MONTREAL—By the time Andrew Scheer came to the inevitable conclusion that he was a dead man walking, few political strategists — be they Conservative or Liberal — still expected him to lead his party in another federal election.

In their best-case scenario, the Liberals clung to the hope that Scheer would drag his party through a messy battle before conceding the obvious in the face of a mediocre score on a vote of confidence at a spring convention.

If anything united the critics that had aligned against the Conservative leader since the election, it was a common will to avoid a destructive battle by pushing Scheer out the door before the end of the year.

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Weeks before Thursday’s resignation, minds in Conservative backrooms had already turned to the succession, and with good reason.

As the post-Thomas Mulcair case of the federal NDP has illustrated, there is a special place in electoral hell for parties that ditch a leader without having thought things through to the morning after his or her departure.

If only because time is of the essence, the Conservatives cannot have their leadership campaign turn into a second amateur talent show.

Minority rule does not lend itself to the selection of a federal leader on training wheels.

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The campaign for Stephen Harper’s succession unfolded under the (faulty) assumption that Justin Trudeau was guaranteed two terms.

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It may help focus Conservative minds that most party members will come to this leadership vote thinking they are picking the prime-minister-in-waiting

In fact, a Liberal defeat in the next election is anything but preordained.

Yes, Trudeau has just had a hard time prevailing over a particularly weak opposition field. But he also won despite being loaded by an uncommon amount of baggage.

The last time a Trudeau-led campaign resulted in a Liberal minority government in 1972, the party was back in the majority saddle two years later.

Harper defeated three consecutive Liberal leaders before losing to Trudeau.

And then Scheer is leaving his successor a smaller party tent than the one he inherited. The party’s strong showing in Western Canada camouflages a crippling weakness east of Manitoba.

Fixing that will require more than electing a more compelling salesperson to sell voters on the same offering.

That being said, if the Conservatives are serious about forming a government the next time around, selecting a leader more in tune with 2019 values on LGBTQ rights and even abortion rights should really be a no-brainer.

It has already been four years since the Conservatives voted to abandon the battle for maintaining the heterosexual definition of marriage. And, by now, the only political fight still ongoing over the right to abortion in Canada is taking place within the confines of their party.

Bringing the Conservative party closer to the mainstream on climate change will require a defter touch but here again, a turn of the provincial tide may facilitate an overdue course correction.

Even as Scheer’s Conservatives were still proclaiming that they would never support a carbon tax this month, Premier Jason Kenney was working on a made-in-Alberta carbon tax on his province’s large industrial emitters.

In New Brunswick, Blaine Higgs’s Tory government has just put the finishing touches on a provincial carbon tax.

In Ontario, the federal results might well inspire Doug Ford’s Tories to shift to a more climate-friendly discourse in time for the next provincial election.

The task of bringing the party base around to a more activist stance on climate change would likely be easier for a candidate with solid credentials in the Prairies.

On that score, it is probably no accident that both Kenney and former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall have already talked up a leadership bid by Rona Ambrose. The former Conservative interim leader may be the candidate the Liberals fear most.

For Trudeau, Scheer’s resignation amounts, at best, to a short-term gain in exchange for potentially long-term pain.

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Until the Conservatives pick a permanent leader, the government should be relatively safe from a vote of non-confidence.

But an early change at the Conservative party helm stands to shorten the already abbreviated timeline of a hung Parliament.

If the leadership campaign results in a boost for the party in voting intentions, the Conservatives could be on the lookout for an opportunity to bring the government down by this time next year.

A note in closing: Based on their throne speech, the Liberals have selected climate change as the hill they are hoping to win back a majority on. At the same time, a good part of the Conservative leadership conversation is widely expected to be devoted to the need to make the party battle-ready for that fight.

But if Ottawa and the provinces move closer to a consensus between now and the next federal campaign and if, as many predict, the economy slows down, they could all be getting ready to fight the last war.