The new leader of the Progressive Conservative Party should expect an earful.
“To be a good listener is perhaps the most important thing,” former Tory premier Rodney MacDonald said of the essential quality the provincial party faithful should pursue in Saturday’s leadership vote.
“A good friend of mine, his mother would often say to him and his brothers that ‘God gave you two ears and one mouth so you should be doing twice as much listening and half as much talking.’ Being a good listener, being a good communicator. That’s number 1.”
John Abbass Jr., a PC member from Bedford whose late father served as party president at the back end of the 1980s, said the new leader will have to be a consensus builder, integrating ideas from across the province and its diverse demographics.
“The person will have to be very in touch with the people,” Abbass said. “They have to be a good listener.”
Karla MacFarlane, the MLA for Pictou West, has worn the party’s interim leadership crown since former leader Jamie Baillie was forced to resign as leader in January in the wake of an investigation into allegations of inappropriate behaviour.
“I think it’s important that they (new leader) collect the facts, and discuss it and then they make a decision,” MacFarlane said.
Tara Miller, president of the provincial party, said all five candidates in Saturday’s leadership convention — Julie Chaisson, Cecil Clarke, Tim Houston, John Lohr and Elizabeth Smith-McCrossin — inspire confidence.
“I have watched with pride all five of them at the six debates and watched their campaigns and how they’ve interacted with people and how they’ve engaged people, how they’ve motivated people,” Miller said. “Any one of those five, I have every confidence will work diligently to bring all of those 11,600 (party) members with them moving forward, focused on our next goal.”
The next goal is a party leader that can take the party to the next level, to win a provincial election and form a government.
“A winner,” MacDonald said half-jokingly about what the party needs in its next leader.
“They need to show the qualities of leadership that exemplify the PC party,” said MacDonald, who was premier from 2006 to 2009. “That’s upholding the principles of the party and having the ability to reach out to members, to listen.
“I think as well it’s someone that Nova Scotians will trust and believe in. It’s more than just providing a vision for a party. ... Secondly, it’s being able to deliver on what you say. Otherwise, you won’t have long-term success.”
MacDonald said party members are going to see different characteristics in different candidates that they think will translate into long-range success.
Abbass unexpectedly turns his gaze to the left to name a couple of fiscally responsible leaders who the next PC boss might emulate.
“The person should have a lot of similar qualities to Stephen McNeil,” Abbass said. “We need a very responsible leader who is going to listen to people and make sure that we don’t continue to increase the debt. They have to take care of all the people and not just a certain segment. I think those are some of the qualities that Stephen McNeil has and our new leader will have those qualities too. We’ve had those qualities in leaders in the past.
“I would say someone with the qualities of John Hamm, moreso, and John Savage. Fiscal restraint.”
Miller grew up in Labrador and moved to Nova Scotia as a young adult to attend university. She doesn’t portray any former PC premiers, neither Hamm nor Danny Williams from Newfoundland, as embodying the perfect traits for a PC leader.
“I think different leaders bring different skill sets at different times and if I were to pick out somebody that I have worked with in the past and say we need that today, I don’t think that’s really a fair translation,” Miller said. “Just because where we are today is not where we’ve been in the past, certainly with the advent of social media and the 24-hour news cycle.”
Saturday will be all about crowning a winner but MacDonald said it’s also imperative for a leader to be able to accept defeat.
“I often say to people that the one thing that the premiers of all the different parties have in common, they’ve all lost elections,” MacDonald said. “If you are going to be a leader of any political party, it’s important what you learn in losing and winning. John Hamm, he wasn’t successful in 1998 but he was in 1999; Stephen McNeil the same thing; Darrell Dexter; I won and I lost. You go through the list, Russell MacLellan, same thing; John Buchanan, Gerald Regan.”
Losing lessons make a stronger leader, he said.
“You have to first of all understand why people decided to choose something different. It’s OK to lose. What I’ve noticed in politics is that the politicians understand the game that they are in, if you will. There are many different issues at play, win or lose. Some of those things are out of your control. Most politicians understand that. We have five fine people and there will be one eventual winner and the key will be that all five support whoever that person is and that the party rallies behind that person and that we build bridges to ensure that they can achieve success in the next campaign.
“Ultimately, we are looking for somebody that the people of Nova Scotia will put their trust in.”
