T1B

Earlier this year, when a leaked e-mail revealed the PMO was putting cabinet ministers on a short leash to keep the government on message, many in Ottawa suggested the PMO was being too paranoid and controlling.

This week, the reason for Prime Minister Stephen Harper's short leash was on full display as a relatively low-profile backbench MP captured headlines for comments he made about the Supreme Court and a leak of details from the auditor general's upcoming report was front page news.

If Tory strategists hold a Friday meeting to review how they perform each week, it would be hard for them to conclude, "We had a good week. We upset both the chief justice of the Supreme Court and the auditor general."

The well-run ship that was the Conservative government showed holes and leaks this week for the first time in its relatively short three month life.

On Wednesday afternoon, Tory MP Maurice Vellacott issued a lengthy statement and announced somewhere on page two that he was stepping down as head of the aboriginal affairs committee.

Vellacott really had no choice.

Over the weekend, Vellacott was among a number of Conservative MPs, including Harper himself, who dropped by a weekend conference for a conservative group known as the Civitas Society in Kanata.

While most people in Kanata over the weekend were concerned about the fate of the Ottawa Senators, people like Vellacott at the Civitas Society were holed up in hotel conference rooms discussing issues such as property rights, the moral justification of war and judicial activism.

Civitas meetings are closed to the media and all events are off-record to allow a free and open discussion. So what Vellacott heard over the weekend is not known.

Republican Pollster Coaching Conservative Party

May 09, 2006


Liberal MP Mark Holland took Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Conservative government to task yesterday over recent meetings with U.S. Republican pollster Frank Luntz at a conference organized by a radical right wing group.

“Since the Prime Minister muzzles his MPs and hides from the press, is the Civitas Society where we need to look to uncover the truth about this government’s real agenda?” Holland asked in the House of Commons Monday.


Mr. Luntz, a republican strategist who helped draft Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America, spoke in Ottawa at the 10th Annual Conference of the Civitas Society, a radical right-wing group closely linked to the Reform/Alliance wing of the Conservative Party of Canada.


Mr. Harper had a private meeting and posed for pictures with Luntz. Mr. Harper’s Chief of Staff Ian Brodie, President of the Treasury Board John Baird, and key advisor and former national campaign chair Tom Flanagan were also in attendance.


Mr. Luntz has made a career of polarizing electorates in the name of short-term political benefit. Mr. Luntz outlined a plan for the Conservative Party that focuses on code wording and imagery, urging Conservatives to focus on specific differences in wording between the two parties instead of the large policy challenges confronting Canada in the 21st Century.

Canada’s favorite sport was also a key element of Mr. Luntz’s strategy. “If there is some way to link hockey to what you all do, I would try to do it,” he said in his speech.


Treasury Board President John Baird also gave a speech at the Civitas Society event entitled, “The Way Forward for Conservatives.”


Are we to assume that Mr. Baird’s way forward involves the same practices that Mr. Luntz advocates for his Republican clients?


Many Liberals across the country have expressed deep concern over the heavy-handed approach the current Prime Minister has taken to governing and how similar this approach has been to that of the Republican Party in the United States.


If the Prime Minister’s actions are being guided by strategists such as Mr. Luntz, the reason for these similarities is becoming abundantly clear.

The Civitas Society is a low-key, yet influential, Conservative group with close ties to Mr. Harper. In its last annual report filed with the government, Mr. Harper's chief of staff, Ian Brodie, is listed as a director and Mr. Brodie attended the group's conference yesterday. Tom Flanagan, a longtime friend of Mr. Harper and his campaign manager for the leadership, is a founder of the group and was also there.

Mr. Harper dropped by unannounced Friday for the opening reception, which featured a speech by federal Treasury Board President John Baird titled "The Way Forward for Conservatives."

Among the Conservative MPs spotted at the conference were Scott Reid and Maurice Vellacott. MP Garry Breitkreuz, a vocal opponent of the gun registry, was a panelist in a session on property rights, with a speech titled "Why Property Rights Should be Constitutionally Protected in Canada."

Mr. Luntz's company website describes him as the pollster of record for the Republican's Contract with America and credits him as being one of the key engineers of the 1994 Republican landslide. One of his strengths is in counselling politicians on how to sell their message to voters.

and a leak of details from the auditor general's upcoming report was front page news.