- Stockwell Day
Infobox CanadianMP
honorific-prefix =The Honourable
name = Stockwell Burt Day, Jr.
honorific-suffix =
PC, MP
riding =Okanagan—Coquihalla
parliament = Canadian
term_start =September 11 ,2000
term_end =
predecessor = Jim Hart
successor =
office2 = Leader of theCanadian Alliance
term_start2 =July 8 2000
term_end2 =March 20 2002
predecessor2 =Deborah Grey (interim)
successor2 =Stephen Harper
birth_date = birth date and age|1950|8|16
birth_place = Barrie,Ontario
death_date =
death_place =
profession =Auctioneer ,businessman , contractor, school administrator
party = Conservative (2003-present)
otherparty =Canadian Alliance (2000-2003)
spouse = Valorie Day
residence =Penticton, British Columbia
religion =Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada
portfolio =Minister of Public Safety
footnotes =Stockwell Burt Day, Jr., PC, MP (born
August 16 ,1950 inBarrie, Ontario ), is a Canadianpolitician and a member of theConservative Party of Canada . He is a former cabinet minister inAlberta , and a former leader of theCanadian Alliance . Day is currently MP for the riding ofOkanagan—Coquihalla inBritish Columbia and the Minister of Public Safety. This portfolio includes theRoyal Canadian Mounted Police , theCanada Border Services Agency , theCanadian Security Intelligence Service , the National Parole Board and theCorrectional Service of Canada . He is widely seen as a prominent voice for social conservatives within the Conservative Party.Early life and career
Day was born in
Barrie, Ontario , in 1950, living in a number of places in Canada during his youth, includingAtlantic Canada ;Ottawa , where he attendedAshbury College ; andMontreal , where he graduated fromWestmount High School . He attended theUniversity of Victoria andVanguard College , then known as Northwest Bible College, inEdmonton, Alberta , but did not graduate from either.His father,
Stockwell Day, Sr. , was long associated with theSocial Credit Party of Canada . In the 1972 federal election he was the Social Credit candidate running againstNew Democratic Party leaderTommy Douglas in the riding ofNanaimo—Cowichan—The Islands . Day, Sr., supported Doug Christie and was a member of theWestern Canada Concept .From 1978 to 1985, Day was assistant pastor and school administrator at the
Bentley Christian Centre inBentley, Alberta . His school taught theAccelerated Christian Education curriculum, which caused some controversy for its allegedanti-semitism . Defending the curriculum publicly led to increased political involvement.In his political career, Day has never campaigned on Sundays, choosing instead to set them aside as time for worship and to be with his family. This came under scrutiny in the 2000 election, when his religion became an election issue. [ [http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2000/nov/001117b.html LifeSite Special Report - Attacks Against Party Leader's Christianity Continue ] ]
Career in provincial politics
In 1986, Day was elected to represent
Red Deer North in theLegislative Assembly of Alberta as a Progressive Conservative (PC), a position that he held until 2000.In January 2001, the Government of Alberta paid out $792,064 in taxpayer funds to settle a defamation lawsuit brought forward by Red Deer lawyer Lorne Goddard against Stockwell Day. [ [http://foip.gov.ab.ca/commissioners_decisions/other/adjudication/pdf/AdjudicationOrder_No3.pdf Adjudication inquiry pursuant to section 75 of the FOIP Act, Alberta Justice, March 13, 2003 ] ]
There was some controversy during his tenure as an Alberta MLA when Mr. Day, on religious grounds, opposed extending Alberta's human-rights code to protect homosexuals from discrimination. He also supported a
pro-life group that wanted the province to cease funding abortions except when a woman's life was at risk.In December 1992, newly elected Alberta premier
Ralph Klein brought Day into cabinet as his Minister of Labour, a position in which he oversaw controversial changes in his ministry, including layoffs in the civil service. In October 1994 Government House Leader was added to his responsibility. In May 1996, Day was made Minister of Social Services, and in March 1997, he became Treasurer. As Treasurer, Day oversaw a continued paying down of Alberta's debt while he cut taxes, instituting aflat tax rate in 1999.Leadership of the Canadian Alliance
In 2000, Day decided to run for leader of the newly-formed
Canadian Alliance party. After a heavily-publicized campaign, Day came in first on the June 24 first ballot of the leadership election with about 44% of the vote, in front of former Reform Party leaderPreston Manning and Ontario PC strategist Tom Long. In the following runoff election against Manning, held onJuly 8 2000 , Day received 63.4%.In order to take a seat in Parliament, Day ran in a by-election in the riding of
