Alliance unlikely for Mulcair’s top foes
Grassroots rejects NDP establishment
Faced with a potentially historic grassroots revolt against the party’s Toronto- based establishment, the two candidates most closely identified with the New Democratic Party’s longtime ruling elites say they won’t form an open alliance to challenge front- runner Thomas Mulcair.
The campaign managers for Brian Topp and Peggy Nash, both Toronto- based veteran party insiders with strong union support, nixed any speculation the two might join forces before this weekend’s final debate in Vancouver in a bid to thwart the Montreal MP.
It is widely assumed that Mulcair, known in party circles for his hot temper and sharptongued put- downs, was not the preferred choice of Jack Layton and those closest to him.
Topp, the former party president who spent considerable time with the party’s revered leader before Layton’s death last summer, almost immediately assembled a leadership campaign team blessed by such party stalwarts as Ed Broadbent, Roy Romanow and Libby Davies, along with key union leaders and some of the most respected organizers in the country.
But Topp has struggled in debates against the far- morepolished Mulcair, the ex- cabinet minister in Quebec who has emerged as the overwhelming choice of political columnists who argue he’s best- positioned to take on Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
“I think it’s a first for the NDP that the party members in many ways are rebelling against the party establishment, or at least part of the party establishment centred around Toronto, that tried to crown somebody else other than Mulcair,” said Ian Waddell, a former MP and former B. C. environment minister who said he’s leaning toward backing Mulcair.
“I think the reason is the party’s maturing, in the sense that the majority of the party would like to have federal power.”
Mulcair is the top moneyraiser among the seven candidates, according to Elections Canada data.
He has been scooping up some significant endorsements from the likes of Mike Harcourt, the former B. C. premier whose province has close to one- third of the 131,152 voting members heading into the final day of voting March 24.
Mulcair also has the most caucus support by far, with 43 of the 101- MP caucus backing him, including former leadership candidates Robert Chisholm and, as of Wednesday, Romeo Saganash.
One official with a rival camp acknowledged that Mulcair has the most first- ballot support. Results of a February poll conducted by Paul Dewar’s organizers also put Mulcair ahead, with 25.5 per cent of the 6,373 committed respondents compared with 16.8 per cent for Nash.
“There have been no discussions” on a formal alliance with Nash, said Raymond Guardia, Topp’s national campaign director.
He said “anybody- but” alliances at old- style conventions involving a few thousand delegates were difficult to execute, but in the one- person, onevote format, “it’s 20 times more complicated trying to pull that off.”
Riccardo Filippone, Nash’s campaign manager, said a pre- convention alliance along the lines of the successful pact between Gerard Kennedy and eventual winner Stephane Dion in the 2006 Liberal leadership race “is not in the cards and won’t be in the cards.”
Alan Whitehorn, professor emeritus at the Royal Military College in Kingston, and coauthor of Political Activists: The NDP in Convention, said many in the party admire Mulcair’s “gravitas” and especially his aggressiveness in the House of Commons.
“They need a tough character who can take on a Conservative prime minister who only plays hardball,” Whitehorn said.