Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak delivers his concession speech at his election-night headquarters in Niagara Falls on Oct. 6, 2011.MIKE CASSESE/Reuters
My mother, borrowing from John Dewey, always says patience is a virtue. Possess it if you can. Seldom found in women, never in a man. To which I might add a large swath of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario.
It is now vital for Ontario Tories to stay cool and patient. Many need to restrain that inner conservative cannibalistic tendency to eat their own. Tim Hudak and his team have taken some important steps on the road back to power despite not winning the last week's election.
They held a tough, wily opponent to a limited mandate. Say what you will about Dalton McGuinty, but he is a good politician and knows his audience well. You don't win power three times from a lack of skill. Mr. McGuinty has made bland a valuable political commodity in Ontario. He also showed his wisdom by borrowing winning strategies from other successful leaders like Stephen Harper. Winners do that. They pay attention to what works no matter where it originates.
But Mr. Hudak himself is not without success. Yes he lost Election 2011 and mistakes were made as they always are in campaigns, but he did manage to hold his opponent to a minority government. Not even Mr. McGuinty could do that to Mike Harris in 1999. The Premier has done pretty well for himself since. Speaking of Mr. Harris, he and Mr. Harper also lost their first elections as party leaders. They studied, as Tim Hudak will undoubtedly do, what went wrong and what went right from their respective campaigns. They then applied what they learned, as Mr. McGuinty did, to winning efforts there after.
As PC Party members in Ontario assess the 2011 campaign they need to keep perspective. They need to resist the urge to turf the leader and pulverize his team as occurred after the 2003 and 2007 election defeats. This leader and his team delivered a better performance in this election than others did in the last two. Numbers like seat count and most importantly holding the Liberals to a minority tell us it was an improved performance.
A popular narrative developed in the months leading up to the vote that it was Tim Hudak's race to lose. This myth largely took root because of a variety of polls showed the Tories with a healthy lead over the Liberals. But that is a bit like making the assumption that playing fantasy football is the same as lacing it up for the Grey Cup or Super Bowl. It discounts the ability of your real opponent – something provincial Tories have constantly done to Mr. McGuinty, only to be proven wrong. It also fails to capture the immediate, tenuous nature of the times, the economic strife in Europe and a national trend to see incumbents as the best stewards of our immediate future. Never mind the great blocking Liberals got from the "Working Families Coalition."
Ontario Tories should hold Tim Hudak and his team to account. They would expect and demand nothing less. A proper in-depth critique will only make them better. However, lynching them only benefits their opponents. Be smart, Ontario Tories, and restrain that blood lust.