Ontario Tories take big risk with Ford
The Liberal attack machine will have a lot of ammunition
In the end, maybe caucus had it right. If, more than anything else, Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives wanted to win on June 7 then maybe they should have stuck with interim leader Vic Fedeli. If the ultrafolksy MPP for Nipissing wasn’t the most compelling imaginable premier-in-waiting, he would certainly have cut a less divisive figure than Doug Ford, who was announced as the party’s new leader late Saturday night in a small room at a Markham conference centre.
“To the party members, I say thank you. To the people of Ontario, I say relief is on its way,” Ford told reporters and campaign workers. “And to Kathleen Wynne, I say your days as premier are numbered.”
That got a massive cheer, of course, but this is an outcome that many in the party consider a worstcase scenario. An Angus Reid poll released this week asked “soft” Tory voters whether each candidate would make them more or less likely to support the party: Ford’s net score (more likely minus less likely) was minus 27 per cent; Christine Elliott, who finished a very narrow second Saturday — and conceded her third failed shot at the leadership on Sunday evening after initially contesting the results — was at plus 20.
Sticking with Fedeli would also have spared the party the hideous embarrassment of Saturday’s botched convention. Vote-counting dragged on for hours thanks to a chunk of ballots that had been allocated to the wrong ridings. A packed crowd of partisans was left in the dark for three hours, then told to hang tight for another 30 minutes, and then sent away into the night with no result. In lieu of a cascade of balloons, there was booing and hollering. Various Ford supporters, citing ostensibly conclusive media reports earlier in the day that Ford had won, alleged party elites were trying to steal the election.
These were not the ideal circumstances in which to build unity, which was the stated purpose of the event. “You’ve been through a very tough couple of months — perhaps the toughest times in the history of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario,” Alberta United Conservative Party leader Jason Kenney told the crowd. “You’ve gone through weeks of anxiety and adversity. But I am certain that you will overcome this time of trial and that, this afternoon, with the election of your leader, you will emerge stronger, united and victorious in the election.”
“This afternoon,” he said. We were so young then.
But members will get over a screwed-up convention. June 7 is a long way away. And there is no reason Ford can’t win. He ran a relatively calm, measured campaign. He stuck to his talking points. On occasions when the campaign was said to get “ugly,” it certainly wasn’t ugly by Ford’s standards. One is reminded of his plan to take on John Tory, as described to Toronto Councillor John Filion: “I’m going to latch on to his ass. He’s going to take off the sheets in bed at night and find my teeth wrapped around his nuts.”
If Ford can keep his teeth away from other people’s nuts, so to speak, Ontarians who weren’t familiar with him before might not be turned off. Perhaps he can even win over some of the haters. The things Liberals imagine could derail him — musings about notification of parents for minors seeking abortions, tearing up the sex ed curriculum, opposing carbon pricing — are probably more popular than they believe. And maybe the desire for change, any change, is so strong among Ontarian voters that just about any human can fulfil it.
But if the Liberal attack machine can still stir up the Ontario electorate the way it did against Tim Hudak, Stephen Harper and other conservatives … well, let’s just say it has never had more live ammunition to work with. For starters, the new Ontario PC leader enabled and still proudly associates himself with his late brother Rob’s administration at Toronto City Hall, which produced easily the most insane series of events in modern Canadian political history. Tory ran successfully for mayor against Doug by promising serenity instead of lunacy. The Liberals and New Democrats will no doubt promise the same, and they will have a point.
Doug Ford accused Toronto police of working with the Toronto Star to prove false allegations against his brother, allegations that were actually true. Chief Bill Blair threatened to sue, and Ford had to grovellingly apologize. Ford had the worst attendance record of any city councillor. The integrity commissioner found he broke the council code of conduct in his business dealings with two clients of Deco, the Ford family’s labelsand-tags concern.
On Pride parades, Ford has complained about “men running down the middle of Yonge Street buck naked.” On a home for mentally challenged youth in his ward, he said: “My heart goes out to kids with autism, but no one told me they’d be leaving the house.” His and Rob’s short-lived radio and Sun News Network shows were a bottomless font of childish bluster, blather and bravado.
The man is a hundred attack ads just waiting to happen. He had almost no support from caucus. His victory was wafer thin. And he hinted at his disdain for party processes even in his victory speech. But Doug Ford could very well be the next Premier of Ontario. What a time to be alive.