The Conservative Party of Canada says roughly 675,000 members will be eligible to vote in this year’s leadership race.
Party representatives told reporters Thursday that the historic figure reflects the success of each campaign’s outreach efforts.
“We’ve had six credible candidates, each with a slightly different message for Canadians, but taken together, they resonate in a way that has produced this extraordinary mobilization,” said Ian Brodie, Chairman of the Leadership Elections Organizing Committee.
In February, before the June 3 membership registration deadline was set, there were about 113,000 active members nationwide, excluding those whose membership expired on that date.
The preliminary count of 675,000 was removed from non-compliance sales (transactions not in line with leadership rules) and duplicate memberships.
“In the frenzy of a leadership race, it’s normal to attract people who don’t know all the ins and outs of the party’s funding rules,” Brodie said.
Among those who signed up over the past few months, 95 percent purchased their memberships online.
The party will publish the list for each individual campaign on Thursday. Candidates and their teams have until midnight Monday to challenge any names they feel have been “improperly” included.
By that same deadline, they can also request that a name be added if they think a person is missing.
“Our scrutinizing director, Don Nightingale, has the authority to make decisions on the challenges. His decisions can then be appealed to our dispute resolution appeals committee. Once all of these challenges have been resolved, the canvassing director promulgates the final list of voters,” Brodie said.
The party doesn’t usually release preliminary membership numbers, but this time it did because of the notable increase.
The most recent peak was recorded during the party’s merger in 2004, which combined several leadership contests to reach 282,000 members.
Ballot packets will be mailed out in batches over the next several weeks, the party said, and must be returned by Sept. 6. A new leader will be appointed on September 10.
During the 2020 leadership race, results were significantly delayed due to thousands of ballots being damaged upon opening.
Automatic envelope opening machines were cutting both the envelope and some ballots, requiring re-marking a new ballot with the same data in order to scan and tabulate it correctly.
Yaroslav Baran, who handles media communications for the current leadership competition, told CTVNews.ca on Thursday that they made changes to the processing to avoid a similar problem.
“Given the volumes we’re dealing with, the party has really increased the number of people processing each stage. There is a small army of people working on this, and that small army will be repurposed for ballot validation once we are at that stage,” Baran said in an emailed statement.
WEIGH-IN OF CANDIDATES
Jean Charest’s campaign said the number of members is “great news” for the party and that they are “very confident” they have a motivated base.
“We will continue to persuade party members by offering real ideas and solutions that will make us competitive in the upcoming federal election,” Director of Communications Michelle Coates Mather said in a statement.
Jamie Ellerton, campaign manager for Scott Aitchison, said 675,000 Canadians have “stepped up” to help the party “fight for a better Canada”.
“Scott Aitchison will launch his national Hope and Respect tour next month and will continue to work to build a Conservative Party that can deliver the results and good governance that Justin Trudeau is unable or unwilling to deliver,” the statement read.
CTV News reached out to all of the campaigns for comment, but at the time of publication, had only heard of the above.
With files from Rachel Aiello of CTV News