Coalition could lead to unified party, Malpeque Liberal muses
Last Updated: Friday, December 5, 2008 | 6:58 AM AT
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As about 100 people gathered at a rally in Charlottetown in support of a Liberal-NDP coalition in Ottawa, the president of the Liberal riding association for Malpeque mused the two parties could become one.
'If this works out well, I think it's a logical conclusion that … [we] end up with a unified, left-of-centre, political party in Canada.'— Harry Keilly, Liberal riding association president for Malpeque
Organizers reminded the crowd that 62 per cent of Canadians didn't vote for the Conservatives in the last election and their voices had to be heard in Ottawa. They also insisted the coalition wouldn't disintegrate during the seven-week prorogation of Parliament, granted by the Governor General on Thursday.
Harry Keilly, president of the Malpeque Liberal riding association, went even further, saying the coalition could give birth to a new party.
"If this works out well, I think it's a logical conclusion that people who have so much in common move towards resolving the few things that keep them apart and end up with a unified, left-of-centre, political party in Canada," said Keilly.
James Rodd, interim leader of the NDP in P.E.I., doesn't share Keilly's view. Rodd said the circumstances that brought the coalition together are extraordinary.
"Through this coalition government, the New Democrats and the Liberals are working on compromise and on co-operation," said Rodd.
"They're doing it as a result of having to sit down and talk things out. That's what Canadians expect to happen, and that's what's being done."
Rodd hopes there is enough common ground to topple the Tories after the late January budget.
No federal MPs attended the gathering, which was organized by the P.E.I. Federation of Labour.
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