While only Anders knows what he’ll say next, others are asking what the veteran Calgary West MP’s latest controversial pronouncements will mean for his political future.
Just days after his comments about Layton, Anders is again drawing fire — this time, for circulating a petition opposing a bill extending legal protections to transgendered people.
Anders has been elected to Parliament six times since 1997 and survived nomination challenges from within his own party — most recently fending off Premier Alison Redford prior to her entry in provincial politics.
Alan Moon, a former member of the Calgary West Conservative riding association, said he hopes there will be further nomination challenges to Anders.
Moon said he pushed for open nomination contests in the past, but the party discouraged challenges to sitting MPs when it was a minority government.
“They made it clear to me they couldn’t make exceptions for one riding, and that because of a minority Parliament, they didn’t want people spending their time trying to be renominated,” he said.
As it stands now, Moon said he didn’t think Anders’ comments about Layton will have any immediate impact on the MP’s standing in the riding.
“There may be some people there who get upset, but (the riding association) tend to be people who are very, very loyal to Anders — to a silly point, in my view,” he said.
However, Moon added Anders may be placing himself on less secure footing with his party, beyond the loyalists in his own riding association.
“He’s not helpful, in my view, with the Conservative party being seen as a more middle-of-the-road party. I think he’s seen more as a silly extremist,” he said.
After Anders’ remarks about Layton, Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s office issued a statement distancing the PM from Anders’ comments.
At a time when caucus discipline is strictly enforced by most parties, having an MP who strays from the party line isn’t totally unwelcome, said University of Calgary political scientist Melanee Thomas.
“The problem with Anders is every time he goes off-script, is actually appalling,” she said.
Thomas cited Anders’ petition against the transgender bill as the most recent, egregious, example.
The bill, sponsored by B.C. NDP member Randall Garrison, calls for including gender identity in the Criminal Code’s hate crimes section and extending protection to transgendered people under the Canadian Human Rights Act.
Anders’ petition refers to the legislation as the “bathroom bill” and said it endangers children by giving male-to-female transsexuals access to women’s public washrooms.
“It’s so profoundly disrespectful,” Thomas said, adding Anders totally misrepresented the bill’s purpose of protecting transgendered people by reducing it to a “bathroom bill.”
Even though Anders has remained safe within his riding, Thomas said the latest episode may be enough to have others in the party wondering about his continued place in the government caucus.
“You’d think there would be somebody behind closed doors who’d be saying, ‘Come on!’” she said.
But to one former Calgary MP and colleague of Anders, the question should be left up to the voters of Calgary West.
“Not everything that Rob does I would say I support, but I also recognize the fact he has the right to his opinion,” said Art Hanger, who sat in the Reform and Conservative caucuses with Anders prior to retiring from politics in 2008.
“The ultimate judge is the electorate.”
Original Article
Source: calgary herald
Author: Jason van Rassel
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