Okanagan—Coquihalla inBritish Columbia , vacated by Reform/CA MP Jim Hart. Day won the by-election onSeptember 11 2000 , arriving at his first news conference on a Jet Ski wearing a wetsuit.2000 election
A few weeks after Day entered the House of Commons,
Jean Chrétien called a snap election forNovember 27 ,2000 , which would not give the newly formed Canadian Alliance time to consolidate itself. Nonetheless, the new party went into the election with high hopes, as Day was expected to appeal far more to the crucial Ontario voters than his predecessors.There were few if any important issues when the election was called, nonetheless the Liberals frequently alleged that Day had a hidden agenda, by making a campaign issue out of Day's
fundamentalist Christian beliefs (he is a devoutPentecostal ), and past comments abouthomosexuality andabortion .Liberal activist
Warren Kinsella mocked Day's belief inYoung Earth creationism by pulling out a Barney doll during a television interview and stating that "this was the only dinosaur ever to be on Earth with humans". Media covering the Day campaign bus, nicknamed "Prayer Force One", whistled theFlintstones theme song to mock the idea that humans and dinosaurs co-existed. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1042814.stm BBC News | AMERICAS | Stockwell Day: Preaching politician ] ]The Alliance's
direct democracy proposals, which would have required a referendum on any proposal supported by a petition signed by 3% of Canadian voters, was also frequently targeted as a suggestion of a hidden agenda. Some asserted that "special interest" groups would use the low requirements to put contentious subjects to a national referendum. The proposal was satirized byRick Mercer of "This Hour Has 22 Minutes ", where he proposed a national petition for a referendum to demand that Day change his first name to Doris.Day was also a victim of an incident during the election. When making a "grand entrance" for a speech at
Conestoga College , communistJulian Ichim splashed him from the front of the stage with two litres ofchocolate milk , saying he did it to protest Day's "homophobic, anti-immigrant and anti-poor agenda". [ [http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2000/10/05/allianceday001005.html Time for change of clothes, government: Day ] ] [ [http://www.lilithgallery.com/articles/canada/The_Prank_That_Destroyed_StockwellDay.html The Prank That Destroyed Stockwell Day ] ] [ [http://experts.about.com/e/s/st/Stockwell_Day.htm Stockwell Day at AllExperts ] ] [ [http://old.uwstudent.org/article.php?story=20011207075939000 uwstudent.org - Ichim convicted of assault for milk attack on Day (Jon Willing) ] ] [ [http://www.bulletin.uwaterloo.ca/2000/oct/06fr.html October 6, 2000 ] ] Afterward, again on "This Hour Has 22 Minutes", actressMary Walsh jokingly offered Day chocolate milk, saying: "All they had was homo, and I knew (Day) wouldn't like that." [http://www.jumptheshark.com/t/thishourhas22minutes.htm]Day stumbled during two campaign appearances in the first week. A photo-op at a technology firm meant to illustrate a "brain drain" to the US was undermined when the owner reported that he had moved "to" Canada from the United States eight years earlier. The next day, at
Niagara Falls , Day remarked that Canadian jobs were flowing south "just like theNiagara River ", when in fact the river flows north. In mid-campaign, the Alliance candidate inWinnipeg South Centre ,Betty Granger , was quoted as voicing concerns about an "Asian invasion" in Canada. And in the televised leaders' debate, Day held up a handwritten sign saying "NO 2-TIER HEALTHCARE" in large letters to counter a "Globe and Mail " newspaper headline earlier in the campaign. As props were against the rules, he claimed it was his briefing notes.At one point, the Alliance was at 30.5% in the polls, and some thought they could win a minority government. On election night, the Alliance increased their seats over Reform totals from 60 to 66, and kept Reform's strong representation in western Canada, but the hoped-for breakthrough in
Ontario did not occur, with the party electing just two MPs in that province. The Liberals' attacks on Day ending up decimating the NDP and Progressive Conservatives, as many voters who would otherwise have supported those parties voted strategically for the Liberals to prevent an Alliance victory.On election night, controversy arose when a CBC producer's gratuitously sexist comment about Day's daughter-in-law,
Juliana Thiessen Day , was accidentally broadcast on the Canadian networks' pooled election feed from Day's riding.fact|date=September 2008Post-election
Further controversies plagued Day following the election. While he had been a government minister in Alberta he wrote a letter to the editor of the Red Deer Advocate in April 1999 in which he criticized Lorne Goddard, a lawyer and respected Red Deer school trustee, for defending a man accused of possessing
