The last debate of the candidates for the Conservative leadership will have finally been a three-way debate. Unable to express themselves easily in French, Leslyn Lewis, Roman Baber and Scott Aitchison could not take part in the open exchanges. Pierre Poilievre therefore found himself coming under attack from both Jean Charest and Patrick Brown, to whom he returned his own arrows throughout the evening.
This debate in French was held in Laval on Wednesday evening. Jean Charest was therefore on more favorable ground than during the last two oratory contests of the race for the leadership of the Conservative Party. The former premier of Quebec even received a chorus of applause and boos — rather than just cries of disapproval — when he once again blamed Pierre Poilievre for supporting the convoy of truckers paralyzing Ottawa and blocking border crossings.
In addition to the favorite themes of the Conservatives — the economy, energy, firearms, Canada’s relationship with China — the discussions also focused, Quebec debate obliges, on Bill 21 on the secularism of State and Law 96 adopted the day before in Quebec to reform the Charter of the French language.
On the latter, Jean Charest indicated in a press briefing after the debate that a government under his leadership would intervene in the Supreme Court, if Bill 96 is challenged up to the highest court in the country. Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown also denounced her in debate, as did candidates Scott Aitchison and Roman Baber.
Law 21 as ammunition
Both Mr. Charest and Mr. Brown also opposed Bill 21 (Mr. Brown even invited other Ontario mayors to fund the challenge to this Quebec law). The two would-be Conservative leaders used it to attack Pierre Poilievre, who they criticized for not repeating in English, as he said in French, that he would not intervene. in the Supreme Court against Bill 21.
“Bilingualism, Mr. Poilievre, means saying the same thing in English Canada as in French Canada,” notably mocked Mr. Charest. “So, are you bilingual or are you not? »
Mr. Poilievre did not respond. But he used the exchange to attack the integrity of Jean Charest. “I remember the Charbonneau commission,” he told her, referring to the commission of inquiry into the awarding of contracts by his government. “Truckers have nothing to learn from you about law and order,” chanted Mr. Poilievre, who in turn was heckled by some members of the crowd.
When Bill 21 came up later in the debate, Pierre Poilievre this time scoffed at Jean Charest’s promise to beat Bloc Québécois MPs in the next election if elected Conservative leader. “You say you are going to force the separatists to retreat. Mr. Charest, it was the separatists who forced you to retire. You even lost your seat,” he recalled of the 2012 Quebec election.
“Mr. Poilievre, join the long list of people who announced the end of my political career,” Jean Charest told him, visibly more amused than at the last two debates.
The exchange strangely also led Pierre Poilievre to say he was “pro-choice”, at the request of Jean Charest, in English as in French. The MP from the Ottawa region was content to say “for freedom of choice” during the last debate.
two against one
Pierre Poilievre repeated the same reproaches as usual to Jean Charest: for having raised taxes in Quebec, created a carbon tax (which was in fact a carbon market), and a health tax; and to have been hired by the Chinese telecommunications company Huawei, when he worked in the private sector. Mr. Charest repeated that he had tried to help free Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor from detention in China.
Patrick Brown threw himself into the fray. “Mr. Poilievre, you are the only candidate who has the support of a Huawei executive,” he said. The Brown campaign alleges that Huawei representative Alykhan Velshi, a former conservative strategist, supports Pierre Poilievre’s candidacy.
Tired of enduring the successive attacks of Patrick Brown and Jean Charest, Mr. Poilievre denounced their “little coalition”. The two men denied having a non-aggression agreement, in a press briefing after the debate. But the two, who have known each other for 15 years, called each other “friends”. Voting for the leadership is by preferential vote and candidates Brown and Charest must hope to recover the second choices of the supporters of the other to climb to the top of the race.
Controversial positions criticized
As during the official debate in English two weeks ago, Mr. Poilievre was therefore the main target of his opponents.
Mr. Charest ended the evening by arguing that the Conservatives need a leader “able to unite the party, but who also has judgment. Who does not leave on stories [en envoyant un] signal [avec] conspiracy theories. Who does not start on theories about the Bank of Canada or bitcoin”.
Candidate Leslyn Lewis also lamented that Mr. Poilievre claimed, in a YouTube video, that cryptocurrency could allow you to invest your money sheltered from inflation. “He is in the [sic] potatoes”, she read with pain and misery on her written notes. The insult nevertheless made the crowd and Jean Charest laugh.
Patrick Brown, meanwhile, accused Mr. Poilievre of cozying up to one of the organizers of the Ottawa trucking convoy, Pat King, who shared conspiracy theories on social media, including one — that of “white replacement — alleging a conspiracy to replace “Anglo-Saxons” with immigration. In an interview with the controversial psychology professor Jordan Peterson, Mr. Poilievre explained his own popularity by the fact that he speaks in plain language and uses “Anglo-Saxon” words.
Mr. Poilievre’s campaign has since denounced, in a press release, the positions of Pat King and the supremacist theory he defended. “I have already spoken out against him and his words. I am for immigration, for open diversity,” Poilievre reiterated Wednesday night. Mr. Brown criticizes him for not having done so on Twitter as well.
The two men, who were MPs in Stephen Harper’s government, had several acrimonious exchanges. Pierre Poilievre also recalled that Mr. Brown had been blamed by the Integrity Commissioner of Ontario for having failed to disclose a loan of $375,000 offered to him for the purchase of his house by a candidate friend of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario which he led at the time.
Hostilities will now take place on social media or in their own partisan rallies. The Conservative Party has not scheduled another debate. The one which was to be held on May 30, organized by the right-wing media True North, was canceled after Pierre Poilievre withdrew.
Aspiring Conservative leaders have until June 3 to recruit new members. They will then spend the summer convincing those thousands of Conservatives to support them. The winner will be announced in Ottawa on September 10.