Stronach joins Liberal cabinet
Tory leader renews commitment to topple government Thursday

FROM CANADIAN PRESS

OTTAWA — In a stunning political move that could save Paul Martin’s government, high-profile Tory MP Belinda Stronach has defected to the Liberals.

Martin sat beside a smiling Stronach at a surprise news conference today, welcomed his new caucus member and named her human resources minister.

He also said she will be in charge of implementing clean-government measures after the sponsorship inquiry reports.

Stronach’s departure is a blow to the Tories on multiple levels — starting with a confidence vote Thursday in the House of Commons.

The government can now likely survive with the support of two Independent MPs, instead of all three.

There was laughter at a news conference when the prime minister said the move had nothing to do with Thursday’s vote.

“I’ve got to tell you, I can count,” Martin said to snickers.

“The significance is that on Thursday, members of Parliament will stand and will be counted in the most-watched vote of the last 25 years.”

If the Liberals were hoping to weaken their rivals on the eve of the crucial vote, they couldn’t have ????ed a more dramatic defection.

In one fell swoop, the new Conservative party lost one of its founding figures, its trade critic, its loudest left-leaning voice, a leadership aspirant, a young, female, Ontario MP with personal ties to the party’s deputy leader Peter MacKay.

Stronach let it be known for weeks that she was unhappy with Tory Leader Stephen Harper’s decision to seek an election.

She said the Tories should have held off on an election until the party had grown in Quebec. The separatist Bloc Quebecois is currently poised to sweep the province.

“I find myself at a crossroads forced on me by the decision of the leader of the Conservative party to try to force the defeat of this government,” she said.

“I’ve been uncomfortable for some time with the direction the leader of the Conservative party has been taking.”

Stronach voiced those disaffections last week when she met ????er Ontario Liberal premier David Peterson at a public event in Toronto.

Peterson promptly called Tim Murphy, a ????er Ontario Liberal MPP and now the No. 1 official in the Prime Minister’s Office.

By last night, Stronach and Martin were hammering out a deal over dinner at 24 Sussex Drive.

After that meeting, she called MacKay – to whom she had been romantically linked – and told him what had happened.

MacKay was gobsmacked, said one of his confidants. He picked up the phone and broke the news to Harper this morning.

Harper said some members feel “devastated” and “betrayed,” but added he is “relieved that we’ve at least gone through this before an election.”

“There’s no grand principle involved in this decision, just ambition,” he said.

“I told my wife only a few days ago that I thought it had become obvious to Belinda that her leadership ambitions would not be reached in this party regardless of whether or not we won the next election.”

Harper acknowledged that given the extremely close numbers in the House, the defection makes the defeat of the government Thursday much less likely.

But he maintained that the caucus is united in trying to force an election, calling the Liberals corrupt.

Two weeks ago, Stronach warned that defeating the federal budget in the confidence vote might be a bad move that could backfire on the Conservatives.

She said critical portions of the budget — particularly the billions promised for municipal infrastructure — were extremely important to individuals in her riding north of Toronto and other constituencies in the area.

One of her aides hinted at the time that she might not oppose the Liberals in a confidence vote.