There are some awfully funny comments from Conservative candidate Loyola Hearn is the following story from The Telegram.
Ordinarily, the story would have focused on the poll by Corporate Research Associates (CRA) showing the Liberals with a commanding lead in in Atlantic Canada and in this province in the federal election. The story would also have drawn big attention to the fact that the CRA poll found that Prime Minister Paul Martin is the party leader preferred by most Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. Obviously, CRA didn't poll Liam O'Brien.
Anyway, the funny bits are the ones where Loyola Hearn wants us all to believe that the poll is crap - it isn't - and that the federal Conservatives have a shot at winning John Efford's old seat in Avalon.
It's funny because Loyola should be focused on winning his own seat rather than fretting over who is going to represent the riding in which he lives.
It's funny because when Loyola says Efford had a free ride previously, Hearn is actually the guy who gave it to him. When faced with a choice as to which part of his old riding he wanted to represent in Ottawa, the supposed Connie heavyweight opted to run in St. John's and Mount Pearl. He thought he'd have an easy ride of it, himself.
Reality proved starkly different.
Everyone else has marked his riding as being definitely in play, a swing seat, likely to turn over even, because Mr. Hearn's margin of victory last time was less than 9% of the vote. Some contend it was less than 5% but I'll stick to my new number.
It was the toughest political fight of Hearn's life and Hearn's less than generous comments in victory attest to how much the former Brian Peckford cabinet minister was pissed off.
Then, to make matters worse, Hearn got trapped in the spring Harper effort to defeat the government. Tons of e-mails poured in demanding Hearn vote in favour of the offshore deal and put partisan issues aside. "Put province before party" they demanded.
The Connie reply was to vote in favour of the bill containing the offshore deal, before they then voted to bring down the government on another motion.
Faced with the choice, Hearn picked Harper over Hamilton Avenue and his choice may continue to haunt him.
And the bruised politician started musing about taking up fishing and giving up the political racket. As he told CBC News, "[h]ow long more to you stay around? That's the point...Another year from now, I might decide that I might want to go trouting too, you know."
For the record, here is the full Telegram story by Jamie Baker.
I am taking the risk of reprinting from their website since there is no permanent link I can use and after a couple of days this story will vanish from the Internet.
Friday, December 2, 2005
Battleground Avalon
By JAMIE BAKER, The Telegram page 1, above the fold.
A new poll predicts the Liberals would sweep all seven ridings in Newfoundland and Labrador if an election were held today, but that isn't dashing any Conservative hopes, especially in Avalon, where the party is promising a changing of the guard.
St. John'’s South-Mount Pearl Conservative incumbent Loyola Hearn dismisses the poll and says Avalon, the riding held by retiring Liberal cabinet minister John Efford, is ripe for the picking.
The three Liberal nominees for the riding are former provincial cabinet minister Art Reid, lawyer Bill Morrow and Avondale deputy mayor Bern Hickey. Hearn said he expects his party will announce its candidate -— it is rumoured provincial Independent PC MHA Fabian Manning is among those interested -— within a matter of days.
Targeted campaign
The riding is among the 20 across Canada targeted by the Conservatives as potentially winnable.
"We will win that riding," Hearn predicted, adding he believes even Efford could have been toppled at the height of his popularity had the challenges been more substantial.
"Efford had a free ride," he said.
"When he ran in the byelection, we ran Michelle Brazil against him, with no organization, nothing and she got 20-odd per cent of the vote. The last time we had a guy come into the campaign, again, with no organization, no money, he had never been involved in anything public like that — and he took 31 per cent of the vote."
"Imagine what a well-known person could have done,— and Efford was riding high at the time."
Avalon's Liberal riding president Stephen Crocker isn't convinced voters will act against the party out of displeasure over Efford's recent political troubles, which began in the heat of the Atlantic Accord battle.
In fact, Crocker is convinced they will look to Efford's list of federal accomplishments as a sign of what the party can do -— and has done -— for the riding.
"I don't think Mr. Efford's legacy was totally negative -— Mr. Efford did a lot of good stuff in his time in politics and I think that is what people will remember, "Crocker said. "The key to winning Avalon, obviously, is a strong campaign and getting the message out to people on where the party stands, where it has been and where it is going.”
If the recent poll conducted by Corporate Research Associates Inc. is to be believed, where the Liberals are going is, apparently, up.
Besides taking all seven seats in this province, the poll has the Liberals taking 25 of 32 seats in Atlantic Canada -— five seats are forecasted for the Conservatives and two for the NDP.
The numbers also show if the election were held now, 46 per cent of Atlantic Canadians said they would vote for the Liberals, 27 per cent Conservative, 18 per cent NDP, 16 per cent were undecided, and 10 per cent had no response or didn'‚’t plan to vote.
Province more Liberal: poll
In Newfoundland, the numbers were even more Liberal, with 50 per cent preferring the Liberals, 29 per cent Conservative and 10 per cent NDP with 19 per cent undecided ‚— those numbers are almost exactly the same as they were in a May 2004 poll conducted in this province prior to the last federal election.
Fifty-one per cent of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians also said they were very or mostly satisfied with the performance of the Martin government, up six per cent from May 2004; 39 per cent were either mostly or completely dissatisfied.
As far as leadership is concerned, 41 per cent of Atlantic Canadians prefer Paul Martin as prime minister compared to just 19 per cent for Stephen Harper and 17 per cent for Jack Layton.
In Newfoundland and Labrador, Martin attracted 44 per cent preference compared to 20 and 15 per cent respectively for Harper and Layton.
"That doesn't surprise me when you look at Mr. Harper's track record and where he stands on health care and so on," Crocker said. "I think health care is going to be a big issue in Avalon, and we all know Stephen Harper's record of supporting two-tier health care.”
With mostly rural areas in the riding, Hearn said attracting the right candidate would also be huge for any party's hopes of victory in ridings east of Montreal.
Unlike more urban areas where voters rarely know the candidate and vote based largely on policies and platforms, Hearn said the candidate is also very important when it comes to campaigning in Atlantic Canada.
"In Atlantic Canada, everybody knows who you are and if they don't know who you are, you'll be hard pressed to get the votes," Hearn observed. "That's why you need reasonably good candidates, someone who is known and well respected. It is very seldom you will see a well established individual doing poorly in an election."
"Voters want solid representation, somebody they know they can trust and somebody they know will do the work for them in Ottawa. Check the public record, Hansard, even watch CPAC, and you'll have an idea who's doing what for the province -— we have not been well-represented by a number of Liberals."”
While Hearn sees Avalon, his own district and St. John's East as potential winners for his party, the big battles, he said, will be getting the right people to take on a couple of other longtime Liberal incumbents Bill Matthews and Gerry Byrne.
"The challenge is really out there in Humber-St. Barbe-Baie Verte and Random-Burin-St. George's to have some good solid people come forward," Hearn said. "We have a great chance of forming government, and an extra seat or two in Newfoundland could be all it takes."
jbaker@thetelegram.com