OTTAWA–The Conservative party is downplaying the threat Maxime Bernier’s new splinter party poses.

Conservative house leader Candice Bergen says her party is “paying attention” but is not “overly concerned” about Bernier’s People’s Party of Canada.

Bernier, a Quebec MP who left the Conservative party last month, launched his party during a Friday press conference.

“Conservatives are frustrated that he’s done this, because it would appear to be pretty self-serving, and not for the good of the country (or) beating Justin Trudeau,” Bergen said in an interview.

“Any smart political party, or smart political organization would pay attention when something like this happens. So we’re watching.”

“(But) it’s one thing to tweet a few things out … and it’s another to start a massive movement. I just don’t see a massive groundswell, but we have to pay attention, so we are.”

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Bernier finished a close second to Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer in the party’s 2017 leadership campaign. But after a year of uneasy peace between the Beauce MP and the Conservative caucus, Bernier announced he’d start a new political movement, calling his former party too “morally and intellectually corrupt” to reform.

The People’s Party of Canada (PPC) will have largely the same platform as Bernier’s leadership bid — a mixture of populist and libertarian ideas that would substantially reduce the federal government’s role in health care and economic development, sharply reduce immigration, and scrap the Liberal government’s carbon pricing plans.

Bernier did not shy away from the “populist” characterization, but said the PPC would stand for “smart populism.”

Most of Friday’s press conference focused on Bernier’s recent criticisms of “ever more diversity” and “extreme multiculturalism” in Canada, and his insistence that new immigrants must share loosely-defined “Canadian values.”

Bernier’s new language around immigration mirrors that of former leadership rival Kellie Leitch, who Bernier dismissed as a “karaoke version of Donald Trump” for proposing a values test for newcomers.

When asked directly if he had any evidence newcomers were not adopting Canadian values, Bernier said he wasn’t suggesting that was currently the case. When asked if he would accept the support of Canadians who oppose immigration on xenophobic grounds, Bernier said no.

“They don’t have a place in our party,” Bernier said, specifically referring to anti-Semites and people who want to close Canada completely to new immigrants.

“I don’t share these values. It’s clear.”

To deliver on his promise to run a candidate in every federal riding in next fall’s election, Bernier will need more than a party name and a platform. He will have to find 337 more candidates, develop a national network of volunteers and riding associations, and raise a lot of money.

But Bernier doesn’t have to accomplish all of that to play spoiler for the Conservative party and his former leadership rival Scheer. Nominating enough credible candidates in key battlegrounds — like the GTA and Quebec — could leach away enough support to hurt Bernier’s former colleagues.

But pollster Darrell Bricker, CEO of Ipsos Public Affairs, said he doesn’t see a natural constituency for Bernier’s mix of populism and libertarian ideals — unlike previous splinter parties like the Reform party or the Bloc Québécois.

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“In the province of Alberta, where it seems like most of this is coming from right now, (the Conservatives) have got votes to waste,” Bricker said in an interview with the Star.

“There’s so many things that you need in order for something like this to really bite in terms of really having a political impact that he doesn’t have together. You never want to say never because we got a long way to go here, and … maybe there’s something there. But you try to put it together in a logical sense, and it’s hard to see.”

Bernier said Friday the party has received $140,000 in donations from around 2,000 members, and that despite not yet having his party registered, they are complying with Elections Canada fundraising laws. Martin Masse, Bernier’s longtime staffer, and Maxime Hupé, his press secretary, are the only two employees on the new party’s payroll, Bernier said.

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