The we
ather-vane leader of a rudderless party
by Maj (ret'd) CORNELIU E. CHISU, CD, PMSC,
FEC, CET, P. Eng.
Former Member of Parliament Pickering-Scarborough East
I followed the Conservative Party Convention of last week with attention. I have participated in a few of them in the past, but not this one. As I am no longer a member of the Conservative Party, I just followed the developments with a good understanding of what goes on behind the scenes.
Unfortunately, today's Conservative Party is rudderless and leaderless. Today's Conservative Party is not like it was in the time of Stephen Harper, who showed competence and leadership in leading the Conservative Party to form the government.
Instead of adding to, and making improve ments in the conservative principles that guide the party, there is a definite movement to dilute them and even ignore them in an attempt to move the party towards the uncharted waters of the center. Following the misguided example of the last, short-lived Conservative Party leader, the current leader is so anxious to become Prime Minister that he is pursuing a "promise them anything" strategy. He preaches liberal policies in the belief that he will get liberal votes doing that, while totally ignoring the conservative base. Has he never heard that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush?
In his ambition to get the top job, he is evidently suffering from an inferiority complex, having sidelined any potential contenders for his leadership and eliminating most of his opponents from the leadership contest. He promotes only those with no voice in parliament yet, who pose no apparent danger to his leadership.
As it is now well documented, the platform he used in his leadership run has been overturned. Currently he is promoting essentially liberal ideas wrapped in conservative packaging. He also shows interesting character traits by openly opposing party members who challenge his ideas, brushing them aside, displaying an unpleasant penchant for ignoring democracy.
O'Toole certainly has changed his tune since he ran for the Conservative leadership last year. There was nothing in his speech to the delegates of the Conservative Party Convention about "cancel culture" or the "radical left." Neither did he offer any tips for winning debates with the "woke left," as he did last fall just months after winning the leadership. Is the big blue tent fading to grey, or is the color being muddied by shades of red and yellow?
In his prepared remarks at the Convention, he said he wanted to defeat the "lie" that the Conservative Party is a party of "climate change deniers." However, in a subsequent question-and-answer session with party members, O'Toole declared that the "debate" over climate change is over.
What changed between those two pronouncements, you ask? Conservative Party delegates rejected a resolution that would have declared that "climate change is real" and "the Conservative party is willing to act" - while committing the party to targeting high emitters and supporting innovation.
This shows that the Conservative Leader was ill-prepared to listen to the members of his Party and did not put forward any ideas to mitigate the issue of the trumpeted climate change.
After telling Conservatives that they need to find the "courage" to pursue "bold" changes, O'Toole said next to nothing about what that might look like.
For now, he seems more interested in saying that the Conservative Party has changed than in actually looking to renew and strengthen the Conservative Party.
After some motherhood statements to members he did not offer a single solution, or even hinted at one. Example:
"We need to reach out …. We can't wage another election just hoping that people come out to our point of view on certain issues"
"I want us to have a serious, comprehensive approach on climate change that is not the tax approach of Trudeau … but a plan that gets emissions down while we champion job growth across the country"
"We need to be more welcoming to people who haven't voted for us before. Like I said, union members who maybe thought we had squabbles in the past we're reaching out"
Interestingly O'Toole singled out private sector union workers and organized labour as audiences he wants to target. However, he neglected to say what he wanted the party to offer those voters.
O'Toole also said that the wealthiest Canadians should "pay their fair share." So why didn't he use his speech to call for a new approach to taxation?
Beyond O'Toole's assertion that what the Liberals have in mind is alarming and potentially divisive, no Conservative counter-offer has been put forward.
It is now clear from his actions (we don't need to wonder anymore) that he is trying to push the Conservative Party to become a Liberal Light Party.
He has demonstrated that he is not capable of embracing new ideas. For example, he could have championed Nuclear Energy as a less polluting form of energy. This could have been a win-win move for him, had he had the courage to pursue it, as there is a nuclear power plant in his own riding.
Instead of embracing new ideas such as the recycling of the spent nuclear fuel, which would create a lot of high paying jobs, be helpful for the environment and propel Canadian nuclear science to new heights, he is hiding behind some foggy ideas in challenging the Liberals and claiming he has a plan that no one has seen.
In his weather-vane leadership of the Conservative Party, swiveling as the wind blows, he has completely forgotten the importance of family values. I am not talking about the social conservatives' idea of challenging abortion, but looking for new innovative ideas which would critically lower abortion rates and dramatically curtail divorces and family breakdowns.
Let's consider a few ideas in this area: how about offering graduated tax relief to families with more than two children, giving families with four children or more income tax exemption for life?
Another idea would be to support working women in real, practical ways, giving young mothers the opportunity to work remotely where possible, and encouraging job providers to promote women's careers by taking into consideration that they are the major players in providing life and care for children.
As there are many other valuable ideas to be addressed to Canadians without wandering into Liberal and NDP areas, we would expect responsible and able leadership to be guided by a long term view of the public interest, not short sighted, self-serving personal interests.
Indeed, the time has come for serious soul searching in the Conservative Party, if it does not want to fold in the near future.
In an election soon to come, Canadians need to have a real choice; options other than the 'Coke or Pepsi' offered by the two established parties.
What do you think?
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