Talk:Jim Harris (politician)/Archive 1

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
Image:Jimharris.jpg
Jim Harris.

I can find no source which identifies Jim Harris as openly gay. If somebody has more information than me, please, do share. -- Matty j 19:49, Jul 9, 2004 (UTC)

The reference is with regard to Chris Lea, who was a leader before Joan Russow. I suspect that Jim's wife might take issues with him being described as "gay". ;-) I tried to simply change this on the page, but I don't understand the process, and my change was removed. Bill Hulet

The gay reference is false. The mistake originated from an interview during the 2004 Canadian federal election in which Jim Harris mentioned in an interview with a CBC journalist that the Green Party of Canada was the only party in Canadian history to have had an openly gay leader (Chris Lea) from 1996-1998?. The journalist mistakenly identified Jim as gay. M Pilling - Green Party of Canada. -- just affirming this this with a real login. M Pilling

I also removed the false claim about Joan Russow quitting the party because of Jim Harris. She quit the party after resigning as leader in 2001, and dissapeared from the scene. For two years (2001-2003) the position was filled by interim leader Chris Bradshaw. Joan Russow re-emerged in 2004 to launch a series of propagandistic statements favoring the NDP, and she, along with leftist commentators like Murray Dobbin, "welcomed" the emerging green party with biased political attacks during the federal campaign.

I removed:

He is also the first openly gay man to lead a significant political party in Canada.

I've found no support for the assertion that Jim Harris is homosexual. It was not mentioned during the election campaign and I can't find a reference searching through Yahoo. Given that and Bill's objection above (although I couldn't find a source for him being married, either), I think it's best to withhold the line unless it can be substantiated here.

Bill -- your contributions to articles would be less likely to be tampered with if you created an account. -- Matty j 01:11, Jul 15, 2004 (UTC)

His wife's name is Lee-Anne McAlear, a corporate training consultant. Check her out here and see the connection to Jim Harris here. –DeweyQ 03:38, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I removed the gay reference (again?). I'm the office manager of the GPC and talked to Jim about this. We had a good laugh about it. He's not gay.

Our Media Relations Officer says that Jim slipped up during the election and said [paraphrasing] "THe GPC is the only party to have an openly gay leader." He meant to say "has had". There was a past leader who was openly gay - Chris Lea.

Basically, I'm corroborating Bill's account on this one.

New to wikipedia--next time I'll make an account. My edit was tagged with IP: 66.11.173.192.

Cheers,

Matthew Clarke - GPC Office Manager


The existence of Chris Lea (unfortunately, only in stub form) may now help clarify this issue. -The Tom 02:18, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)


I've been looking at various postings in the wikipedia about the Green Party of Canada and much of it is quite obviously one-sided partisan slagging. I was quite "hinky" about this idea at first, grew to like it, but it seems obvious to me now that the whole concept is deeply flawed. Don't you guys care about the truth? - Bill Hulet (who signed other posts from that IP)

What concept? And put your comment at the bottom if it's new, unless we are going to archive all the rest. Which we should, since, it's relevant only to the discredited "gay" line. As for not caring about the truth, your own attempt to whitewash or greenwash Green Party of Canada Living Platform is a black mark, Hulet. You are the one-sided one. You deleted tons of facts to replace them with your pro-authority rant. Which was (much more decently) used as the base of a new, shorter, neutral article.

Contents

This Page Needs Improvement

In the last few minutes, I've reverted a number of edits by user 65.49.65.28 (on the Frank de Jong, Joan Russow, Chris Bradshaw and Green Party of Canada pages, to be precise). His edits were extremely partisan, and deleted much salient information that portrayed the Green Party in a negative or questionable light.

That is almost certainly Bill Hulet who makes a habit of censoring all such information that he finds on all large public wikis.

I planned to do the same with this page, but deferred when I saw that the previous edit was equally biased, in the other discussion.

