Conservative leadership candidate Leslyn Lewis suggested Patrick Brown’s welcome to social conservatives may be shallow in an email she sent her supporters on Sunday..Lewis was quick to respond to Brown’s comments on CTV’s Question Period where he reminded viewers of his record as Ontario Progressive Conservative leader from 2015–2018..“There’s a place for all conservatives in the Conservative family and you’ll note that when I was leader of the Ontario Conservative party, there was a number of prominent social conservatives who got nominated,” Brown told CTV. “Certainly, you know, I value their place.”.In 2012, Brown voted in favour of Motion 312 which would have ordered a review on at what point in development life begins — conception or some point thereafter. .However, in the CTV interview, Brown said he believes in “freedom of choice” and would not revisit the abortion issue in a government formed under his leadership. When asked if he’d allow a free vote on a bill restricting rights to access to abortion within caucus, he said he respects the right of MPs to have free votes, but “expects” not to have to go there on that question..Lewis told her supporters by email that Brown his current tone was much different from what he wrote in his 2018 book, Takedown: The Political Assassination of Patrick Brown. Ironically, the book itself became a useful resource to take on Brown again, as she quoted the following excerpt:."I would say to Ford that the social conservatives are dinsoaurs who are becoming less and less relevant every single day. Ten years ago, they may have been a real force, but I believe that their influence is waning with every year that passes. They are people yelling at the sky. They have influence in a political party because they are organized. But they are few in number and they are out of sync with modern Ontario. And I don’t think that they represent conservatism of any stripe."."Conservatism is about getting government out of your business. So how does that work for social conservatives? We won’t tell you what to do, but we’re going to tell you what to do in your bedroom or whom to love? It’s so disingenuously hypocritical. Social conservatism is an oxymoron.".Lewis wrote, “I would encourage Mayor Brown to retract his comments fully, lest they become a stinking albatross for him in this leadership race” — clearly a reinvention of Peter McKay’s use of the same phrase against Andrew Scheer’s social conservatism..Lewis wanted clarity from her rivals on what they meant by giving room to social conservatives in the party. “Room in the Party ... to do what?” she asked..“If by ‘room in the party’, all you mean is that social conservatives are granted the right to vote for you, donate to your campaign, and volunteer for the CPC, while keeping their opinions to themselves, this is not true big tent party,” Lewis wrote..“We can't build a big tent of diverse people if we are afraid of discussing diverse ideas.”.Lewis pledged to allow all Conservative MPs to introduce private member’s bills of their choosing and for caucus members to vote with their conscience, whether socially conservative or “pro-choice and progressive.”.Brown emphasized in his CTV interview that the economy was his priority. In doing so, he said Pierre Poilievre’s claim that Canadians could opt out of inflation through cryptocurrency was “ludicrous” and that his call to fire Tiff Macklem as head of the Bank of Canada was “reckless.”.“Our focus will be on getting Canada back on its feet, growing our economy, creating jobs, and making Canada the destination of choice in the world for where you want to invest,” he said.
