I have a crazy theory that if the Tories want to win an election ever again they’re going to need to un-unite the right and splinter into a true blue party that runs in the west and a progressive conservative party for the east and then try to govern as a coalition. Because frankly I don’t think O’Toole would have won this election! He lost against Trudeau who had at best middling popularity in 2021 — I feel like people now certainly like Carney more than they liked Trudeau then.
Yeah this could be real. The problem for them if they split is that they then get to be even more polarized than they already are. Like the cuckoos in Alberta will go full maple MAGA and then the Jean Charest-esque party (liberal-lite, as Maxime Bernier calls them, not incorrectly) won’t want to work with them.
Perhaps you’re right about O’Toole. I just view him as an ideological ally of Carney so I imagine he has similar appeal, and I’m not sure the Liberal party baggage helped Carney (tho it’s true that Canadians flock to the Liberals whenever anything goes awry).
I’m deeply skeptical that this a) will be seriously attempted or b) will actually be that successful. The 1993-2004 reform/alliance party era probably still sticks relatively sharpely in the mind of many in conservative leadership where they failed to achieve anything close to a governing coalition.
The issue with the conservative party is not that they alienate too many moderate Ontarian voters in places like the 905 belt (they actually made huge inrounds with this specific demographic in this election). They already have carved out the right path to victory in suburban Ontario, rural ridings and western provinces - trying to flip seats in liberal strongholds of Toronto center and Montreal island is an uphill battle that I don’t see them winning no matter how much they attempt to pander to moderates.
I think you're right. Perhaps it's not hard-core Western conservatism that alienates voters but rather Poilievre's distinct style. After all, Harper was pretty darn conservative.
Also it seems like the Tories' big issue is not alienating moderate voters but rather scaring the crap out of New Democrats and Quebeckers, who then vote en masse for the Liberals.
That is sort of a unique phenomenon of this election; the NDP and Bloc had a decently strong performance in 2019 and 2021. Stephen Harper was strongly hated in Quebec but still managed to form government (and win a majority largely due to the collapse of the Liberals). I think we should be cautious to not too hastely generalize trends based on a single, rather unique, election
I feel like the Tories will never attempt this for a lot of reasons you state but I actually do think alienating moderates in more urban areas (e.g some of the further north/west parts of the GTA, but maybe even more central) is something that I could see being fixed by splitting up. Maybe my exposure to these things is rooted in anecdotal evidence rather than facts but the Tories are already relatively popular with young people and I think a lot of the middle aged/older holdouts in these areas are people that probably skew fiscally conservative but are worried if the Tories ever get elected it’ll be wacky MPs from the west that end up driving the policy bus, so to speak.
Sure, some of the party’s failure might be attributable to Poilievre being unlikeable, and there were a bunch of gaffes that went further than just the Trump issue (the golf ad…), but I don’t think anyone actually particularly like Harper either.
I think it may be motivated more by a commitment to generosity in politics, a kind of nothing-below-the-belt partisanship. But you may be ultimately right that this harms the Tories, since they would do better to pick a less noxious leader.
Also Carney surely realizes that this reflects well on him since everyone knows Poilievre would not do the same if their roles were swapped.
I have a crazy theory that if the Tories want to win an election ever again they’re going to need to un-unite the right and splinter into a true blue party that runs in the west and a progressive conservative party for the east and then try to govern as a coalition. Because frankly I don’t think O’Toole would have won this election! He lost against Trudeau who had at best middling popularity in 2021 — I feel like people now certainly like Carney more than they liked Trudeau then.
Yeah this could be real. The problem for them if they split is that they then get to be even more polarized than they already are. Like the cuckoos in Alberta will go full maple MAGA and then the Jean Charest-esque party (liberal-lite, as Maxime Bernier calls them, not incorrectly) won’t want to work with them.
Perhaps you’re right about O’Toole. I just view him as an ideological ally of Carney so I imagine he has similar appeal, and I’m not sure the Liberal party baggage helped Carney (tho it’s true that Canadians flock to the Liberals whenever anything goes awry).
I’m deeply skeptical that this a) will be seriously attempted or b) will actually be that successful. The 1993-2004 reform/alliance party era probably still sticks relatively sharpely in the mind of many in conservative leadership where they failed to achieve anything close to a governing coalition.
The issue with the conservative party is not that they alienate too many moderate Ontarian voters in places like the 905 belt (they actually made huge inrounds with this specific demographic in this election). They already have carved out the right path to victory in suburban Ontario, rural ridings and western provinces - trying to flip seats in liberal strongholds of Toronto center and Montreal island is an uphill battle that I don’t see them winning no matter how much they attempt to pander to moderates.
I think you're right. Perhaps it's not hard-core Western conservatism that alienates voters but rather Poilievre's distinct style. After all, Harper was pretty darn conservative.
Also it seems like the Tories' big issue is not alienating moderate voters but rather scaring the crap out of New Democrats and Quebeckers, who then vote en masse for the Liberals.
That is sort of a unique phenomenon of this election; the NDP and Bloc had a decently strong performance in 2019 and 2021. Stephen Harper was strongly hated in Quebec but still managed to form government (and win a majority largely due to the collapse of the Liberals). I think we should be cautious to not too hastely generalize trends based on a single, rather unique, election
I feel like the Tories will never attempt this for a lot of reasons you state but I actually do think alienating moderates in more urban areas (e.g some of the further north/west parts of the GTA, but maybe even more central) is something that I could see being fixed by splitting up. Maybe my exposure to these things is rooted in anecdotal evidence rather than facts but the Tories are already relatively popular with young people and I think a lot of the middle aged/older holdouts in these areas are people that probably skew fiscally conservative but are worried if the Tories ever get elected it’ll be wacky MPs from the west that end up driving the policy bus, so to speak.
Sure, some of the party’s failure might be attributable to Poilievre being unlikeable, and there were a bunch of gaffes that went further than just the Trump issue (the golf ad…), but I don’t think anyone actually particularly like Harper either.
Predictions:
The members of the conservative party will trigger a leadership review: 95%
PP will either step down or be voted out: 80%
The conservative party will split: 65%
Looks like Carney is doing everything in his power to keep PP the leader of the conservatives: https://toronto.citynews.ca/2025/05/02/pierre-poilievre-mark-carney-byelection-call/
Probably a poisoned chalice gambit.
I think it may be motivated more by a commitment to generosity in politics, a kind of nothing-below-the-belt partisanship. But you may be ultimately right that this harms the Tories, since they would do better to pick a less noxious leader.
Also Carney surely realizes that this reflects well on him since everyone knows Poilievre would not do the same if their roles were swapped.
Keeping Pierre on after such a humiliating loss would be absurd. It would be like if the Dems ran Hillary again in 2020.
i hope you're right but i don't think we're done with PP. a lot of people thought 1/6 was a turning point but here we are.