They dropped the previous leader, but put all their political weight to keep him, in order to have a chance of defeating Justin Trudeau’s Liberals one day: Quebecers in the Conservative caucus do not want their party to repeat the same scenario as in 2019, when their leader was pushed out two months after the elections.
“We are 100% behind him [Erin O’Toole] », Assured the deputy of Portneuf-Jacques-Cartier, Joël Godin, at the exit of a meeting with his caucus Wednesday.
One week before the start of the parliamentary term on Monday, its leader, Erin O’Toole, was the target of an attack in good standing in his own ranks, on the part of Saskatchewan Senator Denise Batters, known to be close to the former Leader Andrew Scheer and Peter MacKay supporter in the previous Tory leadership race.
She accuses Erin O’Toole of pretending in the leadership race to be a “real blue” [un conservateur plus à droite] while having carried out a campaign “almost indistinguishable from the liberals of [Justin] Trudeau ”. The senator demands a vote of confidence from party members over the next six months and launched a petition for this purpose. Rather, she was entitled to a dismissal from caucus. Erin O’Toole got it right that he will not tolerate no such misconduct.
In any case, each of the ten elected Conservative Quebecers had already made known, publicly or in private, their support for the leader. The duty contacted seven of them, as well as party officials, political employees or ex-employees, and a senator.
The Quebec caucus forgives Erin O’Toole for courting the right during the leadership and instead sees him as a fundamentally centrist leader, like his campaign strategy. The expected analysis of the reasons for the defeat should conclude on factors beyond its control, it is believed, such as the timing of the election call and the pandemic.
This same caucus, however, issued a completely different verdict for former leader Andrew Scheer, barely two years ago. Conservative troops in Quebec blamed him behind the scenes for the electoral defeat and participated in the movement that pushed him out, confirm several conservative sources.
The putschists near Quebec
Following the 2019 electoral defeat, the Conservative Party found itself relegated to the opposition benches, with 121 MPs. It is a hard blow for the Quebecers of the party, sure of the value of their team of candidates. Victory seemed possible to them until a question about the chief’s position on abortion during the debate of chefs at TVA come and spoil everything.
Shortly after the election, a sling was organized to show the chief the door. The Quebec Conservatives are not helping him. “The affront really came from Quebec. And it was not roughly organized, ”says a person who worked to rally opponents to Andrew Scheer.
“Others [que les élus du Québec] led the way to bring down Scheer, but everyone was happy to replace the leader, adds another witness with nuance. We concluded that we could not have a pro-life leader. “
Under internal pressure, Mr. Scheer rose in the House on December 12, 2019 to announce this “most difficult decision. [qu’il ait] had to take ”. He left his role as head of the official opposition after it came to light of a case of using party money to pay for her children’s school fees. However, he remained a Member of Parliament, and was re-elected in 2021 in his riding of Regina – Qu’Appelle.
Quebec support
“There was a growl that was expressed much more strongly, much more clearly [contre Andrew Scheer]. It is without any measure with what we see for Erin O’Toole ”, explains the conservative senator Claude Carignan, in interview with The duty.
According to him, if no other elected representative or senator has publicly criticized Erin O’Toole since Monday, it is because the dissatisfied with the leader are few and poorly organized. ” If it [la grogne contre le chef] had been well organized, strategic, it would not have been done like that, ”he says.
Between five and ten elected officials or senators would make up a core contesting leadership, according to different estimates from conservative insiders.
“It is clear that the pro-life, it is a small gang, but disproportionate in our party, which is not happy. And they are in the process of “escaping” ”, affirms a member of the Quebec caucus who agreed to confide in the To have to without being named, to speak more freely.
According to him, the “refocusing” operated by Chief Erin O’Toole is necessary to win seats in Quebec and Ontario, and thus have a mathematical chance to dislodge Justin Trudeau. This generates frustration among some of his more right-wing Anglophone colleagues, especially since they were courted by the O’Toole clan during the leadership race. “I respect our members more to the right, but we cannot do otherwise [que chercher] the balance. I don’t want to be the right-wing NDP. “
Another Quebec caucus member says Erin O’Toole “never had a reputation for being a right-wing guy.” If he courted the more conservative members, it was because “he played the game with the members, ”he said, without holding it against him.
Not a real blue
“It is true that Erin O’Toole campaigned like a true blue,” indicates political science professor Frédéric Boily, of the Saint-Jean Campus of the University of Alberta.
However, when the leader unveiled his climate plan in April 2021, which proposed a price on carbon, it became clear that he was going to position himself more in the center to woo the electorate during the elections. “But I have the impression that it is someone more centrist who, in the race for leadership, was a little more to the right, but who subsequently returned to the center,” he analyzes. he.
A Quebec party official, who calls himself “a personal friend of Erin O’Toole”, agrees with this analysis. “Erin O’Toole is a moderate, but he made a leadership race further to the right. He had to differentiate himself from Peter MacKay ”, his opponent in the leadership of the party, known more in the center.
“This is the dynamic of leadership races,” said former Conservative strategist Yan Plante, who notably advised former Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Since candidates have to woo a small number of members to become a leader, they are pressured to address issues that are dear to them, even if they are out of step with public opinion.
“It’s like the Parti Québécois, where there is a group among the members [qui a des positions] more radical on the independence of Quebec. […] So candidates often speak of sovereignty [pendant la course à la chefferie] but, once a candidate becomes leader, the population does not want to hear any more about it ”.
In the aftermath of an election campaigned in the center, the Conservative Party ended up with 119 out of 338 seats in parliament, even though it won the popular vote. The duty asked Erin O’Toole on September 21 if he felt he had the legitimacy to kick out the more radical right-wing elements within his party.
“We are a modern and open party,” he replied. We have to learn lessons because I’m disappointed. We had gains, but we also had losses. I’m proud of our movement, but we have to [le faire] grow, especially in large cities and suburbs. “