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Rose-Marie Larsson perjfh
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Date Posted: 13:27:32 05/20/03 Tue
Author Host/IP: d150-99-156.home.cgocable.net/24.150.99.156
Ottawa Citizen, May 18, 2003
WOOING THE NEW TORY KINGMAKER
David Orchard probably won’t step into Joe Clark’s shoes, but he will
have a say who does,
writes Norma Greenaway.
--------------------------------------------------
Once dismissed as a tourist in the federal Progressive Conservative
party, David Orchard has graduated to potential kingmaker as he heads
into the leadership convention in Toronto May 31.
Mr. Orchard's strong second-place showing in first-round delegate
selection means he is best positioned to prevent frontrunner Nova Scotia
MP Peter MacKay from succeeding Joe Clark as Tory leader.
"David Orchard has the capacity to be the kingmaker," says political
analyst David Taras. "If he moves (to support another candidate), he
would have enough votes to give someone else the win, because his people
will follow him."
A big question heading into the convention is whether the organic farmer
from Saskatchewan and ardent opponent of the Tory-negotiated free trade
agreements with the U.S. and Mexico will accept the role.
Mr. Orchard is ruling nothing out. He says Mr. MacKay hasn't won yet and
that he expects drama on the convention floor.
Mr. MacKay, a two-term MP and former Crown prosecutor, arrives in
Toronto in the strongest position on the first ballot, having won 1,166
delegates, or 42 per cent of the potential pool from ridings across the
country.
Mr. Orchard finished second with 709 delegates, or 25 per cent, followed
by Calgary lawyer Jim Prentice with 411, or 15 per cent. Nova Scotia MP
Scott Brison got 279 delegates, or 10 per cent of the vote.
The real show begins on the second ballot. Mr. Orchard, considered a
misfit by many Tories, is given low to no growth potential after the
first ballot. The hope in the Prentice camp is that their candidate will
attract enough anti-MacKay and soft MacKay votes to jump ahead of Mr.
Orchard on the second ballot. The Brison camp shares the same hope,
although it is a longer shot.
The bottom line, however, is that, barring a dramatic collapse of Mr.
MacKay’s vote, neither Mr. Prentice nor Mr. Brison can win without
significant backing from delegates from all camps, including Mr.
Orchard’s.
Mr. Prentice and Mr. Brison have been at obvious pains to reach out to
Mr. Orchard during the run-up to the convention, treating the upstart
candidate with respect and praising, in particular, his commitments to
environmental protection.
They also rushed last week to support the Orchard campaign's complaint
about the party’s decision not to hold a delegate-selection meeting in
the Vancouver Island North riding.
After an aggressive campaign to sign up new members there, the Orchard
forces expected to win seven or eight of the 10 delegates. But the
riding executive refused repeated requests from the Orchard supporters
to organize a meeting.
Officials from the Brison and Prentice camps asked the party to call a
meeting, and said that failure to do so would damage the integrity of
the leadership selection process. The two camps complain privately that
party headquarters is biased towards Mr. MacKay, considered the
establishment candidate.
Mr. Prentice makes no secret of his desire to attract Orchard delegates.
"David Orchard is going to have 500 votes, and when he comes off, say,
the third ballot, those people are going to vote for somebody," he said.
Mr. Prentice’s spokesman, Jason Hatcher, took exception to the view that
Mr. Prentice was "too right wing" for Mr. Orchard. He insists the two
men have much in common on social, aboriginal and environmental
policies, despite differences on free-trade, the U.S.-led war on Iraq
and whether Canada should join Washington’s missile defence system.
Still, the betting is strong Mr. Orchard will stay on the ballot as long
as he can. After all, he refused to quit the ballot in 1998 contest
after finishing a distant third to Joe Clark, thereby forcing a second
ballot.
"His people are not going to go elsewhere," said Heather MacIvor, a
political analyst at the University of Windsor. "They are there to put
their guy over the top. If he doesn’t go over the top, they are going to
start wandering out."
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