Stockwell Day

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**Hon. Stockwell Burt Day, Jr.**
Minister of Public Safety


Incumbent
Riding	Okanagan—Coquihalla
In office since	September 11, 2000 by-election
Preceded by	Jim Hart
Born	August 16, 1950 (age 56) Barrie, Ontario
Residence	Penticton, British Columbia
Political party	Conservative
Profession(s)	Auctioneer, businessman, contractor, school administrator
Religion	Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada
Spouse	Valorie Day

Stockwell Burt Day, Jr., PC, MP (born August 16, 1950), is a Canadian politician and a member of the Conservative Party of Canada. He is a former cabinet minister in Alberta, and a former leader of the Canadian Alliance. Day is currently MP for the riding of Okanagan—Coquihalla in British Columbia and the Minister of Public Safety. This portfolio includes the Royal Canadian Mounted Police; the Canada Border Services Agency; the Canadian Security Intelligence Service; the National Parole Board; and the Correctional Service of Canada. He is widely seen as a prominent voice for social conservatives within the Conservative Party.

1 Early life and career
2 Career in provincial politics
3 Leadership of the Canadian Alliance
- 3.1 2000 election
- 3.2 Post-election
4 Political career after leadership
- 4.1 Minister of Public Safety
5 Concerns about legitimacy of riding representation
6 Trivia
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Early life and career

Stockwell Day was born in Barrie, Ontario, in 1950, living in a number of places in Canada during his youth, including Atlantic Canada, Ottawa, where he attended Ashbury College, and Montreal, where he graduated from Westmount High School. He attended the University of Victoria and Vanguard College, then known as Northwest Bible College, in Edmonton, Alberta, but did not graduate from either.

His father, Stockwell Day, Sr. was long associated with the Social Credit Party of Canada. In the 1972 federal election he was the Social Credit candidate running against New Democratic Party leader Tommy Douglas. Day, Sr., supported Doug Christie and was a member of the Western Canada Concept.

From 1978 to 1985, Day was assistant pastor and school administrator at the Bentley Christian Centre in Bentley, Alberta. His school taught the Accelerated Christian Education curriculum, which caused some controversy for its alleged anti-semitism. Defending the curriculum publicly led to increased political involvement.

[edit] Career in provincial politics

In 1986, Day was elected to represent Red Deer North in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta as a Progressive Conservative (PC), a position that he held until 2000.

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 a flat tax rate in 1999.

[edit] 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 leader Preston Manning and Ontario PC strategist Tom Long. In the following runoff election against Manning, held on July 8, Day received 63.4%.

In order to take a seat in Parliament, Day ran in a by-election in the riding of Okanagan—Coquihalla in British Columbia, vacated by Reform/CA MP Jim Hart. Day won the by-election on Sept. 11, 2000, arriving at his first news conference on a Jet Ski wearing a wetsuit.

[edit] 2000 election

Jean Chrétien called a snap election for November 27, 2000, which would not give the newly formed Canadian Alliance time to consolidate itself.

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 devout Pentecostal), and past comments about homosexuality and abortion. Liberal activist Warren Kinsella mocked Day's belief in Young 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 the Flintstones theme song to mock the idea that humans and dinosaurs co-existed.^[1]

Liberal "Hidden Agenda" ad against Day

Further suggestions of a hidden agenda focussed on the Alliance's direct democracy proposals, which were revealed to require a referendum on any proposal supported by a petition signed by 3% of Canadian voters. Some asserted that "special interest" groups would use the low requirements to put contentious subjects to a national referendum. The proposal was satirized by Rick Mercer of This Hour has 22 Minutes (see trivia section).

Clark and Day in the debates

Day's campaign was marred by other controversies. In mid-campaign, the Alliance candidate in Winnipeg, 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.

On election night, the Alliance increased their seats over Reform totals, and kept Reform's strong representation in western Canada, but the hoped-for breakthrough in Ontario did not occur.

