Ignatieff leads after first ballot, but outcome still in question

MONTREAL – The results of the first ballot in the Liberal leadership race show front-runner Michael Ignatieff still has a tough uphill climb to win the prize.

Ignatieff remained out front with 29.3 per cent of the vote, almost exactly what he had based on the elected delegates he got in the super weekend of voting in September.

Bob Rae held his second-place slot, garnering 20.3 per cent of the vote and ending up with slightly less than a 10-point deficit against Ignatieff. The former Ontario premier remained slightly ahead of Stephane Dion and Gerard Kennedy, who remained in a virtual tie for third.

Ignatieff's tally was short of the more than 30 per cent his backers had been predicting, indicating he did not collect the support from ex-officio delegates he had been expecting.

The votes broke down this way: Ignatieff, 1,412 (29.3 per cent); Rae, 977 (20.3 per cent); Dion, 856 (17.8 per cent); Kennedy 854 (17.7 per cent) Ken Dryden; 238 (4.9 per cent); Joe Volpe, 156 (3.2 per cent); Scott Brison, 192 (4.1 per cent); Martha Hall Findlay, 130 (2.7 per cent).

In a major development Friday night, Volpe announced he is going to Rae on the second ballot. Some of his delegates were expected to follow, and a few, led by former MP Nick Discepola of Montreal, went to Ignatieff.

Second-ballot voting begins Saturday morning at 9 a.m. It represents the first round of voting during which most delegates will no longer be committed to a specific candidate.

Earlier Friday night, the Palais des congres was alive with a heady combination of excitement and nerves as the the contenders to lead the Liberal party made probably their most important pitch to voting delegates since the campaign opened eight months ago.

The candidates sang their own praises. They talked about their passion for liberalism and the Liberal party. They lashed out at what they described as the narrow ideological bent of Stephen Harper’s Conservatives.

And the top four in serious contention for the Liberal crown pleaded with delegates to vote for them as the next, best leader of the Liberal party.

In one of the first signs of movement on the floor, Volpe, who was running sixth, announced as soon as the speeches were over that he would throw his support to second-place Rae.

In a dramatic gesture, Volpe strode across the floor, embraced Rae, and the two joined hands in the air.

Ignatieff and Rae spoke last and pulled out all the stops to put lingering doubts about their fitness for the job to rest.

Ignatieff, who has spent most of his adult life living outside Canada, made an impassioned appeal for support in a speech devoted almost exclusively to painting the Liberal party as the hope and future of Canada.

“Tonight is the night the Liberal party begins again, to embrace a new agenda, an agenda of hope, and an agenda for all Canadians,” said Ignatieff, who is seen as facing a tough uphill battle to grow his strength as the balloting progresses.

He said that unlike the Conservatives the Liberals stand for compassion, generosity of spirit and national unity.

Harper is reshaping Canada into a country that is less progressive, less fair, less just and less equal, the former Harvard academic said.

“If we can become the party of hope in the land of hope, there is no party that can defeat us,” he said.

Rae, speaking without notes with a roving mike, told delegates he had the width and depth of experience in politics, public service and the private sector that is needed of a new leader. He admitted he made mistakes as premier of Ontario, but insisted he had learned his lessons.

The former New Democrat brought many delegates to their feet when he praised former prime minister Jean Chretien’s decision to keep Canada out of Iraq, possibly an indirect dig at Ignatieff’s early support for President Bush’s U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

Chretien was in the audience, along with other former leaders, John Turner and Paul Martin, who Rae also paid homage to.

Rae also reached out to some of his competitors, showering praise on Dryden for his work on child care and Dion and Brison for their work on the environment.

He blasted the Harper government as a narrow ideological entity, and said he was prepared to do the hard work as opposition leader to build a Liberal case for bringing it down.

Rae departed the stage after repeating Wilfrid Laurier’s famous slogan: “Canada first, Canada last, Canada always.”

With no candidate a shoo-in, Saturdayís voting promises a cliffhanger. Aside from Ignatieff and Rae, the others in the hunt are Kennedy and Dion.

The name of the game for quartet in the final hours is to try to steal delegates from other camps. Though most of the almost 5,000 registered voting delegates were committed to specific delegates on the first ballot, they are free agents after that.

Each of the delegates was escorted into the hall by their flag-waving, cheering supporters, gradually turning the setting into a sea of Liberal red.

The leading candidates stuck to their tried and tested themes, spicing up their words with partisan assaults on the Conservative government.

