Former prime minister Paul
Martin is heading back to private life, but “Martinites” are still in
the political business.
In
particular, they’re right back in the office of the new Liberal Leader
Stéphane Dion. This, at least, is the opinion of many Liberal MPs who
are increasingly nervous and resentful of this presence.
They’ve been
talking about it in the hallways, in private conversations during
Question Period, and at night, at Hy’s.
However, last
week the concern was made official during the weekly meeting of the
national Liberal caucus.
Two Ontario
MPs have complained about this presence and have asked the leader to
take action, others cheerleading behind them. In fact, for whoever wants
to listen, there are many more complaining about the presence of
Martinites in a less and less discreet way. At the end of the caucus
meeting, in his closing remarks, Dion did not address those concerns.
The issue of
the staffing of the Liberal Leader’s Office was also the topic of the
discussion during the meeting of the Quebec caucus, even though they
decided not to raise it, for now, at the national meeting last
Wednesday.
Until last
week, many were convinced that a federal election was around the corner
and hints of what the potential organization of each party would have
been were more evident. And, as far as the Liberal Party’s organization,
many MPs didn’t like what they saw.
In
particular, “the presence of many Martinites in the Leader’s Office was
noticed and not appreciated,” one Liberal MP, who didn’t want to be
identified, told
The Hill Times.
The only one
from the Martin organization who seems to be accepted is Mark Marrisen,
but he is now seen like a Trojan horse for a busload of former Paul
Martin’s advisers, who were thrown out of the window and are now coming
back through the front door. With Marrisen, those close to Dion are now
Brian Guest, Tim Murphy, Mike Robinson, Elly Alboim and the usual
“known” people behind the scenes.
Furthermore,
there has been some pressure on the Leader’s Office to clarify the
position of Scott Reid, former director of communications to former
prime minister Martin, since he’s been appearing regularly on CTV
NewsNet as a pundit who spars with Conservative Tim Powers. Some MPs
have asked Dion to make it clear to the network that Mr. Reid talks on
behalf of himself and not on behalf of the Liberal Party.
The
discontent goes beyond Ontario and Quebec and into the Maritimes, where
the decision to drop the Liberal candidate in the riding of Central Nova
and support the Green Party leader, Elizabeth May, has still not been
well-received by local Liberals.
Dion’s
intentions might be wellfounded: he wants to bring unity into a very
divided organization. However, his action is not having the desired
results and there might be, according to some Liberal strategists, two
explanations: one, the Martinites are not cooperating in this “peace
mission” and have started the “war” all over again against former
enemies; or two—and this is more serious—Dion’s action is just
premature.
The
resentments are still too deep to pretend that everything can go back to
normal with a snap of a finger, it takes time to have these
confrontational feelings fade away. In some cases, they will fade only
when certain individuals are erased from the political map of the
Liberal Party, meaning that it is not going to happen during Dion’s
leadership.
And this
confirms what many Liberal strategists were saying before the last
convention: the next real leader of the Liberal Party is going to be the
one after the next.
Most likely,
people like Frank McKenna and Brian Tobin, people with a lot of
political experience, sensed all of this last year at this time, and
gracefully declined the invitation. And here it comes, Dion.
