Lord preaches party unity before N.B. Tory leadership vote

On the eve of the Progressive Conservative Party electing its next leader, former New Brunswick premier Bernard Lord urged all party members to leave the convention united if they hope to form government in 2010.

More than 6,100 Conservatives are registered to vote on Saturday afternoon across New Brunswick in a race that features David Alward, a former agriculture minister, and Robert MacLeod, a former party president and business executive.

Lord, who served as party leader from 1997 until stepping down shortly after his government's electoral defeat in September 2006, shied away from offering any of the candidates specific advice, but he stressed the need for party unity before a packed hall of party faithful.

"I told [Alward and MacLeod] to unite and work together and let's put New Brunswick back on the right track," Lord said.

The Conservatives will use a one-member-one-vote system for electing their leader, which means there will be a central location established in Fredericton, along with four satellite polling stations scattered around the province. Both the Alward and MacLeod camps were working overtime Friday night and into Saturday to rev up their electoral machines.

"They key tomorrow will be to get the vote out. The leader who gets the vote out will win," said Lord, who was also elected by the same method in 1997.

Both the candidates are taking their former leader's advice very seriously. There are 6,170 delegates registered to vote on Saturday and Kevin Price, the party's executive director, said the two sides have signed up 2,700 members just in the past three months. Although neither team is willing to divulge their internal delegates counts, there does seem to be some unanimity.

"There is one thing that David and I agree onthis thing is a real horse race," MacLeod said. "It is going to be close. Everybody has an idea of what the numbers are, and it is going to be close. It will all be about getting the numbers out."

Alward said he is bringing the same grassroots philosophy to delivering his campaign delegates as he would bring to government.

Alward campaign decentralized

"If it is too centralized, then I don't think it is going to be too effective," he said. "So our plan is we've got a decentralized plan with each region, each of our workers working in their own area and we have an overall co-ordination to help them."

Originally, the party had intended to use the Friday night gala to be a tribute to Lord and his time as the party leader.

That plan was scratched after the federal election was called, so instead Lord used his opportunity to address the convention delegates to focus on getting the party back to power. He even used some self-deprecating humour, poking fun at the reputation he gained in government for having a penchant for multi-point plans.

So Lord closed his speech offering a five-point plan to return to power with each building block aimed at fostering party unity. He told reporters before his speech that coming together after this convention would be easier than other leadership battles.

"It's one of the cleanest races, with very little animosity you can sense between candidates, that I've ever seen," Lord said. "Maybe the fact there was a federal election during the middle of the campaign that allowed the teams to just do their work, go out and sign up members, talk to the membership directly. There was less confrontation."

The winner will replace current interim party leader Jeannot Volpe, who has served since Lord stepped away from politics. The current standings in the legislature are 32 Liberals, 22 Conservatives, and one vacancy that will be filled in a Nov. 3 byelection.