Creator of Liberals open membership system not sure it’s a good idea

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OTTAWA — The race to replace departing Liberal leader Justin Trudeau hasn’t even officially started yet, but critics are already raising concerns about the party’s lax membership rules, which allow virtually anyone living in Canada aged 14 or older to join free of charge and take part in internal party elections.

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One of these critics is Calgary-based political strategist Corey Hogan, who helped design the Liberals’ open membership model in the early 2010s, while an executive with the Alberta Liberal Party.

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“I’m not sure that I think it’s a very good idea, with the benefit of a few more years of wisdom,” Hogan said of doing away with paid memberships.

Keen to inject new blood into the stagnating Alberta Liberals, Hogan came up with the radical idea of allowing non-paying registered supporters to vote in the party’s fall 2011 leadership race.

“We were highly interested in the U.S. primary system,” said Hogan, pointing to Barack Obama’s surprise breakthrough in the 2008 presidential primaries as a source of inspiration.

“The idea was to open things up a bit and bring in more people, which we hoped would spark enthusiasm.”

While the gambit failed to improve the provincial party’s fortunes, it caught the eye of then interim federal Liberal leader Bob Rae.

Rae pushed successfully for non-dues paying supporters to vote in the party’s 2013 leadership election, which saw a record 104,522 ballots cast in a Trudeau landslide.

The party did away with membership fees altogether in 2016, a reform championed by Trudeau himself.

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Hogan says the membership changes weakened the Liberals’ political identity by giving a say over internal matters to people with no personal stake in the party.

“They set the barriers to entry so low as to be non-existent,” Hogan told National Post on Tuesday. “That’s a real, serious problem they’ll have to think about in a serious way.”

“If the Liberal Party of Canada didn’t exist, would anybody have a reason to create it?” said Hogan. “I’m just not sure they’ve answered that question yet.”

Sharan Kaur, an ex-Liberal staffer and communications consultant, said she’s worried that the lack of barriers to voting in the leadership race could open the door to partisan mischief-making by interests hostile to the Liberal party.

“Ideally, political parties offer membership to engage people in the movement and encourage active participation. While I don’t see an issue with individuals signing up as inactive members, my concern arises when people join with ulterior motives or seek to exploit the system,” said Kaur.

Several well-known pro-Conservative social media accounts, for example, have been circulating links to the Liberal party’s registration page as part of a joke campaign for highly online Kingston, Ont. MP Mark Gerretsen. (Gerretsen has said he won’t be running.)

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Other critics have voiced concerns about the risk of foreign interference in the imminent Liberal leadership race. The process is open to people born outside Canada, including non-permanent residents, and fee-less party registration means no accounting paper trail to help organizers track irregularities.

Leadership races and other internal party contests have been a major focus of the Hogue Commission on foreign interference, which is expected to issue its final report later this month.

“The eligibility criteria for voting in nomination contests do not seem very stringent, and the control measures in place do not seem very robust,” wrote Commissioner Marie-Josée Hogue in a preliminary report published in May.

Veteran Liberal strategist Sarbjit Kaur said the anxieties around foreign interference have nothing to do with the party’s move to a non-paying supporter system.

“Getting rid of the membership fees was a way to increase engagement and include more people in the democratic process. Frankly, those who want to interfere have the funds and ability to buy memberships,” Kaur told the National Post on Wednesday.

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The leadership election rules have not yet been announced but Liberal officials have said not to expect new barriers to registration.

“Our open and inclusive process ensures we hear from more people in the communities we engage with and helps foster civic engagement with those who may one day have the privilege to vote in a federal election,” Liberal communication director Parker Lund said in a statement to the media this week.

National Post
rmohamed@postmedia.com

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