Gregg said.

Increased momentum for the federalist forces may stem from a fear among Montrealers that there will potentially be no francophone presence in a federal cabinet, Mr. Gregg said. Liberal voting preference in the province, which had dropped to 20 per cent earlier this week, is now up to 29 per cent, about five points shy of the 2004 election. The BQ has dropped eight points this week to 52 per cent, three per cent above their 2004 numbers.

Mr. Gregg noted that, while the Liberals have not been able to consolidate the federalist vote under their tent, they may hold on to some Quebec seats as the BQ loses support.

The New Democrats and the Tories each have eight per cent of Quebec supporters.

On the hustings

Who is running the best campaign?

Paul Martin/Liberals: 25%

Stephen Harper/Conservatives: 23%

Jack Layton/NDP: 16%

Gilles Duceppe/Bloc Québécois: 10%

No response: 18%

None: 7%

Other: 1%

Right now, do you think that overall the country is on the right track or the wrong track?

Benchmark: Nov. 24-27

On the right track: 47%

On the wrong track: 43%

Don't know: 10%

Dec. 21-22

On the right track: 45%

On the wrong track: 38%

Don't know: 17%

Harper rules out coalition (Globe and Mail)

2005-12-23T20:41:00.000-06:00

"No, I get the master bedroom on Sussex; you get the corner cot."

Tory minority government would operate on issue-by-issue basis, leader says

By JANE TABER

December 23, 2005

SENIOR POLITICAL WRITER

WINNIPEG -- Stephen Harper said yesterday that a Conservative minority government would not enter into a coalition or formal arrangement with any other party, especially the separatist Bloc Québécois.

In an interview with The Globe and Mail, Mr. Harper said forming a coalition is unrealistic, and that he would govern on an issue-by-issue basis, co-operating with "individuals or parties that are absolutely committed to the unity of the country."

Mr. Harper said he believes his party can win this election.

Yesterday, he spoke at length on how a Conservative minority government would operate, and he tried to debunk the Liberal scare tactic that the Tories would team up with the Bloc.

He called that a "complete bogeyman."

"It's simply unworkable to work with a party that isn't committed to the fundamental institutional structures of the unity and the same basic kind of core values as other federalists," he said. "It just won't work."

Appearing relaxed, the Conservative Leader was interviewed in his hotel suite in Winnipeg after a week of major announcements, in which he also took on Liberal Leader Paul Martin over national unity. This is about the midpoint of the campaign for the Jan. 23 election.

Mr. Harper, who is much friendlier with the media in this campaign than in 2004, even played Santa Claus, and gave out boxes of chocolates to reporters at a Christmas lunch.

He then travelled home to Calgary, where he will take several days off before resuming campaigning in British Columbia on Dec. 27. Mr. Harper, who has been campaigning vigorously, said he just didn't think "I could sit still for eight days."

He said yesterday that the Liberals have governed as if they had a majority, with a strategy that "if things didn't work, to always blame it on everybody else, and say 'that's why we need a majority.' "

But he said that Canadians would not tolerate a "Liberal opposition" that would not co-operate with a Tory minority government.

"I think . . . the people of Canada are kind of annoyed that the Liberals acted as if they had a majority," Mr. Harper said. "I think they will expect the Liberals, if they are defeated, to eat some humble pie and work co-operatively in Parliament."

Mr. Harper said that his Tories have shown from the last Parliament that they can co-operate with the other parties on individual issues. And he said that the Conservatives are similar to the NDP and the Bloc on a "limited range of issues."

"But we are not naive. Even where we share particular agenda items with the Bloc, we know that the Bloc happens to agree with these things for entirely different reasons than we do," he said.

He would not discuss whether he has a transition team in place, although he said his party would be ready to govern right away if it wins the election.

"If we get a minority, we will proceed, let me be clear, we will proceed with the core promises we made in the campaign, things like reducing the GST . . ." he said.

On the controversial issue of same-sex marriage, Mr. Harper said that attempting to bring back the traditional definition of marriage as between a man and a woman was a "commitment we had made for some time."

"I say we will proceed with our promises," he said. "On other things we'll have to look for support to pass things."

This election for Mr. Harper and the Conservatives is clearly different from the one fought 17 months ago.