child pornography . [ [http://www.nowtoronto.com/issues/2000-11-16/newsspread.html NOW On / Newsfront / News Spread / Nov 16 - 22, 2000 ] ] In it he alleged that Goddard himself supported child pornography. When Goddard sued forlibel , the Alberta government covered Day's legal bills. In December, the government lawyers settled out of court, but the legal costs and settlement totalled $792,000. Day was criticized for the costs and eventually re-paid the province $60,000, the settlement amount excluding legal fees. Further controversy ensued in February when it was reported that Bennett Jones, the law firm that had represented Day at taxpayer expense, donated $70,000 to the Canadian Alliance Fund shortly after Day settled. The Alliance launched an internal review that determined that nothing inappropriate had occurred.In April it was reported that Day had approved the hiring of a private investigator to dig up dirt to smear the Liberals. After confirming that he had met the man on April 7, Day denied this on the 8th, claiming on the 9th that he had read of the meeting in "
The Globe and Mail " and had assumed that it was correct.Given the string of negative stories, many Alliance members became increasingly critical of Day's leadership. In late April, several members of Day's
Shadow Cabinet , including deputy leaderDeborah Grey , resigned their posts. In the following months, Gray and other MPs were ejected from the party for criticizing Day. Several of them, led byChuck Strahl , formed the "Independent Alliance Caucus" during the summer. Day offered an amnesty, but seven of them turned it down and formed theDemocratic Representative Caucus , led by Grey and Strahl. The DRC entered a short-lived coalition agreement with the Tories, which was seen as an attempt by PC leaderJoe Clark to reunite the Canadian right on his terms.Political career after leadership
In the fall of 2001 Day agreed to step aside and recontest the leadership, and in the March 2002 Alliance leadership election, Day was defeated by
Stephen Harper on the first ballot. As a concession to Day, Harper appointed him as Foreign Affairs critic. Most of the DRC MPs, with the exception ofInky Mark andJim Pankiw , rejoined the Alliance caucus onApril 10 .In March 2003 Day and Harper co-wrote a letter to "
The Wall Street Journal " in which they condemned the Canadian government's unwillingness to participate in the2003 invasion of Iraq . Day later appeared as a speaker at a "Canadians for Bush" rally in the Niagara region, organized by controversial right-wing ministerTristan Emmanuel .In December 2003, the Canadian Alliance and the Progressive Conservative Party merged to become the
Conservative Party of Canada . Day did not run for the leadership of the new party, but became its Foreign Affairs critic. He was easily re-elected to Parliament in both the 2004 and 2006 federal elections.In November 2004, Day provoked controversy by not offering condolences to Palestinians after the death of PLO leader
Yasser Arafat . The controversy was heightened when it was leaked to the media that Day had attempted to justify his actions to his party colleagues by circulating an article byDavid Frum which suggested that Arafat had died of AIDS. [http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20041122.wstocky1122/BNStory/National/]In March 2007, the federal Liberals accused former Alliance MP Jim Hart of having accepted a payment of $50,000 to step aside in favour of Day before the 2000 byelection. [http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2007/03/22/day-riding.html Liberals allege ex-MP was paid off to give his riding to Day] Contacted at his home in the
Republic of Georgia , Hart - in a brief email statement to the CBC - did not deny the allegations or impeach the authenticity of the evidence the Liberals had obtained. [http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2007/03/23/hart-day.html Ex-MP doesn't deny documents at heart of Day nomination scandal]Minister of Public Safety
On
February 6 2006 , Day was made the Minister of Public Safety in the Conservative government and was sworn into the Privy Council.References
External links
* [http://www.stockwellday.com/ Official website]
* [http://webinfo.parl.gc.ca/membersofparliament/ProfileMP.aspx?Key=78682&Language=E Parliamentary website]
* [http://www.parl.gc.ca/information/about/people/key/bio.asp?Language=E&query=17719&s=M Federal Political Experience from the Library of Parliament]
* [http://www.howdtheyvote.ca/member.php?id=81 How'd They Vote?: Stockwell Day's voting history and quotes]
* [http://www.intheirownwords.ca/ourstockwell.html In Their Own Words: quotations by and about Canada's Conservatives]
* [http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/story.html?id=8fc86a01-cb77-4eba-8392-47364c4a7f62&k=31976 Climate quip puts Day on hot seat - Weblog joke gets chilly reception]
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