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Waiting in the wings
By Carolyn Ryan
Heading into this campaign, pundits were predicting that either Paul Martin or Stephen Harper would not be around to fight the next one.
Martin would come under intense pressure to resign even if the Liberals managed to pull off another minority government, the reasoning went. Given his age and his inability to produce a "traditional" Liberal majority, the party would start looking for a new face in an attempt to convince Canadians to get excited about voting Liberal again. For the record, Martin has refused to address what he will do after the election, telling reporters on Jan. 2 that he wouldn't get into a discussion about "hypotheticals."
Harper was thought likely to step down if the Conservatives failed to win at least a minority government, given what amounted to almost a perfect storm for the precariously ruling Liberals. That included continuing fallout from the sponsorship scandal, a series of stupid remarks by Liberal party officials, an RCMP investigation into allegations that Liberals leaked the Nov. 25 income trust tax decision to the financial sector. If the Conservatives don't break through in the seat-rich province Ontario in significant numbers this time out, Harper will almost certainly be tagged with the loss. Again.
NDP Leader Jack Layton and Bloc Québécois Leader Gilles Duceppe are seen as likely to stay put in their posts whatever happens on Jan. 23, so we won't deal with succession plans for them in this article.
All that said, who is lining up to replace the Big Two if one of them gets hit by a ballot box? Here's a look at some of the top contenders.
Liberal Party of Canada
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Frank McKenna (CP file photo)
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Frank McKenna: Canada's ambassador to the U.S. since March 2005 and a former premier of New Brunswick who turns 56 on Jan. 19.
Advantages: The fluently bilingual lawyer born in Apohaqui, N.B., first gained public attention when he defended boxer Yvon Durelle in a murder trial in his native province. He was elected to the provincial legislature in 1982 and became leader three years later. McKenna's Liberals went on to sweep every seat in the provincial legislature in the 1987 election. After leaving provincial office in 1997, he returned to his legal career and also sat on a number of corporate boards, including The Carlyle Group Canadian Advisory Board. After the death of Israel Asper in 2003, McKenna became chairman of the board of media giant CanWest Global. He resigned his corporate responsibilities after Martin appointed him to be Canada's man in Washington.
Handicaps: As ambassador, the blunt former premier has generated some controversy. He called the American government dysfunctional and said Canada was already a part of Ballistic Missile Defence, though Martin had made a big deal of announcing that the country would not join the U.S.-led alliance. Also, no Maritimer since R.B. Bennett has been elected prime minister, though McKenna's name recognition and many connections to Bay Street could compensate for being from a seat-poor region.
Buzz: In August 2005, McKenna came out on top when SES Research conducted a national poll on who Canadians would like to see as the next leader of the Liberals should Martin depart. McKenna was the choice of 23 per cent of respondents, compared to 11 per cent each for former Chrétien cabinet minister John Manley and former Ontario premier Bob Rae. Some columnists have reported that McKenna has been keeping in touch with plugged-in Liberals and potential leadership campaign supporters and donors since moving to the United States.
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Michael Ignatieff
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Michael Ignatieff: The Toronto-born academic and author, 58, who left his post as director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard University in August 2005 to teach at the University of Toronto and is now running for the Liberals in the Toronto riding of Etobicoke-Lakeshore.
Advantages: After attending Upper Canada College and Trinity College in Toronto, the son of Canadian diplomat George Ignatieff worked as a reporter for the Globe and Mail before going on to earn his PhD at Harvard. He is fluent in English, French and Russian (his grandfather was in the government of Russia's Tsar Nicholas II), and has written 16 books, with titles such as Blood and Belonging and The Rights Revolution exploring themes of nationalism, modern warfare and human rights. Ignatieff won the non-fiction Governor General's Award for The Russian Album, a family memoir he wrote in 1987, and was shortlisted for the prestigious Booker Prize and the Whitbread Novel Award for his 1993 novel Scar Tissue.
Handicaps: Some Liberals in Etobicoke-Lakeshore complained that his nomination was undemocratic, with riding officials conspiring to make sure nobody else was able to become a candidate for the nomination. Ukrainian-Canadians in the riding have protested passages in 1995's Blood and Belonging as being derogatory toward their culture, and opponents have accused him of condoning "soft" torture tactics used by American forces dealing with prisoners suspected of being linked to al-Qaeda. Ignatieff was also called a "liberal hawk" for supporting U.S. President George W. Bush's push to oust Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein on the grounds that Saddam was torturing and killing his own citizens.
Buzz: Ignatieff has been called "the new Pierre Trudeau" and was labelled the "thinking woman's crumpet" when he served as a BBC commentator and arts program host in the 1990s. His decision to move back to Canada in the summer of 2005 was greeted by breathless profiles in national publications, with his future as leader of the Liberal Party of Canada taken for granted. However, Ignatieff has rejected suggestions that he was drafted to come home as part of "an anti-Martin leadership campaign," adding: "I would not have taken part in such activity."
