Doug Ford is making a campaign stop in Sudbury on Tuesday as part of his bid to win the Progressive Conservative leadership.

He will hold a rally from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Caruso Club’s lower hall. Go to www.FordForLeader.ca for more information.

Ford, a former Toronto city councillor and the brother of the late and controversial Toronto mayor Rob Ford, is one of five people seeking the leadership. The job came open when Patrick Brown suddenly stepped down after accusations of sexual misconducted surfaced.

Brown, however, is now trying to win the job back. Also running are Christine Elliott, a former PC cabinet minister, Caroline Mulroney, a lawyer and the daughter or former prime ministry Brian Mulroney, and Tanya Granic Allen, a critic of the Liberal government’s reforms for sex education in Ontario’s schools.

Mulroney was in Sudbury on Monday of this week, where she pledged to double Northern Ontario Heritage Funding to $200 million.

Brown, meanwhile, has the support of Troy Crowder, who will run for the PCs in Sudbury in June’s provincial election, as well as a number of sitting MPPs.

Ford was in Peterborough this week, where he said the Progressive Conservatives need to take a more grassroots approach to defeat the Liberals, who have governed Ontario since 2003.

"I’m going to stand up to the bureaucrats, to the politicians, all the insiders, the elites, the establishment," Ford told the crowd.

"Make no mistake about it, there’s the Liberals and our own party — the same people have been running this province, and our own party, and have failed for 15 years to win. Because they won’t stand up for the grassroots."

He was greeted with applause where he told the crowd he would "axe the carbon tax."

Ford said Ontario businesses are being "taxed to death" by Premier Kathleen Wynne’s government and households and businesses are being hit with unnecessarily high hydro rates and property taxes.

If elected, "we are going to go down to the border and put up a big neon sign saying ‘Ontario is open for business,’" Ford told the crowd.

Party members are voting March 2 to 8 for a new leader. The winner, to be announced at a March 10 convention, will lead the party in the June 7 provincial election.

A Forum Research poll published Monday shows the party at 49 per cent support, with Premier Kathleen Wynne’s governing Liberals at 24 per cent and the NDP at 19 per cent. The poll of 949 people was conducted Friday and Saturday.

On Friday, Caroline Mulroney sharpened her attacks on Ford and her other rivals, even as she urges them to support her calls for the party’s former leader to back out of the contest.

She took aim at Elliott and Ford in a news conference ostensibly aimed at getting them to side with her against Brown.

Mulroney has urged Brown to abandon his bid to reclaim his old job, which he gave up late last month amid sexual misconduct allegations he maintains are false.

Both Elliott and Ford have so far said they’re focused on their own leadership campaigns since the party gave Brown the green light to proceed in the contest earlier this week.

On Friday, Mulroney questioned Elliott’s commitment to the Progressive Conservatives, saying the former health-care ombudsman gave up on politics to take a high-profile job from the governing Liberals.

She also criticized Ford’s fiscal savvy, saying his "on-the-fly" policies would cost the province billions of dollars.

— with files from Canadian Press and Postmedia