TORONTO

This past week marked four years since I ran as the first candidate — and the first openly gay one — in the St. Paul’s byelection for then brand new PC Leader Tim Hudak.

In a feature I wrote in this newspaper after that byelection, which I lost to Liberal MPP Eric Hoskins, I said I had no regrets and no hard feelings.

I feel exactly the same way today.

Blizzard: PCs should stick with Tim Hudak

That summer, I chalked up the party’s missteps and disorganization to Hudak’s inexperience.

Sadly, I see very little change in the four years since.

Hudak and the team of “trusted advisers” around him — comprised of both has-beens from the Mike Harris era and inexperienced wannabes who have no understanding of the grassroots members — have not evolved.

He does not connect with voters and unlike Prime Minister Stephen Harper, the Hudak team has not learned anything from their failures. Harper and his team have worked to gain traction with the urban vote — ethnic, gay, you name it — to win seats in Toronto.

Doug Holyday’s win in Etobicoke-Lakeshore this past summer — gaining the party a toehold in the long-coveted 416 area code — was because of the respect voters had for Holyday, not an attachment to the Hudak brand.

Many are quick to blame the party’s policies. I disagree. It’s the party’s inability to sell those policies.

For the sake of the party’s fortunes in the next general election, I believe Hudak must go.

But let’s be clear, it’s not how I feel that matters in the end.

It’s what would-be voters think about Hudak. With all the scandals that have plagued the Liberals — he repeated cost overruns on any project they touch, the coverups on the gas plant file, the debt that rises every hour and the incessant pandering to teachers unions — Hudak’s numbers should be skyrocketing.

Instead, the PCs have lost nine of 11 byelections, not to mention the 2011 general election, called since Hudak became leader.

A recently released Abacus poll shows that voters disgruntled with the Liberals and Premier Kathleen Wynne are turning to the NDP under Andrea Horwath, not Hudak.

Not only have the PC numbers stagnated, but only one-third of those polled (less than a month ago) see Hudak as an effective candidate for premier, likable and honest. This compares to the 60% who feel Horwath is likable and 54% who think she is honest.

So, if the delegates attending this weekend’s PC policy convention in London were really honest with themselves, they’d send Hudak and his team a strong message by voting for the motion by 10 brave longtime London party members to begin a leadership review.

The PC leader will survive but not because of his popularity.

Since the motion came to light in August, Hudak’s team of insiders and loyal MPPs — all with their own vested interests — have worked overtime to bully would-be PC candidates, delegates and the party executive into submission.

His critics — outspoken Randy Hillier and Frank Klees — have been sidelined. A perceived threat — his loyal finance critic Peter Shurman — was thrown under the bus in a very public way.

As one candidate told me this week: “People are shrugging their shoulders … nobody has enough energy left to fight to keep him or not.”

In another breath, this candidate conceded that the party membership is “not excited” or “invigorated” and party donations are way down.

The fact that the vote will be taken by a show of hands — while Hudak insiders take names — and not by secret ballot is very telling.

Longtime London party member Arn Brown, one of the 10 who moved the motion for a leadership review, believes that people “will vote with their feet” — that there will be a very low turnout to the convention this weekend, as few as 500 compared to the usual 1,400.

So sadly, even if Hudak survives this weekend, it will be Pyrrhic victory.

He will carry on with the same team around him and learning nothing from what should have been a strong wake-up call. That was clear considering that he called the challenge to his leadership “a minor squabble” at a Friday morning press conference.

“Every party has these types,” Hudak said, speaking of his opposition. “You are always going to have some folks that want to focus on constitutional amendments and squabbles … I see the PC party as a team ready to go.”