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John Manley (CP file photo)
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John Manley: Former deputy prime minister under Jean Chrétien, who held finance, foreign affairs and industry portfolios throughout his political career and made a failed bid for the Liberal leadership in 2003. He turned 55 on Jan. 5.
Advantages: Manley was born and raised in Ottawa. He served as law clerk to Bora Laskin, the former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Canada, shortly after finishing his legal studies at the bilingual University of Ottawa. He was named Time Canada's Newsmaker of the Year for 2001 because of his performance as foreign affairs minister in the wake of the 9/11 attacks against the United States. Manley stepped into Paul Martin's shoes as finance minister after Martin and Chrétien fell out in June 2002. In late 2003, he turned down Martin's offer to become Canada's ambassador to the United States, made shortly after Manley said he did not intend to run again for the Liberals in Ottawa South. He later accepted a position chairing a royal commission on Ontario's energy system, and sits on the boards of Nortel and CIBC. The ongoing coolness between him and members of Martin's entourage would allow him to distance himself from its failure to retain majority governments for the party. And as a devoted marathoner, he's used to pacing himself to get the job done in the long run.
Handicaps: He was roundly drubbed for questioning the value of the monarchy to Canada while Elizabeth II was in the country on a royal visit in 2002, and for fumbling the question of whether NHL teams in Canada needed a federal bailout. As well, Manley was closely associated with Chrétien, whose star has dimmed in the wake of the November 2005 report into the sponsorship scandal, and the other federal parties would no doubt not let Canadians forget that. He is also a booster of stronger Canada-U.S. relations at a time when such sentiments can prove a political minefield.
Buzz: He is said to be "listening to supporters but not committing to another bid" for the party's leadership. Manley reportedly asked an old friend in Brampton, Ont., to pull together a barbecue for 300 guests in September, at which he hinted strongly about seeking the Liberal leadership. He was scheduled to be the guest speaker at a $200-a-ticket fundraiser for the Ottawa West-Nepean Liberal candidate in mid-January.
Other names that have been named: Former justice minister Martin Cauchon; public works minister Scott Brison; citizenship and immigration minister Joe Volpe; former federal cabinet minister and Newfoundland and Labrador premier Brian Tobin; former Ontario premier Bob Rae; six-term Ontario MP Maurizio Bevilacqua; and former health, justice and industry minister Allan Rock.
Conservatives:
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Peter MacKay. (CP PHOTO/Tom Hanson)
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Peter MacKay: Deputy leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, former (and last) leader of the federal Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, and the 40-year-old MP for Central Nova.
Advantages: MacKay is a bilingual Nova Scotian who is seen as a moderate voice in the Conservative Party, closer to the old-style Red Tories than to the former Reform Party of Canada contingent of the united-right party he helped create. He was born into politics, the son of former Mulroney-era cabinet minister Elmer MacKay. The younger MacKay spent four years as a Crown attorney before being elected to the House of Commons in 1997, at the age of 32. He beat a field of four other candidates to win the leadership of Sir John A. Macdonald's party in May 2003, then struck a deal with Canadian Alliance Party leader Stephen Harper five months later to unite their parties. His quick wit and colourful phrasing have made him one of the new Conservative Party of Canada's strongest performers in Question Period. On a more frivolous note, his rugged good looks have gotten him voted Parliament Hill's sexiest male MP for several years in a row, according to surveys conducted by the Hill Times newspaper.
Handicaps: The deal with Harper to unite the right broke an earlier deal MacKay had made with 2003 P.C. leadership candidate David Orchard, and he has been tainted with the "promise-breaker" label ever since. MacKay also suffered some public humiliation when his then-girlfriend, fellow MP Belinda Stronach, crossed the floor of the House of Commons to join the Liberals, apparently giving him only a few hours' warning. And like McKenna, MacKay would face the challenge of trying to become prime minister from a Maritime power base – something fellow Nova Scotian Robert Stanfield was never able to manage.
Buzz: MacKay was courted to leave Ottawa to return to Nova Scotia earlier this year and replace departing Tory premier John Hamm, but chose to stay put on the federal circuit. That added fuel to the growing consensus that he wanted to follow in Harper's footsteps as leader. Asked by a newspaper reporter recently whether he wanted the job, MacKay did not give a definitive answer, but said: "I have not been organizing or fundraising, or doing anything that would destabilize [Harper's] leadership or the party." On another note, the same SES survey that found McKenna was the top choice to lead the Liberals next also asked Canadians who they'd like to see running the Conservatives next. MacKay was on top nationally, with 17 per cent picking him over 15 per cent for former Ontario premier Mike Harris and 13 per cent for the current premier of New Brunswick, Bernard Lord.