There are published resignation letters from close associates of Harris that shed a lot of light on recent situations. Perhaps now that this is public, it is possible to do this:

Someone needs to write an *unbiased* account of Harris's leadership, preferably one which doesn't selectively omit important information. CJCurrie 01:35, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Agreed. How about this one? The rumours that he has several times threatened to resign, check out. Also there are sources like this that seem to back up what is said. Also see yahoogroups: gpc-members for discussions not under the direct censorship or Harris or the GPC.
This should be updated with reference to published resignation letters of Harris' associates, which validate some of what was in this longer elaborated version.
Image:Jimharris.jpg

Jim Harris (born ca. 1961) is a Canadian politician and political activist. He has led the Green Party of Canada since 2003, and was the party's leader for the 2004 federal election. After the Canadian federal election, 2004, Harris was re-elected leader in a much closer race against Tom Manley and John Grogan, despite the Party's dramatic rise to 4.3% of the popular vote (see Party directions below for more on this). Harris has run in municipal, provincial and federal elections as a Green.

Early Career

Harris was educated at Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario in the 1980s. Initially a member of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada, Harris was converted to green politics after reading Green Politics by Fritjof Capra and Charlene Spretnak, which highlighted the emergence of the German Greens. He worked as the National Press Officer of the British Green Party in 1987, and was made a lifetime member of that party.

After traveling the world for four years after his graduation, Harris returned to Canada and became active in that country's green movement. He helped to organize the Green Party of Ontario's campaign in the 1990 provincial election, and was himself a candidate in the Toronto riding of St. Andrew—St. Patrick. The party fielded 40 candidates and received 33,000 votes, a significant increase from seven candidates and 3,000 votes in the previous election. Harris himself received 1,112 votes for a credible fourth-place finish.

In 1993, Harris and other Ontario Greens sought and won a change in the party's constitution, allowing for the election of a full-time leader. The party was nominally led by Katherine Mathewson in the 1990 election, but she had little influence over the campaign or the party's policies. Harris and others argued that electing a full-time leader would allow the Green Party to organize itself more professionally, and present a united message in future campaigns. Harris supported Frank de Jong's successful campaign for the party leadership; de Jong, in turn, would later support Harris at the federal level.

Although he did not run for the party after 1990, Jim Harris was elected as the first president of the Green Party of Ontario in 2001, and served in that role until he moved to the federal arena in 2003.

Author and Speaking Career

Jim Harris has written six books, one of which was a best-seller in Canada. He also delivers public speeches on change and leadership. Association Magazine ranked him as one of Canada's top speakers. Harris speaks at about 50 international conferences a year, and conducts strategic planning sessions with executive teams on leadership, change, CRM, eLearning, innovation and creating learning organizations. Like most other politician authors, his books have included uncredited contributions from party researchers.

Some of Harris' critics have spoken disparagingly about his actual knowledge of these subjects or capacity to apply the "Green values" in either business or politics. See politics sections below. Many of Harris' top aides worked both in the leaders' office of the Party and Harris's personal businesses, often simultaneously.

His second book, The Learning Paradox, was nominated for the National Business Book Award in Canada and appeared on numerous bestseller lists. Books for Business ranked it as one of the top-10 business books in North America. Harris also co-authored The 100 Best Companies to Work for in Canada, part of a regular best-selling series of books that multiple authors have contributed to over the years. His most recent book, Blindsided!, has been published in over 80 countries.

Harris' insistence on micro-management causes him to burn through close allies quickly. For instance, his closest assistant during the 2004 election supported rival Tom Manley for the leadership just two months later.

2004 campaign

Harris was elected leader of the Green Party of Canada on February 14, 2003, defeating Jason Crummey and John Grogan with over 81% of the votes cast. He replaced interim leader Chris Bradshaw, who led the party from 2001 to 2003.

