Politics Briefing: Finding a way forward after harassment complaints

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Will they or won't they? Since the Ontario Progressive Conservatives were thrust into a leadership crisis last week, the question has been who will steer the party through a provincial election that  – according to polls – should be the PCs' race to lose. After Patrick Brown was forced to step down last week, Northern Ontario MPP Vic Fedeli was chosen by the caucus to replace him. It was initially unclear whether Mr. Fedeli was the "leader" or the "interim leader" – the province-wide election, after all, is on June 7, which doesn't leave a lot of time or money for a robust leadership vote in the space between.

Ultimately, the party decided it would hold a leadership election and gave itself a few days to come up with the rules. But then Rick Dykstra, the party president, resigned on Sunday. And then Doug Ford,  brother of the late Rob,  said yesterday he would run for the party leadership.

Suddenly the party doesn't seem so sure it wants the time, expense or internecine warfare of a leadership vote just now.

This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Chris Hannay in Ottawa, Mayaz Alam in Toronto and James Keller in Vancouver. If you're reading this on the web or someone forwarded this email newsletter to you, you can sign up for Politics Briefing and all Globe newsletters here. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.

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TODAY'S HEADLINES

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel, a former cabinet minister, says some in her party "should be ashamed of themselves" for not acting on allegations about Mr. Dykstra raised during the last election, and that her colleagues in the House should hold their conduct to a higher standard. "Is it possible for a drunk staffer to give consent for sex to a senior male who aggressively propositions them [in a workplace organization]? Within any standard workplace code of conduct, the answer to that should be unequivocally no," Ms. Rempel said.

Liberal MP Kent Hehr, who was dropped from cabinet last week pending an investigation into harassment complaints, was reportedly hospitalized over the weekend because of a seizure.

The sixth round of North American free-trade agreement talks wrapped up without much to show for it.

British Columbia's publicly owned auto insurance provider is facing a staggering loss of $1.3-billion this year, jeopardizing the NDP government's pledge to freeze premiums and imperilling next month's provincial budget. The province says the Insurance Corp. of B.C. would need to raise premiums by $400 a year to cover the losses, but the NDP government insists it will find a way to avoid it. But that won't include moving to a no-fault model already in place in other provinces.

B.C.'s transportation regulator has fined a number of illegal ride-hailing services, which have been able to fly under the radar while targeting Chinese customers. The province is considering legalizing services like Uber, but in the meantime more than half a dozen small operators have launched without permission.

Big-L Liberal senators are a vanishing breed.

Canada Revenue Agency executives got the biggest public-sector bonuses.

And an Ottawa landlord is recommending other landlords not to take on tenants who are diplomats, after a worker at the U.S. embassy used diplomatic immunity to get out of paying $8,000 in rent.

Campbell Clark (The Globe and Mail) on the North American free-trade agreement: "More and more, it looks as though this is going to be Canada's new reality: The talks continue for a year, perhaps even three years, with Mr. Trump's threat to withdraw from NAFTA constantly hanging in the air. On trade, Canada could be living dangerously for years."

Globe and Mail editorial board on Liberal nomination guarantees: "This resurrected Liberal system is anti-democratic. MPs in safe Liberal ridings have effectively been gifted with seats for life – U.S. senators must be looking on with envy."

Adam Radwanski (The Globe and Mail) on the Ontario PCs: "For a good number of Ontario Progressive Conservatives, the idea of going into this spring's election with Doug Ford at the helm is almost as much of a nightmare as what they have endured the past week."

Christie Blatchford (National Post) on the evidence against men accused of sexual assault or harassment: "In this lethality, and the lack of some recognizable and fair process available to the accused men, the #MeToo tsunami has about it a real whiff of McCarthyism."

Michael Spratt (CBC) on the burden of proof in politics: "You see, the presumption of innocence operates in our courts of law to protect people charged with crimes from the power of the state to deprive them of their liberty. It does not operate to immunize political leaders from scrutiny."

Chantal Hébert (Toronto Star) on what could come next: "Based on more than three decades of Parliament Hill watching, the question is not whether there are or have been sexual misconduct skeletons in every party closet but whether one or more will come back to rattle its political family."

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