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Mike Harris. (CP file Photo)
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Mike Harris: Former Progressive Conservative premier of Ontario, who turns 60 on election day (Jan. 23, 2006).
Advantages: Harris started off as an elementary school teacher and golf pro before taking over his family's resort business and getting into local politics in the Lake Nipissing area of Ontario. By the time he announced his retirement from politics in late 2001, his "Common Sense Revolution" had changed the face of the province. Harris's election platform in 1995 included slimmed-down government services and big tax cuts. It struck a chord with middle-class voters, who re-elected his government in 1999 after seeing their income taxes fall by 30 per cent in three years. By the time he decided to leave politics mid-term in 2002, Harris and his finance ministers had delivered four consecutive balanced budgets, though the deficit had hovered near $7 billion the year he took office.
Handicaps: The closure of hospitals, forced amalgamation of many Toronto-area municipalities, repeal of some labour laws and repeated face-offs with teachers during the Harris regime left many Ontarians with a sour taste in their mouths. His deep cuts to government services have been blamed for everything from the Walkerton tainted water tragedy to poor literacy skills to the current round of gun-related violence in Toronto. As this campaign unfolds, a public inquiry is examining whether inflammatory statements by Harris played a role in the 1995 death of unarmed native protester Dudley George at Ipperwash Provincial Park.
Buzz: The SES survey in August recorded a strong level of support for a future Conservative leadership bid by Harris, who is now a Senior Fellow at the Fraser Institute think tank. He was seen as a possible contender for the 2003 Conservative leadership race that saw the election of Stephen Harper, but chose to sit out the contest and support Belinda Stronach instead. Now that she is a Liberal, he may not decide to sit out the next race.
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Bernard Lord. (CP File Photo)
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Bernard Lord: Current Progressive Conservative premier of New Brunswick, aged 40.
Advantages: Lord came to national attention in 1999 when his party pushed the New Brunswick Liberals out of power, taking 44 of the 55 available seats in the legislature thanks to his promise to accomplish 20 specific goals within "200 Days of Change." The new premier was just 33, a totally bilingual lawyer who was born in Quebec but grew up in Moncton. His electoral win got him named one of Time magazine's top 25 New Generation of Leaders in Canada for the year 1999. Three years later, Lord delivered a stirring keynote speech at the national convention of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada in Edmonton, leading to a "Draft Lord for Leader" campaign among those trying to breathe life into the near-moribund party. Lord finally answered them in October of 2002, refusing the invitation in words that seemed pretty definite: "I am announcing today that the door is not only closed, it is also locked." A year later, he was again urged to run federally, this time as the leadership race for the new Conservative Party of Canada neared. Alberta Premier Ralph Klein was among the public figures who said they would support his bid, and Peter MacKay said he would stay out of the race if Lord ran, but again the New Brunswick premier declined to jump in.
Handicaps: Lord's Tories fumbled their re-election bid in 2003, coming within two seats of going down to defeat in the face of a reviving Liberal party. He tried to shore up his minority with a Conservative win after NDP leader Elizabeth Weir left politics last year, but the Liberals took her Saint John seat in a November 2005 by-election, giving them 27 seats to Lord's 28 (the Speaker is a P.C. member and votes only in event of a tie). In the past few years, Lord has also faced protests over hospital cutbacks, high insurance rates and the government's reluctance to sign a child-care agreement with the federal government. Another minor handicap: Lord still may not have shaken off the perception that he has a thin skin, fostered by the day he got teary-eyed in the legislature while talking about an editorial cartoon that he considered a sexist shot at his transportation minister.
Buzz: Having twice refused efforts to draft him into federal politics – in 2002 and 2003 – Lord may not be able to resist a third. His two young children are a bit older now, and his government has dropped in popularity at home. Lord had one of the best lines early in the federal campaign, when he criticized Paul Martin's Liberals for what he termed scare tactics over Quebec sovereignty: "They're like pyromaniacs with the matches and gasoline in their hands. They light the fire and then they say, 'Oh, let us put it out.'"
Other names that have been named: Quebec businessman Daniel Fournier, the Conservative candidate for the Outremont riding; Medicine Hat MP Monte Solberg, the party's finance critic; Edmonton-Spruce Grove MP Rona Ambrose, a strong performer during her first term in Parliament; 2003 Progressive Conservative leadership contender Jim Prentice, the MP for Calgary Centre-North; Jean Charest, the current Liberal premier of Quebec who led the federal Progressive Conservatives from 1993-1998; and former Ontario cabinet minister Jim Flaherty.
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