Mr. Harper said his party is better prepared this time, and he has been "immensely helped by the fact that none of the other parties seem to be competing with us . . ."

He has made one major policy announcement after another in the first four weeks of the campaign. The other leaders have made fewer policy announcements.

He said he and his strategists have found targeted policy announcements more effective than the kind of larger announcements they made in the last election campaign, when they simply, "dumped it [the platform] out in big chapters."

" 'Here's all the things we're going to do for the economy. Here's all the things we're to do on the federation,' and the consequence was that nothing really got through, whereas this time we've tried to hone in on specific policy ideas . . ."

Mr. Harper said that party polling data has shown that the public immediately understood his promise to cut the GST by two percentage points.

He said that they have also had much interest in their child-care policy in which families with young children would be given $1,200 a year toward care.

"The child-care policy, believe it or not, is well understood and has resonated out in the public not just because we pushed it out but frankly because of Scott Reid and John Duffy's amplification of it," Mr. Harper said.

Mr. Reid and Mr. Duffy, two senior Martin strategists, said on national television that Canadian parents would spend the money on beer and popcorn.

As well, the Conservative Leader painted a rosy picture of the situation in Ontario, the province with the most seats in play.

Taking a substantial number of Ontario's 106 seats can win a party a government.

He said that despite public polls that have shown little upward movement for the Conservatives, the party's internal polling is positive.

He also predicted his Tories will win seats in Quebec.

Tories rule out Bloc tie-up: report (Reuters)

2005-12-23T20:24:00.000-06:00

"If anyone asks, we talked about last night's game."

Friday, December 23, 2005

TORONTO (Reuters) - The leader of the opposition Conservative Party ruled out a formal coalition with the separatist Bloc Quebecois in a newspaper interview published on Friday, eliminating one option for Canada after the January 23 election.

Stephen Harper told The Globe and Mail newspaper that he was confident his party would win the election, the second federal vote in Canada in less than two years.

But he said a minority Conservative government would cooperate with other parties on an issue-by-issue basis rather than form a formal coalition with the Bloc Quebecois, a party that did not support the unity of Canada.

"It's simply unworkable to work with a party that isn't committed to the fundamental institutional structure and the same basic kind of core values as other federalists. It just won't work," the paper quoted him as saying.

The Bloc, a federal party with ties to the pro-independence Parti Quebecois, only puts up candidates in the French-speaking province of Quebec. Opinion polls show it well ahead of the ruling Liberals in the province, with the Conservatives trailing far behind.

Countrywide opinion polls mostly put the Liberals ahead of the Conservatives, although no party would win enough seats to be guaranteed a majority in Parliament if the latest poll figures were translated into votes.

The Liberals had a minority of seats in the previous Parliament. The other parties voted them out of office over a corruption scandal that centered on wasted government cash and kickbacks to Quebec Liberals during an advertising campaign to promote a united Canada.

The Liberals have been hinting that the Conservatives might form a coalition with the Bloc if they are returned as the largest party in Parliament. Harper dismissed that as a "complete bogeyman."

Duceppe predicts another minority government (CTV.ca)

2005-12-23T20:22:00.000-06:00

December 23 2005

Canadian Press

MONTREAL — Gilles Duceppe says Canadians are in for another minority government - but that it will last longer than the last one.

The Bloc Quebecois leader told The Canadian Press on Friday that voters don't want another short parliamentary session.

"I think people will learn a lesson from this short legislative session," he said.

He cited Lester B. Pearson's successive minority governments in the 1960s. Pearson's second minority government lasted longer than his first.

However, in 1979-80 Joe Clark's minority Conservatives held onto government for only nine months.

Duceppe did not say whether he believed it would be Paul Martin's Liberals or Stephen Harper's Conservatives at the helm. But he said either could do well if they avoid being "arrogant."

He also told a French-language all-news channel that if the Liberals are re-elected on Jan. 23 he would have to recognize their "moral authority" to govern.

"Unless other things come up, which they've hidden from us," he said, referring to the sponsorship scandal.

