Sask-premier warns ‘more of the same’ from Trudeau as PM announces Parliament reopens Dec. 5 

A new online poll conducted by the Canadian Press has shown that Andrew Scheer has less than 50 percent support from Canadians who self-identify as Conservatives, according to CKOM.

Just 48 percent of Conservative supporters say they want Andrew Scheer to continue as leader. 40 percent want him to resign, while 12 percent remain undecided.

This comes as another bad news story for the Conservative leader who will require a far greater majority in his leadership review in April of next year. The precedent in Candian politics is that leaders who undergo reviews should receive a much higher portion of the vote than just 50 percent. 

Stephan Harper, for example, won over 85% of the vote in his leadership review after his 2004 election loss. It has been broadly considered that 75 percent of the vote is the bare minimum for an incumbent leader to continue his tenure. 

The survey was conducted from Nov. 15-25 and over 3,000 Canadians participated. 

Recently, Andrew Scheer has received significant pressure from the Conservative base to resign. This criticism previously derived from the Red Tory faction of the party when Peter MacKay and Rona Ambrose criticized his leadership. 

Peter MacKay, for instance, declared that issues like abortion and immigration “hung round [Scheer’s] neck like a stinking albatross.” MacKay went on to say that this election was like “having an open net and missing the net.” 

Another prominent Conservative politician, Ed Fast, who served in Harper’s cabinet as the trade secretary, declined a position in Scheer’s cabinet, saying that the leader needed someone who “fully supports” his leadership. 

Soon after, the Globe and Mail reported that the social conservative wing of the party had begun to abandon Scheer. One former Conservative MP, Brad Trost, said in the article that “A lot of social conservatives have no interest whatsoever in backing Andrew Scheer.” 

Last week, Scheer suffered another setback after a third-party organization was created by a group of prominent figures within the Conservative movement. This group, Conservative Victory, is devoted entirely to the ousting of Scheer.

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe says adding nuclear power to his province’s energy mix while augmenting renewables and slashing coal-fired plants would reduce emissions caused by electricity generation to a net-zero by 2050.

“This is positive for Saskatchewan, it’s positive for Canada and it’s taking real action in addressing global climate change,” Moe told reporters on Sunday in Toronto, where premiers are gathering for policy meetings this week.

Alongside Ontario Premier Doug Ford and New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs, Moe said the trio inked a Memorandum-of-Understanding to support planning, development and “early-stage commercialization” of Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) in their jurisdictions.

“This technology has potential of creating high quality jobs and local economic development in communities where existing electricity transmission infrastructure already exists,” said Moe.

“Or in further or remote communities who currently rely on higher emissions power production methods.”

According to the National Energy Board, 84 percent of Saskatchewan’s electricity is generated burning coal and natural gas.

Conversely, 90 percent of Ontario’s electricity demands are met with zero carbon-emitting sources; nuclear (58 percent), hydro (22 percent) and approximately 10 percent via wind and solar.

New Brunswick’s energy palette is somewhere in between as the province still generates 40 percent of its electricity through burning coal and natural gas.

Small SLOWPOKE (safe low power critical experiment) reactors have been around for some time and are still used for research by the places like University of Alberta and McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario.

About the size of a cinder block and powerful enough to heat a bathtub of water, SLOWPOKES were built in the 1970s by Atomic Energy of Canada Limited – AECL tried to build more powerful versions, but these got little traction because natural gas was cheap.

While military submariner applications have been around for decades,–Russia recently unveiled a floating reactor to power the Siberian town of Pevek–mini-reactors or SMRs for commercial electricity in Canada have not been tried.

Canadian Nuclear Association president John Stewart told The Post Millennial in an interview back in July that regulatory hurdles would push the window for SMR deployment in Canada to at least a decade.

Steward did acknowledge that expanding nuclear power would likely happen first where the primary power source remains coal.

“You would want the new generators to go in exactly where those coal-fired generators are,” said Stewart.

“If you owned (coal-fired) plants like New Brunswick or Saskatchewan does, what you really don’t want to do is complicate the project by having to change the transmission structure.”

Conservative MP (Ontario, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill) and recently appointed CPC deputy leader Leona Alleslev caused outrage Saturday when she flippantly asked on CBC’s The House why no one was asking leaders about attending Saint Patrick’s Day parades, equating it to politicians not attending LGBTQ Pride parades.

“Have we asked anybody if they’ve marched in a Saint Patrick’s Day parade?” said Alleslev Saturday morning on the CBC politics program.

Shortly after the program aired, Alleslev apologized for equating Saint Patrick’s Day parades with Pride parades, which were started to push back against gay persecution and inequality.

Many critics on both sides of the political aisle argue Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer’s CPC lost crucial ridings in Ontario and other progressive metropolitan areas of the country because of his ambivalence on LGBTQ issues and his personal religious beliefs, which led to him being dogged by reporters throughout the election campaign with questions he evaded.

A large contingent of the CPC is also actively trying to get Scheer to step down as leader after the party failed to oust Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in October. They were quick to pounce on the latest blunder by his new deputy leader, who was still a Liberal MP until crossing the floor about a year ago.

Journalists were also questioning the judgement of the leadership of the party when they’re still having difficulty communicating unequivocal support for the LGBTQ community.

Scheer critics also questioned why he didn’t include CPC MP (Ontario, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry) Eric Duncan in his shadow cabinet, the first openly gay Conservative MP. Duncan was the former mayor of the township of North Dundas, with over eight years prior experience in politics. He also vocally defended Scheer during the 2019 election when the CPC leader was being attacked on LGBTQ issues. Since the election, Duncan has said the party needs to rethink its approach towards LGBTQ issues.

Meanwhile, party stalwarts launched a non-profit organization last week to raise money to depose Scheer from power.

Conservative Victory was created by Kory Teneycke, Doug Ford’s top election advisor and former director of communications for prime minister Stephen Harper, Jeff Ballingall—the founder of the Proud Network and the Chief Marketing Officer at The Post Millennial—and John Reynolds, who co-chaired the Stephen Harper’s 2006 election campaign.

Scheer loyalists in the party maintain that the CPC leader still holds the vast majority of support from his caucus and the uprising is just a small dissident group.

Scheer’s office did not respond to The Post Millennial‘s request for comment.

Conservative MP Ed Fast has rejected Andrew Scheer’s invitation to join his shadow cabinet as the leader needed someone who “fully supports” his leadership, according to the Globe and Mail. Fast is a prominent member of the Conservative caucus, having served in Prime Minister Harper’s cabinet. 

Ed Fast is a well-respected figure within the Conservative Party having served as the trade minister. Fast made his decision public only a few hours after Scheer’s cabinet announcement.

Speaking to the Globe and Mail, Fast said, “Mr. Scheer and I recently had a conversation about where I could fit into his shadow cabinet, and I expressed my desire not to be included at this time.”

Fast went on to say that “Mr. Scheer is entitled to surround himself with a team that fully supports his leadership.”

Fast’s comments were interpreted by many in the party as a rebuke of Scheer’s leadership and strategy during the election campaign.

Since Justin Trudeau’s re-election as PM, Scheer has faced increasing pressure over his decision to remain as leader. This pressure, originally coming from former Conservative politicians, has transitioned to disapproval from both the moderate and the social factions of the Conservative Party.

This week, a third-party organization was created by a group of prominent figures within the Conservative movement. This group, Conservative Victory, is devoted entirely to ousting Scheer.

Others in the party pushed back on the recent media reports, saying Scheer has overwhelming support from his caucus and pointing out he won the popular support.