Poilievre to face leadership review in January
Conservative Party members will vote in January on whether Pierre Poilievre should remain as leader after his party failed to win April's election.
The vote will take place in Calgary, the party's national council determined during a meeting Saturday, three sources told The Globe and Mail.
Some within the Conservative Party were suggesting a March convention, but two of the sources told The Globe that Mr. Poilievre wanted to have the leadership vote sooner. No firm date for the vote has been established, but the party is targeting the last week in January for the event.
Calgary was chosen because it could accommodate the event, the sources said.
The Globe is not identifying the sources as they were not authorized to publicly discuss national council decisions.
A spokesperson for the Conservative Party declined to comment.
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Throughout 2024, Mr. Poilievre's party seemed certain to win the election scheduled for October, 2025.
Polls suggested they had a double-digit lead over the governing Liberals, numbers linked both to Mr. Poilievre's economic focus and widespread discontent with then-Liberal leader and prime minister Justin Trudeau.
After the election of Donald Trump last November, the ground began to shift as the U.S. President imposed a range of tariffs on Canada and mused about the country becoming the 51st state.
The dispute set off a surge of nationalist fervour, and support for the Liberals began to inch up as the question for Canadians became who was best to go up against Mr. Trump.
Then, Mr. Trudeau resigned, and former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney became prime minister, dissolved Parliament and called an election.
He led the Liberals to a fourth-term victory, albeit another minority. Mr. Poilievre's party picked up more seats in the April 28 vote than they held in the last Parliament and increased their share of the popular vote.
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The Conservative Party's constitution states that at the first national convention after an election the party doesn't win – if the leader hasn't resigned – 'the delegates will vote by secret ballot if they wish to engage the leadership selection process.'
Mr. Poilievre also lost his seat in the April election.
He is expected to run in the Alberta riding of Battle River-Crowfoot.
Mr. Carney has said he will call a by-election as soon as is feasible.
Though the Conservatives have failed to win the past four elections, this will be the party's first leadership review since 2004, when then-leader Stephen Harper won handily.
He went on to win government for the Conservatives in the 2006, 2008 and 2011 elections and then resigned after his defeat in 2015.
Neither of his replacements – Andrew Scheer and Erin O'Toole – remained in their positions long enough after the 2019 and 2021 elections to face party membership.
Some Tories say the collapse of the NDP vote is the reason they failed to defeat the Liberals this year. Others have said the campaign didn't adjust when it became clear the stakes were changing.
'We didn't pivot quickly enough,' Conservative MP Brad Vis told the podcast Bigger Than Me earlier this month.
'We were rightfully focused on cost-of-living issues, on changes that we need to see in the Criminal Code, but we didn't speak enough about the challenges that Donald Trump raised before and during the election in a quick enough manner that Canadians thought we were the best party to govern the country.'
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