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Maxime Bernier targets untapped voters with broader populist platform of People's Party

OTTAWA — Maxime Bernier insists the populist pillars of his young political party have nothing to do with opportunism and everything to do with ideology. And if someone were to call him an ideologue, he’d take it as a compliment.
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People's Party Leader Maxime Bernier speaks at an event in Hamilton, Ont., Sept. 29.

OTTAWA — Maxime Bernier insists the populist pillars of his young political party have nothing to do with opportunism and everything to do with ideology.

And if someone were to call him an ideologue, he’d take it as a compliment.

Bernier has constructed the People’s Party of Canada by meshing his long-known libertarian convictions with a collection of more recent, strong public stances on social issues.

He has raised eyebrows and triggered controversy defending positions far different from his opponents’, including calls to fight “mass immigration” and “extreme multiculturalism.”

He called teenage Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg “mentally unstable” on Twitter, a charge he later walked back.

The veteran politician has been using his year-old party to argue for, among other ideas, fences along parts of the U.S.-Canada frontier to stop the illegal entry of refugees, slashing immigration levels by more than half and rejecting climate-change “alarmism.”

Bernier had no clear public track record of advocating for these positions during more than a decade as a Conservative MP. Nor were they part of his platform a couple of years ago when he finished a close second in the party’s leadership race to Andrew Scheer.

For example, he called leadership rival Kellie Leitch a “karaoke version of Donald Trump” in a 2016 debate because of her pledges to crack down on immigration.

Bernier has since adopted Leitch’s controversial vow to screen newcomers with his own promise to introduce immigrant interviews designed to “assess the extent to which they align with Canadian values and societal norms.”

His newer public positions raise a question: are Canadians getting the real Maxime Bernier?

“It’s not based on a political calculation,” Bernier said in an interview with the Canadian Press earlier this month.

“It’s based on an ideology. And if some say that Maxime is an ideologue, well, for me I would take it as a compliment because most politicians today are at the mercy of opinion polls.”

Bernier insists there’s no specific attempt to attract social or fiscal conservatives with his new party. It’s simply putting forward policies good for all Canadians, he says.

The People’s Party was launched in September 2018, only a few weeks after Bernier’s bombshell break from the Scheer-led Conservatives. On his way out, he tore into his former leader and colleagues, calling them “too intellectually and morally corrupt to be reformed.” He said Scheer, as prime minister, would just lead a more moderate version of Justin Trudeau’s “disastrous” government.

At first, Bernier’s new party worried Conservatives. Rachel Curran, who was a director of policy for former prime minister Stephen Harper, wrote on Twitter at the time: “I hope Justin Trudeau and his cabinet colleagues are breaking out the champagne … Congratulations to @gmbutts — Gerald Butts, Trudeau’s principal secretary — & co. who have secured an easy win in 2019 despite a mostly terrible summer.”

It remains unclear if the People’s Party can hurt the Conservatives by drawing away votes on the right and whether it will be to able capture any seats of its own. Opinion polls have suggested the party could attract as much as four per cent of the popular vote.

Bernier argues there’s lots of potential for his party, particularly since more than 30 per cent of eligible voters did not cast ballots in 2015. With polls suggesting Canadians could elect a minority Parliament this month, he’s hoping his party can secure the influential balance-of-power position.

“At this moment, there is a certain momentum,” said Bernier, who intended to run candidates in all 338 ridings.

“There is a certain political clientele for a politician who says what needs to be said and who speaks the truth, in my opinion. And who doesn’t make any compromises.”

His smaller-government economic philosophy has been familiar to those who have followed his political career.

During his Conservative leadership bid — and now as leader of the People’s Party — he’s been pledging to balance the federal books within two years, to eliminate corporate welfare, such as government loans and grants, and to get rid of foreign development assistance. He’s also vowed to introduce corporate tax cuts and to phase out Canada’s supply-managed system for dairy, poultry and eggs, which he calls a “cartel.”

But at the helm of his own party, Bernier has also taken up some new views. In his 2016-17 leadership platform, for instance, he said Canada should accept 250,000 immigrants per year, down from 300,000 under the Trudeau government.

In comparison, the People’s Party platform for the 2019 election pledges to avoid putting too much financial burden on Canadians by cutting immigration to between 100,000 and 150,000 people a year.

“The primary aim of Canada’s immigration policy should be to economically benefit Canadians and Canada as a whole,” the People’s Party says in its platform. “It should not be used to forcibly change the cultural character and social fabric of our country.”