Liberal photo 'beyond tasteless,' Harper says (CTV.Ca)

2005-12-23T20:17:00.000-06:00

December 23 2005

CTV.ca News Staff

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper says a photo circulating within Liberal ranks is a "tasteless" sign the Grit campaign is set to take turn to the negative.

The photo, depicting a quiet conversation between Harper and Bloc Quebecois leader Gilles Duceppe, is featured in campaign instructions available to Liberal candidates online.

"I think it's beyond tasteless," Harper said Friday, noting that the photo was taken when all four federal party leaders were attending a Holocaust memorial on Parliament Hill last spring.

"To imply that Mr. Duceppe and I share some sort of agenda other than opposing the Holocaust is disgraceful."

According to the Conservative leader, the material foreshadows an impending negative turn in the ongoing election campaign.

"I think you're just seeing the beginning," Harper told reporters outside the Calgary toy store where he'd stopped to buy presents.

"A corrupt party that doesn't have a record to run on: this is the sort of stuff they're going to do."

Liberal Party national director Steve McKinnon refused to discuss the ads on camera, but in a statement the Grits denied a negative campaign was in the works.

"They were never at any time prepared in the context of an advertising strategy," the statement said, describing the material as part of a list of issues intended to help candidates as they go door-knocking.

The picture was used to illustrate the suggestion a Harper-Duceppe coalition would lead to a weakened federal government.

Pollster Allan Gregg warns, should the Liberal campaign take a negative turn, the party should be prepared for the move to backfire.

"Negative advertising and negative campaigns can have a negative effect on those who launch it -- so they have to be very careful," the Strategic Counsel chairman told CTV News.

Saddled with a nagging reputation for negative campaigning, the Conservatives are taking a more subtle tack in their newest advertisements.

But Harper stopped short Friday of vowing his party would avoid negative campaigning in its bid to mislead the public in his bid to form a Conservative government.

"Anything we will be saying in this campaign will be factual and accurate. I can't promise it will all be pretty."

Meanwhile, the Jewish community is demanding an apology from the Liberals, for making them the first casualties in what is expected to be an increasingly nasty campaign in the weeks leading to Jan. 23.

Prepared with a report from CTV's Robert Fife

GLOBE AND MAIL/CTV/STRATEGIC COUNSEL POLL: Liberals pull ahead in B.C. (Globe and Mail)

2005-12-22T21:37:00.000-06:00

Only 5 points away

December 22, 2005

45%

The percentage of Canadians who say they have a favourable view of Conservative Leader Stephen Harper - the lowest favourable rating of any party leader. Liberal Leader Paul Martin is judged favourably by 49 per cent of those surveyed nationally and NDP Leader Jack Layton by 61 per cent. In Quebec, 75 per cent of those surveyed have a favourable view of Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe.

Dec. 18-20

Liberal: 34%

Conservative: 30%

NDP: 16%

Bloc Québécois: 15%

Green Party: 5%

The Strategic Counsel's daily tracking allows us to provide Globe readers with an unprecedented degree of insight every day. At globeandmail.com, you'll find a daily poll tracker and the complete methodology of the polling.

The national race remains little changed, with four points separating the two top parties. The Liberals lead the Tories 34-30. The NDP, with 16 per cent of voter support, has lost its modest post-debate gains.

In B.C., the Liberals appear to be pulling into a solid lead in what was a tight three-way race, gaining strength as the Conservatives suffer a 13-point decline from last year's election results. The Liberals have the support of 39 per cent of declared voters in the province, compared to 29 per cent for the NDP and 26 per cent for the Conservatives.

In Quebec, however, Liberal support is falling apart. At 20 per cent, they have fallen 10 percentage points since the beginning of the campaign, and even strong federalists are abandoning the party. The Bloc dominates, with 58 per cent, while the Conservatives and NDP are both at

9 per cent.

Frankly, I don't go around demanding apologies. I can take a punch."

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper, refusing Paul Martin's request that he apologize for suggesting the Liberal Leader wants a separatist government in Quebec to wrap himself in the flag and win votes.

Voters, pick your poison (Macleans)

2005-12-22T21:28:00.000-06:00

CHRISTMAS CAMPAIGN Debates work like a tonic; now the gloves come off
Do you want the smart tax cut, as a consolation for Liberal bungling? Or the dumb, but popular, tax cut?