The Green Party conducted a high-profile campaign in the 2004 election under Harris's leadership, running candidates in all 308 ridings for the first time in its history. The party received 582,000 votes (4.3%), but failed to elect any candidates. Harris himself campaigned in the riding of Toronto—Danforth, and placed fourth against New Democratic Party leader Jack Layton with 2,575 votes (5.4%).

The 2004 GPC platform emphasized full cost accounting, triple bottom line and the green tax shift. The Green Party's support for taxing resources rather than incomes is considered by many to be a right-wing initiative.

Federal electoral record:

Post-election challenges and controversies

Harris's leadership of the Green Party has been extremely controversial. He is generally regarded as an eco-capitalist, and has attempted to shift the party to the political right on a number of issues (his support for international shipping has caused particular controversy in the party, which has traditionally supported local production). Following the 2004 election, he was challenged for the party leadership by Tom Manley, a prominent party figure in eastern Ontario.

He won re-election, though by a narrower margin than before. While initially elected in 2003 with over 81 per cent of the votes cast in a three-way race. After the 2004 Canadian election, Harris was re-elected leader in a closer race against Tom Manley and John Grogan, despite the Party's rise to an historic high of 582,000 votes (4.3%).

Harris' insistence on micro-management causes him to burn through close allies quickly. For instance, his closest assistant during the 2004 election supported rival Tom Manley for the leadership just two months later.

Despite GPC Constitution provisions that Leaders not direct Party internal affairs, Harris seems eager to manipulate the Party's internal processes to personal political advantage - several times he has been personally implicated in factional infighting that has seen removals, suspensions and resignations from the Green Party's internal Council. His favourite tactic seems to be to call "emergency" in camera meetings, making various claims about member, volunteer or staff morale, and demanding what he wants from the Council - sometimes threatening to resign - see below.

A very major controvery erupted regarding the Green Party of Canada Living Platform and the party's participatory democracy. Harris put his personal press release author, Dermod Travis, in charge of the party's entire platform.

Harris had already exercised tight control over the Green Party's electoral campaign and press releases during the 2004 election. Very few releases during the election quoted any Party figure other than Jim Harris. Many complained that they had no access to the party's media pipeline whatsoever, and that it was being used effectively as a self-promotional tool for Harris personally.

If Harris' objective was publicity, it was partially frustrated by his being excluded from the Canada-wide TV leaders' debate. Harris was also wrongly reported as being gay by one reporter in a mix-up with former leader Chris Lea. It was a difficult election in many ways, compounded by a leadership race that followed almost immediately after.

Since the election, the Party has been almost completely ignored by the media, leading some to question Harris' determination to bring the Party's message to the public, and certainly the performance criteria applied to Travis.

The loss of momentum has been blamed on several factors but that most often cited is that Harris is busy authoring a new book and interfering in Party internals rather than doing his job as Leader - which is to present the party's program to the public. It has been widely speculated that Harris seeks control of the platform to reinforce what is said in his book - using the platform as a book promotion.

Party directions

Despite GPC Constitution provisions that Leaders not direct Party internal affairs, Harris seems eager to manipulate the Party's internal processes to personal political advantage - several times he has been personally implicated in factional infighting that has seen removals, suspensions and resignations from the Green Party's internal Council. His favourite tactic seems to be to call "emergency" in camera meetings, making various claims about member, volunteer or staff morale, and demanding what he wants from the Council - sometimes threatening to resign.

He has denied funds to Shadow Cabinet, redirected funds from Living Platform development, and effectively put a press release author in control of all policy debate. He also has tried to target EDA fundraising and capacity-building as a threat to the central power he and the party's chief creditor Wayne Crookes wield over the party at present.

Mr. Harris is also somewhat infamous for organising purges of his Councillors who don't follow his lead, the latest among many being the Fundraising Chair who asked some serious questions about the party's plans to incorporate with only one director, the Chief Financial Officer, John Anderson, who has never submitted a financial statement to the membership. With an annual budget of over $1,000,000, many other Council members are also concerned, especially as Harris is also being investigated by Elections Canada for financial irregularities.

