Scheer victory solidifies West as Conservatives’ home base
It’s tempting to compare the new Conservative leader, Andrew Scheer, to former PC leader and prime minister Joe Clark.
Or “Joe Who?” as he was dubbed by the Toronto Star after he won the Tory leadership in 1976 by riding up the middle and defeating favoured candidates from Quebec — Sen. Claude Wagner and Brian Mulroney.
Clark was only 36 when he won the leadership and only 39 when elected prime minister. Scheer is 38.
Clark hailed from small town Alberta and had been a political organizer, candidate or MP for most of his adult life. Scheer was born in Ottawa but carved out a political career for himself in Regina. He was only 25 when he defeated longtime New Democrat MP Lorne Nystrom, and only 32 when he was elected Speaker of the House of Commons.
But a lot has changed since Clark stumbled into the PC leadership. Dubbing Scheer Andrew Who? speaks more to the reluctance or sheer short-sightedness of central Canadians to recognize that the Conservatives’ power base has shifted west. Stephen Harper wasn’t just a temporary aberration. Lots of Conservatives were off the mark when they assumed the next leader would have to come from Quebec or Ontario because “the West” had had its turn.
Even favoured candidate Maxime Bernier curried support in Alberta by declaring that Alberta was the foundation of the Conservative party.
Scheer, even though he had only a thread of a victory margin, won British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Ontario and Atlantic Canada and significant support in Quebec. Bernier won Alberta, Manitoba and Quebec.
As the Reform Party used to point out, it was never a problem as far as Liberals or Progressive Conservatives in central Canada were concerned that so many prime ministers hailed from Quebec (St Laurent, Trudeau, Mulroney, Chrétien, Martin). But it was seen as a problem by many western conservatives who saw it as a permanent power grab by Quebec at their expense. And hence the Reform slogan — “the West wants in” that carried the party to victory in the West, eventually led to a takeover of the PCs and the election of Stephen Harper as prime minister.
But of course that’s not the only thing that has changed. The West, particularly Alberta, has developed powerful economic heft that is key to the country’s economy, not just the province.
Also, the main vehicle for conservatives in this country, the Conservative Party of Canada, has taken a sharp turn to the right compared to what it used to be.
Scheer prefers budget cutbacks to budget deficits, a standard conservative position. But that didn’t go over well during the last federal election for either Stephen Harper or NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair, who also jumped on the balanced budget bandwagon.
And it hasn’t gone over well in Saskatchewan, either, where Premier Brad Wall’s recent budget featured both a deficit and spending cuts.
A recent poll found that the budget is so unpopular that if an election were held now, Wall and the Saskatchewan Party would lose to the NDP. That’s quite a come down since last year when they were re-elected with 62 per cent of the popular vote.
Scheer is a social conservative, who supports anti-abortion and anti-gay marriage views, although he did not campaign on those issues.
He has also been promoting free speech at university campuses, which apparently has to do with ensuring antiabortion demonstrations are allowed to proceed. How will positions like that go over with young urban voters?
Scheer is also following in the footsteps of Stephen Harper when it comes to reducing carbon emissions in an effort to combat climate change. That means doing very little on that file, other than repealing Justin Trudeau’s carbon tax.
But Scheer is much more smiley than Stephen Harper, more in the style of the compassionate conservative. And he certainly knows how to reach out to conservatives of all stripes and bring them into the big tent.
His biggest challenge will be winning over voters who don’t necessarily see themselves as Conservatives.
If he fails, he will indeed become Andrew Who?