OTTAWA – Delegates at the Conservative Party’s policy convention have voted against confirming “climate change is real” and also against winning another election.
By a margin of 54 percent to 46, the Conservative rank and file rejected a policy proposal to support “innovation in green technologies” and to give the Conservative party a “hope in hell” of “forming government at some point.”
Party Leader Erin O’Toole urged party members to vote in favour of the motion, stating “look, if we deny climate change, the liberal media will unfairly paint us as a bunch of climate change deniers.”
But delegates like Mike Hanlon from Revelstoke were unconvinced: “Sorry to be “politically incorrect” or “unelectable” or whatever you want to call it, but conservatives aren’t interested in virtue signalling by being on the right side of a totally settled issue with life-and-death consequences. We’re not trying to win a popularity contest here.”
Delegate Sarah Cheeley voted in favour of the motion, saying “I think we could at least pretend to acknowledge climate change and then do nothing meaningful about it. It’s a winning Liberal strategy that could work for us, too.”
O’Toole stressed that the stakes couldn’t be higher: “If we fail to take bold steps on the environment, you’re going to have to look your grandchildren in the eye and tell them why I didn’t get to be Prime Minister.”