Harris has also refused to sign the nomination papers of locally selected candidates, and has frequently ignored the Party's constitution. Long lists of his violations of the Party's constitution circulated all through 2004 and early 2005.

On raucous internal GPC mailing lists it is common to see Harris ascerbically described as "misogynistic" and (likely the most amusing) as the GPC's "pointy-haired boss".

Threatened to resign

This has likely taken its toll. In mid-January 2005, Harris was rumoured to be close to quitting, having threatened on more than one occasion to "take his Rolodex with him," (according to Party insiders), and perhaps follow Russow in defaming the Party, its members and directions, discouraging donors and voters. It remains to be seen if he and his core group of followers are able to remain in "election readiness" in anticipation of a Canadian federal election, 2005 that might never come, or if Harris will resign the leadership to focus on his career as an author and speaker.

He has said that he would resign when the party elects the first Green Member to the Canadian House of Commons. Presumably that MP would be expected to become the Leader upon their election. Evidently Harris does not expect to be that MP. In the 2004 election, he ran in a hopeless race against New Democratic Party of Canada leader Jack Layton and long standing MP Dennis Mills, getting only 5.38%, behind the Conservative candidate at 6.21%.

A storm of protest over what detractors see as Harris' attempt to hijack policy and exclude talented female activists has led some to conclude that Harris cannot do more than remain a "lame duck" leader until the 2006 AGM. Several members of the Green Party's Council and Shadow Cabinet who were supported by Harris when elected have spoken strongly against him and what they describe as his dictatorial tactics within the party.

Meanwhile, more experienced politicians such as Sheila Copps, David Orchard and Green city councillor Elio Di Iorio have been rumoured as possible candidates to replace Harris.

External links

Harris, Jim Harris, Jim Harris, Jim

1993 GPO Leadership Contest

Hello,

Does anyone have any information about the 1993 GPO leadership campaign? Specifically: what was the final vote total, were there any other candidates besides Harris and de Jong, where did it take place, how many were in attendance? CJCurrie 00:50, 6 December 2005 (UTC)


Harris's clients

I've just reviewed Harris's business page -- and, in fact, all three of the companies previously listed in the article (GM, Honeywell, Mobil) appear on his list of clients. So too do numerous other companies. I'm not sure this qualifies as any sort of smoking gun -- for a motivational speaker to meet with such groups is not unusual, nor is it much different from a lawyer defending clients with a wide range of views (many of which are bound to diverge from his/her own).

If you can find a credible source (ie. not the GPC discussion board) which cites complaints against Harris on this front, it might be possible to return this information. Until then ... CJCurrie 23:01, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Btw, I still haven't found any info on the 1993 GPO leadership contest. CJCurrie 23:02, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Point by point examination

The most complete version of the article yet, with over fifty different references should be debated and examined point by point on this talk page. For one person to hide it from sight and comment and decide what is balanced or reasonable isn't the way things are usually done.

Anyone who sees the Canadian media can verify that the main attention Jim Harris has got in this election has been for the internal conflicts within his party - this is not a minor matter. Do a major media search (CBC, CP, CTV, Canwest, National Post) and you will discover that the biggest stories have been Harris' financial doings, his many conflicts with women within the party, the failure of the party to get its platform out the door, his absence during the campaign's kickoff, opening his campaign to an empty room, and so on. The ineptness is a story in itself, and it might be the only story worth reporting on this man who has no chance even of taking a seat in the Canadian House of Commons, and who won re-election by a very slim majority (54%) way down from his original 80%, even after a huge breakthrough. You have to wonder, what kind of guy is so hated that his support drops so far so fast even when he's increasing the vote by five or six times over the prior election? Neutrality also means honesty - not permitting people to turn this page into spam for their books and so on.

