Reform Party relic’s nomination feud points to parties’ problem of new blood

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Rob Anders is only 41, but he's kind of a rough relic in Calgary's Conservative politics. He's a walking-talking old-style Reform Party guy in a city that's changed around him.

The veteran MP faces a challenge to keep his party's nomination, again. You can guess that plenty of folks in the Conservative Party would be happy to see him ousted. His eruptions, from objecting to Nelson Mandela's honorary Canadian citizenship to dismissing Canadian Forces veterans as NDP hacks, have caused embarrassment.

He's something of an endangered species after 17 years in office, a federal Conservative who still lives the West-wants-in, blunt-talking, uncompromising social- and fiscal-conservative Reform Party. Calgary was the core of that movement, but its voters are relatively young, and the city has grown wealthier and more cosmopolitan. And his party is more buttoned-down.

Mr. Anders is also a symbol of an uncomfortable problem political parties will face this year, especially the Conservatives and the NDP, in nomination races before the 2015 election. There'll be threats to sitting MPs that cause squabbles inside the party. And for party leaderships, there's another problem: it's hard to dislodge veteran MPs to bring in new blood.

On this score, Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is lucky that his party has only 36 seats. He can try to recruit new star candidates to run in open ridings that polls now suggest they'd have a good chance of winning.

But the NDP's Thomas Mulcair faces a headache in Quebec, where he'd probably like to see some of the surprise MPs elected in 2011 replaced with solid figures to boost the argument his party is ready to govern. It's not easy to get incumbents to make way, especially if they think they can be re-elected. They have an advantage in lining up party members in their own riding.

For the Tories, Mr. Anders sits on prime political property. He's the MP for Calgary West, and plans to run in the new riding of Calgary Signal Hill, and Conservatives don't get beaten there. The party's nominee becomes the MP. That's one reason he's been challenged repeatedly for the nomination, by Alison Redford long before she became Alberta's premier, and by others who thought, mistakenly, they could oust him. Now it's Ron Liepert, a former Alberta finance minister, who's lining up a shot.

The Conservatives, too, who are starting to suffer from the perception their government is growing long in the tooth, will want some new blood in the next election. That job is easier because there will be 30 new ridings after redistribution, including six in Alberta. But there will be demand for winnable seats. And seeing Mr. Anders dislodged would make some headaches go away.

It seems like that would be easy. David McKenzie, the Calgary lawyer who has mounted a website dedicated to beating Mr. Anders, was asked by a CBC interviewer what the MP has done wrong. The straight-faced reply began with the fact that Mr. Anders "has had trouble staying awake in the House of Commons." He added that "when he finds himself in the media, it's generally not for a good reason."

Mr. Anders is an odd kind of a Jekyll and Hyde. He doesn't seek out the media spotlight, but sporadically finds himself in its glare. He does take some serious policy positions, but even his Tory colleagues often write him off as loopy. He was an early Stephen Harper supporter, and pledges loyalty, but has taken issue with him – like when he opposed Chinese oil-sands investment back when Mr. Harper was declaring it welcome. He took over Mr. Harper's riding in 1997, but Mr. Harper has since rued Mr. Anders's eruptions.

But Mr. Anders's blunt, unapologetic style and rock-ribbed conservatism has retained the backing of solid numbers of Reform-minded Conservative Party members in his riding. That's enabled him to beat back nomination challenges so far, even though he doesn't work the rounds of events in Calgary, like most politicians do, just to press the flesh. Even in election campaigns, he knocks only on the doors of supporters, according to one Tory.

And that's how he's approached the current campaign to oust him: It's Red Tories, not real blue Conservatives, trying to get him, he's said. They'll recruit Liberal and New Democrats to help, he charges. Those who aren't with him aren't real Conservatives.

But some who know Conservative politics in the riding think he's flirting with danger now. His core supporters are older, and most younger voters in the riding don't remember the old Reform zeal, or its style. The riding is one of the country's wealthiest, with oil-industry employees from all over the world. It's changed more than he has. It has the hallmarks of a messy fight over prime political turf.

Campbell Clark is The Globe's chief political writer.