Conservative leader Stephen Harper has stepped back from previous criticism of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, and is promising to maintain the development agency's budget.
In the 2004 campaign, Harper pledged to get "the government out of the business of corporate welfare."
- FROM MAY 28, 2004: Harper targets business loans, subsidies
But during a campaign stop in Halifax Thursday, Harper said he now feels ACOA serves a role in public policy.
Stephen Harper
"We support ACOA," Harper told reporters.
"We want to see ACOA work in a way that's not partisan or politically motivated, that assists the development of business in this part of the country, assists the development of infrastructure and research and development."
ACOA was founded in 1987 by then prime minister Brian Mulroney, as a means of boosting the economic performance of Atlantic Canada.
Since its birth, ACOA has been a magnet for controversy, with accusations through the years that politics has played too strong a role in determining which projects get supported.
Harper's comments come as the Conservatives are positioning themselves as being more in tune with the political centre.
Greg Thompson, a New Brunswick MP and the Conservatives' critic on ACOA, said the party's view on the agency shifted during a policy conference last year.
"ACOA is an issue I took to the floor and won support for," Thompson told Canadian Press.
He said the Tories want to see changes in how ACOA's advisory board reports to the minister responsible for the agency.
With files from the Canadian Press
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