In a few sad cases, to give someone a 50-50 good-bad coverage is not neutral as a random poll of people who know him well or have worked with him would turn up a much lower ratio than that. The article doesn't make a big deal of the fact, for instance, that all his former assistants Matthew Pollesel, Robert Newman, Gabriel Draven, Hayley Easto, Michael Pilling are all totally and irreconcilably alienated from the guy, or that he ran through Matthew Day, Robin Green, Derek Pinto and Dan King as campaign managers in this election alone. For Harris more like 10-90 good-bad on his dealings with people in his own party, would be giving him a very nice break. In the field his track record is radically worse than that. Even Adolf Hitler had some people left with him in his bunker at the end. It's not sure that Harris will, at the rate he burns through people. He might have to be in a rising party just to make friends who don't know him yet.

Anyway it would be valuable to decide in an open process what the key facts are.

If you're concerned about this bio being used as a partisan platform to attack the Green Party of Canada, then, instead of trying for a bogus balance in this article, why not expand on Andrew Lewis, David Chernushenko, Michael Oddy, Frank De Jong, Lynette Tremblay and other Greens in Canada? [unsigned]

My response:

Some aspects of the previous posts are worth keeping. The problem is that the general presentation was rather amateurish, and some statements were over the top.

A few months ago, this page was effectively a battlefield between pro- and anti-Harris posters. The result was that the page was basically an unreadable polemic. I don't want to see this happen again.

You have to wonder, what kind of guy is so hated that his support drops so far so fast even when he's increasing the vote by five or six times over the prior election?

Even Adolf Hitler had some people left with him in his bunker at the end. It's not sure that Harris will, at the rate he burns through people.

Notwithstanding the legitimate criticisms of Harris, I think this may be a bit over the top as well. Perhaps someone could just reference Stuart Parker's essay, and that would be that. CJCurrie 18:00, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Bias and Neutral Point of View

There have been a whole pile of accusations added to the "Conflict and Controversy" section of this article. Some of those accusations are stated as simple fact, rather than identifying that they are accusations and who is making those accusations. There appears to be a bit of an edit war brewing here, involving anonymous contributors who seem intent on presenting a negative POV on the article's subject. Additionally, some of the content seems like it may fit better under a controversies heading for the Green Party of Canada article rather than this article.

So, I have a request to the anonymous contributors who want to include the accusations against Harris in this article: Please review the Neutral point of view policy and the tutorial before adding accusations to this (or any other) article. If you follow the directions there, your content is far more likely to remain in the article (which is what you want, isn't it?). --GrantNeufeld 10:20, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

This has been going on for quite some time. A year ago, this page was a battleground between pro- and anti-Harris groups within the Green Party. I've tried to resolve the matter, but the bad edits keep coming.

I would suggest removing the POV check notice, now that I've reverted it to a previous version. CJCurrie 17:59, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Murray Dobbin's articles

Murray Dobbin's articles on Jim Harris and the Green Party were extremely biased and factually innaccurate, to put it moderately. Furthermore, he is a partisan member of the NDP. (see *http://www.canadiandemocraticmovement.ca/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=791). I am a member of the Green Party so obviously I'm biased myself, but I don't see why Dobbin's propaganda deserves mention on Wikipedia.Nick.annejohn 19:04, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

  • The articles deserve to be mentioned as part of the debate on Harris's leadership. They are presented here as representations of the "anti-Harris" position, not as absolute or uncontested truth. (There is also a reference to Bill Huget's rebuttals of Dobbin's articles). CJCurrie 20:40, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
  • In that case it should at least be acknowledged that Dobbin is a member of the NDP, rather that presenting him as a neutral columnist.

