Former central banker Mark Carney will launch his bid to lead the Liberal party in Edmonton on Thursday, says a news release from Calgary Liberal MP George Chahal.
In a note to supporters inviting them to attend the event, Chahal describes Carney as “not a career politician.”
“In an era of global challenges, in a time of economic opportunity, Mark Carney has the experience required and the leadership skills needed to meet those challenges and take advantage of the opportunities,” Chahal’s email said.
Candidates only have about a week left to declare that they will run.
Former finance minister Chrystia Freeland and current cabinet minister Karina Gould are also expected to launch their leadership bids in the coming days.
Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly and Finance Minister Dominic LeBlanc have all ruled out running to replace Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
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The next Liberal leader will need to turn their attention quickly to ensuring the party is ready for an early election once the short leadership race ends in March.
The Liberals say they have 129 candidates nominated out of 343 federal ridings, while the Conservatives say they have close to 221 and the New Democrats say they have 93.
The Liberals currently have 153 MPs in the House of Commons but many high-profile caucus members have said they will not seek re-election—including Transport Minister Anita Anand, Marie-Claude Bibeau, Seamus O’Regan and Dan Vandal.
University of Toronto political science professor Randy Besco said the next Liberal leader will need to quickly sort out their campaign machinery, since senior members of Trudeau’s office may be unwilling to stick it out under a new leader.
“There’s not that many people who are qualified to run a national campaign. There’s like 10 or 20 in the whole country. It’s really quite small, actually, compared to say the United States or elsewhere,” he said.
“Putting all that infrastructure together and the people and the organization, if it’s true that we’re going to have a new leader and then immediately an election, that’s going be a big challenge (for the party).”
He said the Liberals won’t have a hard time finding candidates but likely will struggle to attract star talent, given the Conservatives’ solid double-digit lead in the polls.
Candidates who are nominated late in the game won’t have spent much time knocking on doors and fundraising before the election campaign begins, Besco said.
“That’s also going be a problem for them.”