Kennedy, who was introduced by Justin Trudeau, portrayed himself as the one to lead the renewal of the party in the wake of its defeat in the January election.

“My friends, Mr.Harper is vulnerable, but he is not going to defeat himself,” he said of the Conservative prime minister. “We will defeat him by becoming the Liberal party that we need to be, no matter when the election is called.”

He also vowed to unite the party after a decade of division under Chretien and Martin.

There will be no “Kennedy Liberals, only Liberals” if he becomes leader, the former food bank activist and Ontario education minister said.

Dion, a former federal unity minister who is in a virtual dead heat with Kennedy for third spot, engaged in a gloves-off verbal assault on Harper for being too close to the Bush administration on the environment and foreign affairs.

He called the last 10 months of Conservative government a “disgraceful way to govern,” and told delegates he was the best man to unite the Liberals and defeat Harper.

“There is more culture in a bowl of yogurt than there is in this Conservative government,” he said. At another point, he said: “The Conservatives do not understand social justice.”

The top four have significant baggage to overcome. Ignatieff must make up for what were widely seen as campaign missteps that threw his political astuteness into question. Rae is battling his former NDP membership and his much-criticized record as premier of Ontario in the early 1990s.

Kennedy’s poor French is seen as a major weakness, alongside his lack of experience outside Ontario.

In Dion’s case, it’s his struggling English and, in the eyes of some, his rigidity towards Quebec nationals.

The biggest early ovation was won by hockey icon Ken Dryden, a Montreal hero who brought all camps to their feet.

“You’re great,” Dryden declared before launching into his speech.

The second-tier candidates were first up to bat, starting with Martha Hall Findlay, a lawyer who finished last in the delegate count but who has made clear she is determined to win election to Parliament.

She was followed by three MPs who finished near the bottom of the pack, including Brison, Volpe and Dryden.

None of the bottom four used their speech to declare support for any of the leading contenders. Findlay, who finished last on the first ballot, is the only one forced off the ticket for the second round.

The question is whether others will voluntarily drop off at that time, or decide to hang in, as Dryden has suggested he might.

All cheered what they called the Liberal legacy of critical accomplishments such as the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Their messages included pitches for party renewal, the need to support whoever wins and appeals for the party to take the lead on everything from combating climate change to improving the lot of aboriginals.

They also took targeted shots at the Harper Conservative government.

“I have a message for Mr. Harper. It’s the green economy, stupid,” said Brison, who devoted the bulk of his speech to environmental issues.”

Dryden described the campaign as tough, but inspiring.

But in the end, he said, all the noise boils down to delegates “choosing the person who has the best chance to win the country.”

Volpe, whose campaign was dogged by, among other things, revelations children had donated to his campaign, celebrated life as an immigrant. “For me Canada was paradise, and it continues to be,” said Volpe, who arrived in Canada as a child.

Regardless of who wins the race, he said, he wants the new leader to be “a battering ram” for all immigrants to Canada.

The cloud hanging over Volpe’s campaign has resulted in the top contenders keeping a distance from him, despite wanting his delegates.

Over the course of the campaign, Findlay won praise for sticking it out as eventually the sole woman in the race, and for pressing her call for giving women a bigger voice in the party.

A smiling, upbeat Findlay said the party needs “brains, heart and guts,” and declared she had all three traits.

Earlier, Chretien made a splash as he arrived at the centre. He stopped to talk to reporters, and clearly enjoyed the banter.

“I miss the people of the Liberal party,” he declared at one point. But he said he had to keep his promise to his wife to quit politics before he turned 70, which he did by retiring at the age of 69.

He also weighed in on the question of who makes a good leader, and his answer was vintage Chretien: “A good leader is one that wins elections,” he said with a broad grin. “My contribution was winning three majority elections.”

A major campaign theme for the candidates has been a desire to rebuild the Liberal party and bury once and for all the internal war between forces loyal to Chretien and those loyal to Martin.

The candidates’ speaking order was based on the reverse order of where they finished in the super weekend of voting in September that selected the delegates to this convention.

This means Ignatieff, who picked up support Friday from astronaut Marc Garneau and Senator Romeo Dallaire, the retired Canadian general, spoke last.

He was preceded by his closest rival Bob Rae. Gerard Kennedy spoke third-last. Stephan Dion, who snagged the backing of Liberal stalwart Allan Rock on the last day of campaigning, spoke fourth-last.