Do we have conclusive proof that Dobbin is an NDP supporter? The article you've cited makes the allegation, but doesn't provide evidence. (I also have some concerns about the source). CJCurrie 20:23, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Not quite ... the link says he was involved with the New Politics Initiative, in an attempt to build a new party out of the NDP and other progressive forces (including some Greens, perhaps?). I'm not sure this makes him an NDP supporter now. CJCurrie 21:28, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Where to start?

I am not a Green. My suggestion to Greens (who I assume are most active here) are to adopt the recommendation above to seriously shorten this article and take out the he said/she said circus. He's in politics people are going to critize him, but that doesn't mean everyones story needs to be in here. Elio Di Iorio?. A politician with <1000 Google hits. Never heard of him before reading this article. Don't much care what he says. And so on and so on. You get the drift. There is a bunch of once briefly interesting, but now completely unencylopedic stuff in this article. Also, the whole potential leadership challenge speculation might barely qualify as wikipedia-worthy (although it's highly speculative), but it belongs in the main article on the Green Party, not here further muddling this article. Deet 02:16, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

  • I can't agree with his -- DiIorio was the only "elected Green" anywhere in the country when he made those statements, and it was fairly big news for the party. And since Harris is the current leader, speculation on a replacement is as valid here as anywhere. CJCurrie 03:50, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
  • It still seems a bit lowbrow to have comments like that in Wikipedia. I can think of a certain NDP MP from BC who stole a ring. I'm sure there are some interesting things that people have said about that guy over the years, but he has a perfectly cordial write-up. Why do we not owe the same to this living person? Just because there is a footnote reference, to me, does not suggest that we have a license to quote a bunch of insults and call it a good article. Deet 01:27, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
    • DiIorio was a senior figure in the party's apparatus, made the comment in a public letter. I'm not averse to adjusting the wording if it seems unfair; nonetheless, I don't think we should be shielding JH from comments like this. CJCurrie 22:08, 26 April 2006 (UTC)
      • The way I think about it, not that I'm always right, is that such extreme comments reflect more on DiIorio than Harris, and are therefore more appropriate in DiIorio's article (and they are there already). When an aide of Martin called Bush a moron, it was newsworthy for certain, but I wouldn't think we would put that in Bush's article, but rather into the article of the person who made it (or under anti-Americanism, or something else).Deet 01:50, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
        • True, but DiIorio made the comments in his resignation letter from the GPC executive (in which he castigated Harris for his leadership abilities). Perhaps we should ask for a third opinion. CJCurrie 03:41, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
          • This third opinion is to keep it. Political parties are usually black boxes, and very hard to get reliable information from. Resignation letters that actually name names are very very rare, and those coming from elected Green politicians in Canada simply don't exist other than this one. One purpose of open content is to draw together sources that aren't of interest to commercial media. Another is to give the public access to information that they need to make decisions, including political ones. That is, transparency is part of the basic principle of Wikipedia and all such projects. Aside from that, there's respect for the risks people take as whistleblowers, especially those facing opponents known to use libel chill. If Di Iorio thought the dealings in his party were so bad that he had to distance himself from them, and use such strong edge-of-incrimination language that he'd be both legally and politically accountable for, then his exact choice of words should be simply reported rather than paraphrased, and any known record that backs him up should be cited. Jim Harris has, or had, unfettered access to national media and the funds of a whole political party to make his case that his approach would bear fruit. Di Iorio by contrast had no such access. Harris' view is known to all of Canada. Di Iorio's view will only be heard by it being reported by journalists and article writers. Given that there are several resignation letters of similar tone to Di Iorio's, variously casting light on activities of Harris, or David Scrymgeour, or Wayne Crookes, or Dermod Travis, who effectively ran the party during this period, it is simply wrong to dismiss Di Iorio's concerns as unshared or not sourced. If you're unconvinced, read all the letters. Then decide.SimplePOVfix
            • I appreciate the thorough response. I wonder if we can also get some feedback from others who don't write solely on green party topics? Not that there's anything wrong with that, but some distance to this infighting might be useful. Deet 02:44, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

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