STEVE MAICH
December 20, 2005

The most enlightening moments of an election campaign never come in the choreographed media presentations. They're more often in the unscripted moments that crop up along the way.

When Stephen Harper is enthusiastically embraced by a grinning toddler, and he reacts as if the child might be infected with the Ebola virus, he's telling you something about himself. And when one of Paul Martin's senior advisers says working parents are more likely to blow a little extra cash on beer and popcorn than to spend it on their children, you learn something about the attitudes that help form Liberal policy. The media tend to characterize these things as "gaffes," when in fact they are precious moments of truth.

These little clues are useful, but the more substantive evidence is gleaned from the ideas that underlie the parties' promises. Take, for example, the contrast between two key tax proposals now on offer to Canadians: do you want the smart tax cut, offered as a consolation prize for Liberal bungling? Or do you prefer the dumb, but popular, tax cut, proposed by the Tories?

First, consider the incumbents' plan. In addition to gradually reducing income taxes by $30 billion over five years, Team Martin is now dangling a proposal to slash dividend taxes. It's a sensible idea, affordable and likely to yield real benefits to the economy. The trouble is not the end result, but the disgraceful route taken to arrive there.

The dividend tax cut was announced last month, after several weeks of costly agonizing in Ottawa, all revolving around the Liberals' paranoia that income trusts are decimating federal coffers. Companies structured as trusts pay out most of their cash flow to investors in monthly cash distributions, and by doing so, they're able to avoid federal taxes. Some estimate this costs the feds hundreds of millions every year, but that wasn't seen as a major problem until recently. More and more companies have been converting into income trusts of late, and when reports surfaced this year that some major banks might make the switch, the bureaucrats in Finance mashed the panic button.

Ralph Goodale declared that this income trust thing had to be reined in, and a wave of fear was sent crashing through the capital markets. Small investors sold trusts like mad, retirees saw their portfolio values plummet, and confusion reigned. In the end, on the eve of a new election, Goodale stumbled on the simple solution that had been obvious to most observers all along: cut the dividend tax rate to reduce the incentive for companies to convert into trusts. It'll still cost the feds millions, but the so-called tax leakage will be reduced, and companies will be encouraged to reinvest profits in the business.

The Liberals ended up in the right place, but not before sparking an unnecessary crisis for untold thousands of investors. The whole farce was capped off by what appears to have been a disastrously timed leak from Goodale's underlings that may have sparked a rush of insider trading on the day of the announcement. Now the Liberals are campaigning as if this tax cut is a gift to voters that came in a flash of fiscal genius. It's a clever line, it's just not true.

Sadly, the prime alternative suffers a different set of problems. The central plank of the Conservative tax plan, so far, is Harper's promise to trim a percentage point off the much-loathed GST, and to follow up with another percentage point cut within a few years. It's good politics, and bad policy.

The Tories declared that the initial cut would put another $400 a year in the pockets of an average family with an income of $60,000. Sounds great, except it won't. That calculation assumes the family spends $40,000 a year (essentially every penny of its net income) on things subject to the GST. In the real world, most families spend a lot on GST-exempt necessities -- like groceries, rent or mortgage payments -- meaning the real savings will be far less than advertised. But that's not all. The Tory tax cut is also totally regressive. Slashing a consumption tax like the GST favours the people that buy the most stuff -- i.e. the rich -- thus providing the greatest benefit to the people who need it the least.

Harper defends the cut on economic grounds, saying there's no better way to spur consumption. And that may be, but Canada doesn't have a consumption problem, it has a competitiveness problem. People and corporations don't need encouragement to go buy more stuff, they're already doing that at a healthy pace. The country needs incentives to invest more for the future. A GST cut encourages the opposite. Moreover, every point cut from the GST costs the feds $4.5 billion a year, so there won't be much room for additional relief once this is done.

It hardly inspires confidence that Harper flubbed a basic math question right out of the gate, and seems to misread the nature of Canada's economic challenge. The only redeeming fact is that the Tories are at least offering up a policy that people seem to want.

Still, it's a depressing choice. Do you want the party that has fallen backwards into the right policy, but only after blundering through a few missteps first? Or would you rather the party that's more prone to let populism form the backbone of misguided policy? Hey, we said election campaigns could be enlightening, not inspiring.

