Tory hopefuls to debate face-to-face
Don’t let attacks ‘become personal,’ event organizer urges candidates
EDMONTON Conservatives tuning into the next leadership debate hope to see the six candidates vying for the party’s top job lay off the personal attacks, says one campaign manager.
“I want the candidates to speak to the issues, debate the issues, debate them vigorously. But don’t become personal,” said Ed Fast, the British Columbia MP who is co-chairing former Quebec premier Jean Charest’s leadership campaign.
“At the end of the day, all of us are part of the Conservative family and we’re going to have to come together to fight the next election and be successful.”
Charest, along with the contest’s other five contenders, are headed to Edmonton to participate in the party’s first official leadership debate happening in English on Wednesday, which will be followed by one in French two weeks later.
Party members and interested Canadians had a chance to see how five out of the six candidates reacted to one another when they took the stage in Ottawa last week for an unofficial debate, held as part of a conference for conservative faithful.
They saw an hour and a half of fiery exchanges, which included Leslyn Lewis laying into fellow MP Pierre Poilievre for his stand against COVID-19 mandates and Poilievre going after Charest for his past work with Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei. Poilievre also accused Charest of being a Liberal for having led the Quebec Liberal party.
“Our members are highly engaged,” said Andrew Scheer, the former Conservative leader now working to get Poilievre elected.
“Our members want to see how leadership candidates can handle the sparring from each other, because it’s going to be a lot tougher in a general election campaign.”
Speaking ahead of last week’s debate, Scheer said Poilievre — who has earned the reputation of being a bulldog through years of aggressive performances in the House of Commons — also comes with a deep knowledge of policy.
“He is one of the most well prepared members of Parliament I’ve ever seen,” Scheer said.
One big difference between last week’s debate and Wednesday’s will be the presence of Patrick Brown, the mayor of Brampton. His campaign said he decided to forgo last week’s event to sell memberships.
Brown, like Charest, sees a path to victory by bringing in droves of new Conservative members, rather than trying to win over the existing grassroots. Brown is specifically focusing his efforts on drawing support from racialized Canadians, including those with Muslim, Tamil, Sikh, Chinese or Nepalese heritage.