Anti-Vellacott website a Liberal plot, candidate says

Last Updated: Monday, January 16, 2006 | 6:20 PM ET

CBC News

Saskatchewan Conservative candidate Maurice Vellacott is returning fire at online critics who have accused him of being an absentee MP.

A group calling itself Concerned Voters of Saskatoon-Wanuskewin has created a website dedicated to ousting incumbent Vellacott from the seat.

The "Vote out Vellacott" site outlines the politician's social conservative beliefs and points to what it calls his poor attendance rate in 2004.

Eric Hovius, a second-year law student at the University of Saskatchewan, said the internet is proving to be an effective means of informing the people of Saskatoon-Wanuskewin about their MP.

"We're just trying to grow as a group and we're trying to increase our capacity to inform people," he said. "But also what we're trying to do is create a grassroots campaign."

So far, there have been nearly 7,000 hits at www.voteoutvellacott.com .

However, the Vellacott camp fired back with a statement on the weekend condemning the website and suggesting Hovius is a known Liberal supporter.

It said Vellacott's attendance record in Parliament has been 90 per cent over the past 8½ years and his attendance voting in the last Parliament was in the high 90s.

"Maurice Vellacott has not seen the recent website posted against him and does not have time for such silliness," the statement from Vellacott's campaign office said. "He gathers it is filled with lies and innuendos."