By Andrew Macdonald
Nine month MLA Elizabeth Smith-McCrossin of Amherst is getting a major boost in her quest to become the next leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Nova Scotia.
While seen as a wild shot to take over the party, nonetheless her leadership candidacy has major credibility because Tory powerhouse Scott Armstrong is chairing her leadership bid.
Armstrong, a Brookfield resident, and now school principal, is the former MP for Cumberland Colchester. Within the Tory party, when Armstrong speaks, people tend to listen and it’s no understatement to say he has lots of tentacles throughout the rank and file.
Along with solid Tory Janet Fryday Dorey, Armstrong ran Jamie Baillie’s campaign last spring, when Baillie came within two seats of pushing the Liberals into a minority government
The 48-year-old Smith-McCrossin was elected as Cumberland North MLA in last spring’s general election.
She is a nurse of 26 years, and a businesswoman with an MBA degree from St. Mary’s University in 2011, but is not a household name in the province so her campaign is an uphill battle.
She says she is happy to have Armstrong running her campaign, and her campaign kickoff this week in the border town of Amherst attracted 60 Tories, while fellow campaigner Cecil Clarke had a robust crowd of 600 folk at his own kickoff last weekend in North Sydney.
Significantly for Clarke’s prospects, the crowd contained a large contingent from vote-rich Halifax, and he was introduced to the crowd by one of Halifax’s most dedicated Tory party workers, David Henderson, a former boss at the Halifax Port Authority.
As for Armstrong’s endorsement, Smith-McCrossin says: “I am certainly happy to have his support. He is simply amazing. I am very grateful”.
The fact Armstrong is endorsing her campaign is leading to political pundit talk that Irene MacLeod most likely will also vote for Smith-McCrossin.
The Antigonish-based MacLeod has been described to me as the “best Tory organizer” in the Maritimes.
Married to nursing home tycoon Brian MacLeod, Irene is best known as ensuring Rodney MacDonald won the PC leadership in recent years.
He was seen as an also-ran candidate, but Irene ensured MacDonald became party leader and premier at a 2005 PC leadership convention, pulling of an upset as he defeated prominent businessman, Bill Black.
Irene MacLeod also ran Armstrong’s campaign in 2015 in Cumberland Colchester, but Armstrong was defeated that year by Tory-turned-Liberal, Bill Casey.
Cape Breton-born Irene has been in touch with Smitt-Mccrossin.
During Smith-McCrossin’s 30-minute interview this week by The Macdonald Notebook, I asked if Irene is onboard her campaign team.
“All I will say is that Irene has been very encouraging, and helpful.
“I’ve had numerous conversations with her. Irene is a strong woman, and she is intelligent and I actually sought her out and asked for her advice — and she has been very helpful.”
Irene cut her teeth in Tory politics 35 years ago as a PC Youth toiler in the 1983 federal leadership race, which Brian Mulroney won.
During the Mulroney tenure from 1984 to 1993, Irene and Brian MacLeod were frequent guests of Brian and Mila Mulroney at 24 Sussex Drive in Ottawa.
So powerful were the MacLeods in those years that both were written about in the must-read expose On The Take, a best seller by Stevie Cameron during the Mulroney era.