The Republican behind the costume (Rabble News)

2005-12-22T21:16:00.000-06:00

Stephen Harper quipped that the NDP is “proof that the Devil lives and interferes in the affairs of men.” It's hard to imagine a Devil promoting affordable housing, education, social conscience, women's rights, gay rights, minority rights, daycare or health care.
by Michael Nickerson
December 22, 2005

It's been quite a sight watching Stephen Harper contort himself into a sheep costume these last few months, and despite a few hiccups along the way, he's done a remarkably good job transforming into the sort of placid political farm animal that Conservative strategists hope will win over the Canadian public.

He's got a new haircut, a new wardrobe and a sudden affinity for photo-ops with 14-year-olds. If he isn't flipping burgers in summertime, then he's cracking wise in the winter, all his fangs tucked away, a peaceful, caring man who has found his heart along with the centre line of Canadian politics.

He's done such a good job that you almost forget who's still inside the costume.

Not that the Liberals haven't tried to remind us.

More worried about job security than actually doing the job at hand, they've turned the last two election campaigns into fear fests right out of a David Cronenberg horror movie, replete with ogres and monsters and tales of the apocalypse should we do anything other than vote for our local Grit.

It's the sort of divisive, negative politics that has made many grow weary of the electoral process. But with another of Harper's skeletons clattering out of the closet last earlier this month, one wonders whether it's more than just Liberal smoke and mirrors when it comes to the right-wing bogeyman.

In an eight-year-old speech (which received very little coverage or commentary in the corporate media) that Conservative Party strategist Tim Powers tried to spin as nothing more than a tongue-in-cheek laugher on par with the sort of wit displayed at the annual press gallery dinners, Harper expressed a side of himself recently forgotten.

Aside from the undesirability of ever subjecting people to the sort of wit expressed at such dinners and the need to leave humour in the hands of comedians and not stilted politicians who chuckle at a moderately well-turned pun, this speech was not humour, nor jest, but a public expression of a man enamored with a political movement and social focus that would appall most Canadians.

Speaking to a crowd whose members would make even the most radical of Conservatives and former Reformers seem like mild-mannered Communists, Harper comes across as a man not terribly proud of his own country; in fact, he seems disdainful of much that it represents.

He calls us a welfare state, second tier, a land where unemployed people happily live on the public dole. We are “basically an English-speaking country,” with a French-speaking minority throwing dirt in the gears of government. We consider things like universal health care and women's rights fundamental, ideas that apparently would horrify his audience whom he calls “a light and an inspiration to people in this country and across the world.”

I would be very surprised if many in this country would ever consider the Council for National Policy an inspiration, save for a few evangelicals who might like to see church and state find their way back into the same room.

Referred to by some as a “think tank,” the CNP is a collection of diehard conservatives and religious fundamentalists who are already making many Americans fear for their First Amendment rights. Expressing and financially supporting views that have been at the heart of a resurgence of Republican power in the U.S., this group represents much that is right (forgive the pun), if you're Stephen Harper, but much that is very wrong if you have an ounce of social compassion.

Since Harper's speech in 1997, the United States has moved steadily towards a policy of tax cuts, and more tax cuts. The idea has always been an unproven one: that putting money in the hands of the middle class will lead to prosperity for all. The sad fact is, it has gone quite the other way in the U.S., with an increased stratification of rich and poor, spiraling debt, and a devalued dollar, along with social and foreign policies that few in Canada would ever consider “an inspiration.”

Stephen Harper quipped that the NDP is “proof that the Devil lives and interferes in the affairs of men.” It's hard to imagine a Devil promoting affordable housing, education, social conscience, women's rights, gay rights, minority rights, daycare or health care.

The Devil may be in the details, but not in the policies. It's an observation that I suspect is still lost on the new Harper, or at least the Republican behind the costume.

Michael Nickerson is a regular columnist and political commentator for Politics Canada and Esprit de Corps magazine. His work has also appeared in a range of publications, including The Globe & Mail, The Toronto Star, The Halifax Chronicle-Herald, and the e-zine Caffimage.com.