Membership issue stopped MacLeod
Tory admitted she hadn’t been party member for the required 6 months
Lisa MacLeod faced a roadblock on her path to the Conservative nomination in the riding vacated by John Baird, because she had let her federal party membership lapse.
MacLeod announced Tuesday that she would not seek the nomination in Nepean, saying that she didn’t want to stay in campaign mode after months of work on her erstwhile candidacy for the provincial Progressive Conservative leadership.
But in order for her to seek the nomination she would have needed a special waiver from federal Conservative headquarters, a waiver that federal Tories suggest might not have been forthcoming.
MacLeod said in an interview Wednesday that her membership had lapsed.
“Apparently it did,” she said. “It’s now renewed. But I don’t think there’s ever been a question of whether or not I’ve been a Conservative.”
Elections Canada records show that she last donated to the federal party in 2005. She said she donates provincially, and let her federal membership lapse by mistake.
“I don’t sit there on the 28th of December every year and say, ‘Oh, I should pick up my membership for the federal or provincial Tories’.”
Federal party rules require that candidates for nominations must be party members for six months before they can run. If they are not, the party president and the director of political operations can, if they choose, let the national candidate selection committee consider waiving that requirement.
Federal Tories have suggested such a waiver would not have been forthcoming for MacLeod.
Pierre Poilievre, who is the political minister for the Ottawa region now that Baird has left for a business career, may have supported another candidate.
But MacLeod said her conversation with party officials never got to the point where she discussed the mechanism for seeking a waiver to allow her to run.
“Have I spoken to the party apparatus?” she said. “No I didn’t.”
She said politics is a tough business.
“It’s a coveted seat,” she said. “People have preferred candidates and friends and they play hardball. But I’m a big girl. I’ve been in this business a long time.”
Because MacLeod withdrew from the provincial leadership race after Baird stepped down, there was widespread speculation that she would seek his seat.
She said she and her family thought about it but she just doesn’t want to start a project like that now.
“I’m so tired,” she said. “I don’t want to get into another campaign. Not to say in three years if there’s a seat available I wouldn’t think about doing it another time.”