If you take John Crosbie’s version at face value, the Conservative Party rejected his son Ches as a candidate for the party in Avalon because of the intervention of David Wells.
Wells, the son of retired justice Robert Wells, is a senator from Newfoundland and Labrador. He is also an influential Conservative, the sort of fellow who normally goes about his business largely out of the public spotlight. .
Thanks to Crosbie, Wells is in the public eye. According to Crosbie, Wells didn’t “want Ches to be elected as an MP in the district of Avalon or any federal district because he would be too independent-minded and [Wells] wouldn't be in control as he has been now for a couple of years of most of the transactions between Newfoundland and the federal government.”
What the venerable Conservative was doing with that accusation was telling us less about the specific events that led to Ches’ rejection and more about a bigger story behind the scenes in Conservative politics.
