Manitoba Tories can learn from Poilievre’s mistake

AMONG the many errors made by Pierre Poilievre since becoming leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, his decision to attempt to persuade supporters of Max Bernier’s People’s Party and other right-wing groups to return to the Tory party — as opposed to adopting policies that would make the CPC more attractive to moderate Canadians — may be his greatest mistake.

By pandering to that small group of voters, Poilievre alienated a much larger group of centrist voters who would have otherwise considered voting for Conservative Party candidates in the 2025 federal election. Instead, those voters found the pro-Canadian, fiscally and socially moderate platform offered by Mark Carney’s Liberals to be more attractive, resulting in the humiliating defeat of the Conservatives.

The situation for the federal Tories has worsened since then, with the Liberals continuing to hold a large lead in public opinion polls and Carney leading Poilievre by almost 30 points on the “preferred prime minister” question. Those same polls also reveal that many Conservative voters approve of the Liberal government’s performance and prefer Carney over Poilievre as PM.

Despite all of those numbers — and all the evidence that pushing policies designed to attract the right-wing fringe of the political spectrum is making it all but impossible for the CPC to have any realistic hope of winning the next election — Poilievre continues to rely on the same caustic rhetoric that cost his party the 2025 election. If anything, he has turned up the volume lately, with his efforts increasingly resembling a political suicide mission.

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