ONTARIO TORY LEADER TAKING HEAT OVER PARTY'S VETTING PROCESS
Dec 05, 2016
By Bob Komsic
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Leader Patrick Brown concedes some would-be Progressive Conservative candidates for the 2018 provincial election are not cutting it.
(Steve Russell / Toronto Star)
Some rejected candidates are complaining about the nomination process, including Derek Duval.
He claims he didn’t get the nod in Glengarry-Prescott-Russell after party officials didn’t like a video he’d posted and that Brown tried to catch him by surprise by moving up the date for the nomination meting because the party wanted someone else as its candidate.
But Brown says it had nothing to do with the video, adding it’s the party’s right to vet candidates to make sure there’s nothing that would embarrass the Tory brand.
The party had said nominations for 2018 would start next month, but Brown says that was moved up because he wants all candidates in place by the end of 2017, and that means doing ten nominations a month for the next year.
The Liberals plan to start nominations ‘soon’ and the NDP’s expected to begin the process next month.