The coming Conservative schism
What moderate Tories should do if the Conservative Party cracks up.
A former Conservative Senate leader is expressing concern about the direction Pierre Poilievre is taking the party, worrying the Tories might be reaching the point of “fracturing beyond repair.”
In an exclusive interview with The West Block’s Mercedes Stephenson, Marjory LeBreton said Conservative leadership candidates jumping on the “grievance brigade” is doing a “disservice” not only to the party but to the country.
[…]
“I really fear that the great accommodation that was reached between (then Canadian Alliance Leader) Stephen Harper and (former Progressive Conservative Leader) Peter MacKay in the fall of 2003 is fracturing beyond repair.”
LeBreton was explicit about what caused her the most concern: members of the party embracing the convoy protests that paralyzed downtown Ottawa for weeks and blocked multiple Canada-U.S. border crossings.
The former senator said “law and order” is a “cornerstone” of modern Conservative politics.
“And law and order is law and order. And illegal blockades are illegal blockades, whether they’re at the border crossing, a pipeline, a railway line, they’re illegal,” LeBreton said, referencing Conservative opposition to Indigenous rail blockades in early 2020.
Conservatives can’t say blockading the City of Ottawa is “okay, but it’s not okay for some other group to block a railroad.”
“The whole idea of wrecking a cornerstone of conservatism in law and order … really, really upsets me.”
LeBreton is one of the most high-profile Conservative figures to criticize her own party for their embrace of the convoy protests, but she is by no means alone. Multiple Conservative sources – both on leadership campaigns and on the sidelines – have expressed concern about MPs and the broader movement cheering on what was deemed an illegal “occupation” by police.
I think some of the commentary and media coverage about the “Freedom Convoy” was unfair and over the top, and some authorities’ actions in response - especially the imposition of the rarely used Emergencies Act - posed serious civil liberties concerns.
I also think hitching your wagon to a fringe minority - and it is a fringe minority, even if it’s really loud - whose rhetoric and conspiracy theorizing turns off even many vaccine- and lockdown-skeptical Canadians, is a really bad idea for a political party that wants to regain control of the federal government some day.1
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