Federal and provincial Tories fight over membership lists
In the run-up to the June 27 leadership contest among Ontario’s Progressive Conservatives, the federal party is claiming that the provincial party misused the national party’s membership list, the Toronto Star reports. Doug Finley, the federal party’s director of political operations, complained to all four provincial PC leadership candidates about their use of the list in an effort to recruit new members. “I would like to remind all campaign teams that Conservative party data is the property of the Conservative Party of Canada and is not to be used by any of the leadership campaign teams in any form,” Finley wrote in a letter to PC senior officials. “We will continue to monitor the situation and will take the necessary action to ensure compliance.” Meanwhile, Ken Zeise, president of the Ontario Tory party, recognized that privacy laws mean parties must guard their lists closely, and said Finley’s letter is moot because the cutoff to join the party to vote passed at 10 pm last night.