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And former CBC TV host Ralph Benmergui is crafting Green party message in Toronto
By JEFF DAVIS
Published April 26, 2010
http://hilltimes.com/page/view/climbers-04-26-2010
With a healthy degree of nostalgia for his Reform yesteryears, Craig Cantin fondly recalls Preston Manning's tolerance for dissent. Besides knowing all staff in the Office of the Leader of the Opposition by their first names back in the late 1990s, Mr. Manning respected—even encouraged—staff to air out their views on the party's destiny.
By 2004 Stephen Harper was installed in the OLO, and the Canadian right was inching ever closer to power. Nevertheless, this former OLO staffer saw was unsettled that the right's tradition of populist democracy was fading fast.
"There's a big difference with the way Stephen managed things. Stephen has obviously been successful, but it's the ends to the means that I had problems with," Mr. Cantin said. "When Stephen wants something done, you do it, you don't question it. You question it, there could be consequences."
With this Reformer's disenfranchisement growing, Mr. Cantin had a change of heart after encountering some local Green Party activists near his hometown of Stittsville, Ont. He quickly perceived that the grassroots populism he adored was now strongest with the Greens, and ended up voting Green in the 2004 election, despite still being on Mr. Harper's payroll. When the Conservatives took power, he took his leave of the Conservatives.
The same rigidity and aversion to dissent that drove him from the Conservative camp, Mr. Cantin predicted, will be the Harper government's ultimate downfall.
"The machine is doing great, but as soon as there's a roadblock, because there's no dissenting voices you just crash into it," Mr. Cantin said. "I simply disagree with the way that works. I think it's better to have more people giving their opinions."
Fast forward to 2010, and this disenchanted Reformer has found a new home: as interim executive director of the federal Green Party.
Happy as a clam in his downtown Ottawa office, Mr. Cantin said he draws strength from the grassroots enthusiasm and responsiveness of the party, and, of course, its dedication to preserving the earth for our collective progeny.
Hired as a network administrator, Mr. Cantin served as one of the Greens three deputy national campaign managers in the 2008 general election. He says he's just "pinch-hitting" for now, and that a permanent executive director should be named at the party's national convention in Toronto in August.
Many were skeptical when Green Party Leader Elizabeth May asserted during the last election that her party could pull support from all parts of the political spectrum. But Mr. Cantin is living proof, as is Ralph Benmergui, a Canadian celebrity of some note.
Well-known across Canada after a long career with the CBC, during which he hosted Benmergui Live and Midday, he now works for private Toronto radio station JAZZ FM 91 where he hosts Benmergui in the Morning.
Mr. Benmergui said that after leaving the CBC a few years ago he had more freedom to become active in politics. He joined the NDP some two-and-a-half years ago, and began helping leader Jack Layton craft the party's messaging for the 2008 election.
Despite having been a NDP supporter for years, he said the experience left him with an ambivalence he couldn't put his finger on. Mr. Benmergui said he later realized the party was tired and badly in need of "a revolution."
Then one day he encountered a young Green Party activist, who put him in touch with Ms. May, who subsequently convinced him to attend the Green convention in Pictou , N.S. He said the passion and righteousness of the Greens overwhelmed his initial reservations about the party, and convinced him that only the Greens could provide a platform that would entice young voters.
"People really were excited about a new, 21st century politics," Mr. Benmergui said. "The bottom line is: if you can't breathe it doesn't matter if you're left or right."
Mr. Benmergui, who is now a paid employee of the Green Party in addition to his work with JAZZ FM, said he will not be running as a Green candidate. He said his skills are better used on communications, adding that he has already redesigned the party website, produced some TV ads, delivered speeches, and expanded the Green network in Toronto .
In the next election, Mr. Benmergui said the Greens will focus on securing their first seat, and not spread themselves too thin. Like all Greens, he underscored the need for proportional representation in elections, noting that if that system prevailed in the last election 22 Greens would occupy the House.
And Mr. Benmergui is not the only former CBC reporter to join the Greens. Also new to the party is Jacques Rivard, a pioneering environmental reporter who is now the party's deputy leader and top man in Montreal .
A former Hill journalist who has known Ms. May since she was an environmental adviser to the Mulroney government, Mr. Rivard plans to carry the Green banner in his home riding of Westmount-Ville Marie next election. He'll face off against incumbent Liberal Marc Garneau in a riding that is a Liberal stronghold in Montreal .
A man of bulletproof green credentials, Mr. Rivard is one of Quebec 's best-known environmental reporters, having covered the beat since the 1980s. On top of his cutting edge reporting on climate effects in the North for CNN, he has studied environmental law at Harvard and Tufts universities in Boston .
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