Bruce Hyer says the person the NDP anoint this weekend as their next federal leader will shoulder an enormous responsibility.
On Monday the Thunder Bay – Superior North MP said there are three leadership candidates up for the task – frontrunner Thomas Mulcair, Nathan Cullen, the candidate Hyer has publicly backed, and Paul Dewar.
If one of those three are elected, he said, good things are in store for Canada’s official opposition party.
“If one of those three is the leader, then I believe we will form the next government and that person will be the next prime minister,” the overly optimistic Hyer said.
“We’re probably picking the next prime minister here in this leadership convention.”
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In Hyer’s eyes, Cullen is the only man to succeed Jack Layton, the late leader who took the NDP from perennial also-rans on the federal stage to last May’s orange crush of Quebec at the expense of a now third-place Liberal party.
“I really believe that Nathan Cullen has all of Jack’s best qualities and then some,” Hyer said.
“So I believe Nathan, who is only 39 years old, will not only become prime minister, but he will be prime minister for perhaps decades.”
With at least one national poll putting the NDP within a couple of percentage points of the ruling Conservatives, the key for the party’s next leader will be maintaining the momentum through 2015, when the next federal election is scheduled.
The NDP presently hold 101 of the 308 seats in the House of Commons, 64 fewer than the Conservatives.
“A week is a long time in politics, as the cliché goes, and three years is a very long time. But I really do believe that any one of those three men, especially Nathan Cullen, can take us to victory and we will form the next government, whether it’s a minority government or perhaps even a majority government.”
Hyer, 65, also weighed in on former party leader Ed Broadbent’s foray late last week into the leadership race, saying Mulcair would take the party too far toward the centre of the political spectrum, away from its left-wing roots.
Saying Broadbent, who supports Brian Topp in the race, has every right to voice his opinion, Hyer nonetheless politely disagreed with the sentiment.
“I go from the left to the moderate right myself,” Hyer said. “I hate to categorize politics as left or right. I think that we should decide issues on an issue-by-issue basis. And I think Thomas Mulcair, Nathan Cullen and Paul Dewar can span the political spectrum to from NDP to Liberal-light to whatever it takes to form government.”
Hyer, who along with Thunder Bay-Rainy River MP John Rafferty, was sanctioned by NDP earlier this year for voting with the Conservatives to end the long-gun registry, said he’s expecting those sanctions to end with the election of a new leader, especially if Cullen or Dewar hold the reins when the final ballots are cast.
“I know that all three of those men are democratic,” he said.
Also running are Peggy Nash, Niki Ashton and Martin Singh.
Rafferty has publicly said he’ll support Mulcair in Toronto this weekend.