[edit] Post-election

Further controversies plagued Day following the election. While he had been a government minister in Alberta he wrote a letter to the editor in which he criticized Lorne Goddard, a lawyer and Red Deer school trustee, for defending a man accused of possessing child pornography. In it he wrote that Goddard himself supported child pornography. When Goddard sued for defamation, 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 Bennet Jones, the law-firm that had represented Day at tax payer expense, donated $70,000 to the Canadian Alliance Fund days 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 leader Deborah Grey, resigned their posts. In the following months, Gray and other MPs were ejected from the party for criticizing Day. Several of them, led by Chuck Strahl, formed the "Independent Alliance Caucus" during the summer. Day offered an amnesty, but seven of them turned it down and formed the Democratic Representative Caucus led by Grey and Strahl. The DRC formed a short-lived coalition agreement with the Tories which was seen as an attempt by PC leader Joe Clark to reunite the Canadian right on his terms.

[edit] Political career after leadership

Day arrives for his swearing in at Rideau Hall on February 6, 2006.

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. 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 the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Day later appeared as a speaker at a "Canadians for Bush" rally in the Niagara region, organized by controversial right-wing minister Tristan Emmanuel.

In December 2003, the Canadian Alliance and the Progressive Conservative Party merged to become the Conservative Party. 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.

[edit] Minister of Public Safety

In February 2006, he was made the Minister of Public Safety in the Harper government and was sworn into the Privy Council when he joined the Cabinet of Prime Minister Stephen Harper on February 6, 2006.

[edit] Concerns about legitimacy of riding representation

In March, 2007, the Federal Liberals accused former Alliance MP Jim Hart of accepting a payment of $50,000 to step aside in favour of Day.^[2] 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.^[3]

[edit] Trivia

In his political career, Day has never campaigned on Sundays, believing them to be time for worship and to be with his family. This came under scrutiny in the 2000 election, when his religion became an election issue.^[4]
According to a BBC article, Day is a believer in Creationism.^[5]
Day's stop in Southern Ontario stumbled badly in the first days of the 2000 federal election. 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, he remarked that Canadian jobs were flowing south just like the Niagara River, when in fact the river flows north.
In 2000, the Canadian television comedy program This Hour Has 22 Minutes launched a national petition for referendum, asking Day to change his name to Doris Day, invoking a Reductio ad absurdum argument against Day's proposal that a petition with signatures of 3% of the electorate would automatically force a referendum on any particular issue. The petition received more than the minimum number required, and would have been subject to national referendum if Day's proposal had been implemented.^[6]
Day was the victim of an incident during the 2000 election. When making a "grand entrance" for a speech at Conestoga College, communist Julian Ichim splashed him from the front of the stage with 2 litres of chocolate milk, saying he did it to protest Day's "homophobic, anti-immigrant and anti-poor agenda".^[7]^[8]^[9]^[10]^[11]

After, on the political comedy show This Hour Has 22 Minutes actress Mary Walsh jokingly offered Day chocolate milk, saying "all they had was homo, and I knew (Day) wouldn't like that."^[12]

Cabinet Post
28th Ministry - Government of Stephen Harper
Predecessor	Office	Successor
Anne McLellan	Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness (2006–) styled as Minister of Public Safety	incumbent

Preceded by Deborah Grey	Leader of the Opposition in the Canadian House of Commons 2000–2001	Succeeded by John Reynolds
Preceded by Deborah Grey (interim)	Leader of the Canadian Alliance 2000–2001	Succeeded by John Reynolds (interim)
Preceded by Jim Hart	Member of the Canadian House of Commons from Okanagan—Coquihalla 2000–present	Succeeded by Incumbent
Preceded by New District	MLA Red Deer North 1986-2000	Succeeded by Mary Anne Jablonski

Members of the current Canadian Cabinet
Ambrose \| Baird \| Bernier \| Blackburn \| Cannon \| Clement \| Day \| Emerson \| Finley \| Flaherty \| Fortier \| Harper \| Hearn \| LeBreton \| Lunn \| MacKay \| Nicholson \| O'Connor \| Oda \| Prentice \| Skelton \| Solberg \| Strahl \| Thompson \| Toews \| Van Loan \| Verner Secretaries of State Guergis \| Hill \| Kenney \| Paradis \| Ritz