A contender for the federal Liberal party presidency is promising to bring prairie issues to the centre of political attention if he is elected.
“The Liberal party at its policy conventions and its deliberations and day-to-day activities has to make sure Western Canada is included in the national dream,” said Greg Ashley, a Winnipeg business executive who once worked for former federal agriculture minister Eugene Whelan.
“We have to listen to Western Canada.”
Ashley is lobbying prairie Liberals for support in his bid for the party presidency, which will be voted on at the same November convention that will decide the successor to party leader Jean Chrétien. The party president is in charge of running the political machinery that gets party candidates elected to Parliament.
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Ashley is appealing to prairie Liberals to support. “It’d be good for Western Canada to have another voice on the national scene,” he said.
But he admits his biggest challenge in getting prairie Liberals to back him is to convince them that they should care about the party.
“You have to go out and find these people who are in Regina, Weyburn, Estevan, Kamsack and Pincher Creek. The Liberal-thinking people are out there, but you have to give them something to get on board with.”
Ashley, who was born in Newfoundland, went to high school at Notre Dame college in Wilcox, Sask., and has worked for Liberal politicians across the country. He thinks farmers will support the Liberals if the party takes farming issues more seriously.
If the party came up with better western agricultural policies before crises struck, the Liberal government would appear to care more, he added.
“Western Canada has to see that there’s a plan in place before these things happen, not after they happen.”
As well, he said the Liberal government must be pressured from inside the party to treat western issues as seriously as it treats eastern issues.
“(The government) should be helping Toronto (because of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome), but it should also be helping the feedlots and the cattle ranchers,” Ashley said.
“It should be helping Western Canada.”
He also said the grain marketing system should be continually assessed.
“Are (farmers) paying too much to have their wheat hauled? Are we doing enough to sell their wheat around the world? Is the wheat board as productive as it should be?”
Ashley’s father was one of Newfoundland premier Joey Smallwood’s main organizers, and his sister, Bonnie Hickey, ran for the Liberal party presidency in 1998, losing to Stephen LeDrew, who is now president. Ashley helped organize Whelan’s leadership bid and Sheila Copps’ first bid.
He was also chief of staff to the Saskatchewan Liberal leader in 1977.
“Politics is in my blood,” Ashley said.
“I’ve stuffed envelopes. I’ve made the phone calls. I’ve knocked on doors. I’ve chased after signs in windy weather.”
