Garth Turner can’t sit in the House of Commons as a Conservative. But rather than be an independent, might he ask if he could sit as a member of the Green Party? It will be up that party’s leader Elizabeth May to make that call and we may yet hear from her later today on that issue. On his blog (which, presumably from the traffic load is largely inaccessible right now) Garth has blogged a lot about environmental issues and, though many think that the Green Party and the NDP are interchangeable, many Green members might describe themselves as Progressive Conservatives without the social baggage.
Jim Harris, the leader prior to May, was, himself a former Tory, and the party has at times favoured a free-market approach to environmental issues.
For the Greens, it would be huge bonus to have an MP in the House. Why?
- In the last election, only leaders of parties with sitting MPs were invited to take part in nationally televised leaders’ debates.
- Because her party has an MP in the House, party leader Elizabeth May would be afforded some of the privileges of other leaders in the House of Commons, namely, the opportunity to scrum, after Question Period, in the same place and same time as other party leaders.
- May would, presumably, have some ability to direct or advise how Garth should spend the money he gets from the House of Commons to run his MPs office.
Garth himself has a news conference scheduled for 5 pm Ottawa time and I’ll bet you might be able to catch it live on CTV Newsnet.
Thanks for the heads-up!
Hell yeah…if his constituents want him to.
Tobey VanRoon
David,
I respect your reporting, but do you really think it's fair to call social conservatives a “bagage” on the CPC?
Respectfully submitted for your consideration.
Hi Kasra — I hear what you're saying and perhaps I should have been more specific: I've heard Green Party members use that phrase and I repeated or reported the phrase “Conservatives without the social agenda baggage” to characterize what they feel is an overall or general policy difference with the CPC.
Thanks David. I appreciate your note.