CALGARY — Life without Stephen Harper as leader has never been on the Conservative radar . . . until now.

Don’t get me wrong. The delegates who are gathered in Calgary for a national convention did not come here bearing knives to throw at the wounded prime minister.

The majority of them may not even be angry at Harper. But they suspect that he is now damaged goods.

Over the past few weeks they have seen public anger with the Senate turn into pointed questions about how fit for office their leader is.

They have watched the opposition parties openly laugh at Harper and the latter twist himself into a pretzel in the House of Commons.

Related:

· Conservatives float referendum on Senate abolition

· Harper calls courts enemy of Senate reform

More than a few have been at a loss to understand a PMO strategy that has raised the profile of the Senate fiasco to unprecedented heights.

Those who had held their breath in the expectation that Harper would use his keynote speech to the convention Friday night to regain the initiative did so in vain. He rehashed his recent Throne speech. On the Senate he essentially stuck to the question period lines that have so far done little to extricate his government from the controversy.

After almost eight years in power Harper seems to have run out of windmills to lead his troops against.

The gun registry is no more.

Conservative efforts to frame the environmental movement as a public enemy have backfired on Canada’s energy agenda.

Attempts to define Justin Trudeau as unworthy of the job of prime minister have foundered on the fact that many Canadians feel they have a long-standing connection with the Liberal leader — and believe they share the same values.

The prime minister would relish an epic battle with the NDP on trade with Europe but so far Thomas Mulcair is refusing to accommodate him.

Looking at the resolutions that have made their way into the Calgary convention handbook, it seems that the best the Harperites have come up with is to pick a fight with the labour movement.

But anectodal evidence suggests that the issue does not truly galvanize the Conservative base or at least not in the way of some of the hot-button battles of the recent past.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Government spin doctors are pushing the notion Harper still has an unbeatable economic ace up his sleeve.

But if the experience of Paul Martin is any indication, decent economic credentials or even sterling ones are not a panacea for a poorly managed corrosive scandal.

Harper’s moral authority has always rested on the notion that he was best placed to lead the Conservatives to electoral victory.

That central idea has taken a major hit over the past months and the repercussions of that hit are being felt in the hallways of the Calgary gathering.

If anyone still had doubts that Jason Kenney had emerged as a force in his own right, this convention would dismiss them. Upon their arrival in Calgary many delegates received what they could only construe as a loud signal that the influential human resources minister is increasingly keeping to his own counsel.

Kenney’s public defence of former chief of staff Nigel Wright’s probity — coming on the heels of startling efforts by the prime minister to portray his former aide as the villain in the Duffy affair — could hardly be described as the move of a mate coming to the rescue of his team’s quarterback. Justice Minister Peter MacKay has now joined Kenney in his defence of Wright.

Meanwhile junior Minister Maxime Bernier jumped in front of the Senate parade with a call for a national referendum on Senate reform

Fears that Kenney may be taking the inside track on Harper’s succession are setting off a predictable chain reaction.

As one potential leadership aspirant put it recently, sitting on one’s hands while Kenney builds a prohibitive lead is just not an option.

And so, increasingly, the shape of Conservative life after Harper is taking precedence over efforts to breathe new life into the incumbent’s government. On Friday the prime minister could have used a keynote speech that would have pushed the leadership toothpaste back into the tube. It is unlikely to have done that.

Chantal Hébert is a national affairs writer. Her column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

Read more about: