OTTAWA—The good news for the beleaguered federal Liberal party is that more than a dozen people believe it has a future — one they wouldn’t mind steering.

And now that interim Liberal Leader Bob Rae has bowed out of contention for the leadership vote next April, the field of potential candidates seems to be exploding.

Liberal party president Mike Crawley has been saying he expects at least a half-dozen prospective candidates to be on the barbecue circuit this summer, scouting out their chances.

Crawley may have been lowballing the number. A scan of the names floating out there as potential leadership candidates reveals nearly triple that figure. It’s not just the usual suspects, but a whole array of Liberals — some known, others not so known — who see themselves in the top job.

So here, in case you happen to run across one or more of them in your neighbourhood or backyard, is the list of people who are having summer dreams of Liberal leadership.

When or Whether?

Current MPs who are thinking about running

Justin Trudeau: He’s the best-known, most-discussed, non-candidate in the Liberal leadership race — the second-term MP for the Montreal riding of Papineau. Even before Rae announced this month that he wouldn’t be running for the permanent job, pressure was building for the 40-year-old Trudeau to enter the race. According to his backers, Trudeau is the only one with the star power to resuscitate the Liberal brand and put some sizzle into the leadership race. He ruled himself out as a candidate in 2011, saying he was troubled by how many people were expecting him to be the heir to the legacy and reputation of his prime minister dad, Pierre Trudeau. And, equally importantly, he said his family — wife, Sophie, and children Xavier, 4, and Ella, 3 — come ahead of any political aspirations at the moment. But then there was the boxing match earlier this year against Conservative tough-guy senator Patrick Brazeau. Trudeau’s surprise victory had people taking a new look at him, if only because it was one of the few wins that Liberals have been able to enjoy in recent years. Rae’s withdrawal has also increased the pressure on Trudeau. He still says he’s not swayed by people who are evoking his father’s name or Liberal strategists who are looking for a quick fix to the party’s woes. But Trudeau is listening to younger people, who say he represents generational change in the party. Of all the arguments out there, these are the ones that will persuade him. He’s thinking things over this summer, after a holiday with the family, and it’s starting to look like a leadership run will be almost impossible to resist.

Dominic LeBlanc: The 44-year-old MP for the New Brunswick riding of Beausejour came very close to running in 2008, after Stéphane Dion stepped down, and he has many backroom veterans who are keen to work on his leadership campaign. The son of former governor-general Romeo LeBlanc, a close friend since childhood to Justin Trudeau, and an aide to former prime minister Jean Chrétien, LeBlanc has deep roots in the party and a sense of humour that has earned him friends all over the political map. Last weekend, LeBlanc was one of three prospective leadership candidates who appeared on CTV’s Question Period. They all made it clear they were actively weighing their chances. LeBlanc tentatively scoped out a candidacy rooted in rebuilding Liberal bridges between French and English solitudes in the country, where he’s been travelling a lot lately to assess the kind of backing he’d get for a leadership run. “I still think there is a huge appetite for a reinvigorated, renewed Liberal party that offers Canadians a different government, a different vision of the country,” he said. “One of the most pressing challenges for us is to be relevant in French Canada. Obviously in francophone Quebec, but I represent a francophone riding outside Quebec.. . . I think the low-hanging fruit for us has been to be in French Canada, and . . . we need to select a leader who’s absolutely, fluently bilingual. We need somebody who can speak to both linguistic groups in the country.”

Marc Garneau: He’s Canada’s first man in space and now a 63-year-old politician with nearly four years of Commons experience under his belt as the MP for the Montreal-area riding of Westmount-Ville-Marie. He is also leaning strongly toward a run for the next leadership contest. Here is a bit of what he had to say on Question Period last week: “I’m looking at it seriously . . . And what I mean by seriously is that I’m doing my homework. Obviously you can’t let your ego get in the way if you decide that you’re going to look into running in a race. You mustn’t let yourself be deluded into thinking that a lot of people support you if they don’t.. . . If you’re going to go into a race, you have to have a vision to present. I certainly have been working on that part of it, and I think that’s what’s going to make the competition interesting.”

David McGuinty: He got himself into a bit of family trouble late last year when he started talking to the media about whether his older brother, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, should run for the leadership. “He kind of knows what he is doing, and the team he built is a high performing team,” McGuinty, 52, told an Ottawa columnist. This prompted the premier to tell reporters at Queen’s Park that David McGuinty would be sitting at the kids’ table at Christmas dinner. So nowadays, the MP for Ottawa South is only talking about his own leadership musings. And he is keeping his name out there, testing to see where he would find support. Last January, at the big Liberal convention in Ottawa, David McGuinty told reporters he was sounding out possible supporters “in a quiet way.” If he decides to enter the race this summer, that outreach will be less quiet.

Denis Coderre: His ambition is not a secret and there is obviously a reason that Coderre, 48, has amassed such a wide network of contacts in Quebec in his 15 years as an MP for Bourassa. A former immigration minister, Coderre reached into cultural communities in the same way that the current minister in that job, Jason Kenney, has for the Conservatives. Coderre’s network has been put at the service of prime ministers Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin and their successors as Liberal leaders. (Though a tussle with Michael Ignatieff resulted in Coderre’s resignation as Quebec lieutenant in 2009.) Over the summer, Coderre says he wants to get out and about, and see whether he’s more interested in pursuing the job of mayor of Montreal or leader of the federal Liberal party. Coderre’s great strength would be his base in Quebec, and he would be his own best organizer.

Scott Brison: One of the contenders in 2006, a former Progressive Conservative from the Nova Scotia riding of Kings-Hants, Brison should almost be automatically expected to enter the 2013 contest. He was one of the few candidates who made the economy front and centre in the last race. And with the economy a hotter issue today than it was seven years ago, the timing seems ideal for a Brison candidacy. However, there’s been another change in his circumstances. He married his partner Maxime St. Pierre in 2007 and within the next year or so, they hope to add a child to their household. Brison, 48, says he will be mulling all of this over during the summer, but always putting his family first. He acknowledges he’s getting some offers of help and support for a future candidacy, but at this point, he’s not in the race.

Ralph Goodale: The longest-serving of all the MPs in the current Liberal caucus, with experience in the Commons dating back to the 1970s, Goodale is not likely to run, when all is said and done. He’s one of the few candidates who has actually headed a political party, as Saskatchewan Liberal leader through the 1980s. Some Liberals would like to see a voice from the West in this contest. So Goodale, 62, is listening and thinking about it over the summer. It would be a surprise, though, if he did enter the race, and his lack of fluency in French would hold him back. More likely, Goodale will stay in the role where his steady counsel and experience is valued, as deputy to interim leader Rae.

Comeback Kids

Past MPs and leadership contenders considering encores

Gerard Kennedy: In the 2006 leadership campaign, Kennedy was a significant figure. The former Ontario education minister had the backing of Justin Trudeau and signed up more new members than any other candidate. His decision to move his support to Dion on the convention floor made him the kingmaker in that contest — though that distinction became more controversial through Dion’s troubled tenure as leader. Kennedy, 52, lost his Parkdale-High Park seat in the 2011 election and is now a professor at the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University. But he also appears regularly as a Liberal commentator and on his Facebook page, Kennedy has posted stories featuring his name as a possible contender for the next leadership race.

Martha Hall-Findlay: Though she came in last in the 2006 leadership and still owes $60,000 from that campaign, former Willowdale MP Hall-Findlay has made it clear that she wants to be seen as a serious and potential contender in the next race. Since being defeated in the 2011 election, Hall-Findlay has kept up a profile as a pundit and frequent speaker on the speech circuit. She’ll be 53 in August. On Question Period last week, Hall-Findlay said she’d stepped up her leadership consideration after Rae’s announcement. “The support that we’ve been getting and the encouragement, especially over the last few days, has been overwhelming, and both in terms of support as volunteers, but also in terms of support financially,” she said, noting that a huge job awaits the next leader. “There’s a great deal of work to be done. There is a lot of rebuilding. This party hasn’t been a national party for a long time, so the people who are running . . . shouldn’t be looking at it as the job it used to be.”

Mark Holland: At 37, he’s the youngest of the MPs and former MPs who are considered possible leadership material. When he was the Liberal MP for Ajax-Pickering, he had a habit of getting under the skin of the Conservatives — a skill that wouldn’t be regarded as a bad thing in a Liberal leader. Holland lost a close-fought battle in his riding in 2011 against star Conservative candidate Chris Alexander. Since then, he’s been working at the Heart and Stroke Foundation, but also as a regular pundit on TV, keeping his political profile high for an expected return to public life. But he’s one of only a couple of the rumoured candidates who didn’t reply to repeated inquiries about his plans, so he may already see himself as a long shot.

Martin Cauchon: The former justice minister in Chretien’s cabinet, now a lawyer with the Heenan Blaikie firm, has been flirting with a return to politics almost since he left in 2004. He considered leadership runs in 2003, 2006 and 2008, and he tried to return to elected politics as a Liberal candidate in 2011. But Cauchon was defeated in his former Outremont riding by the man who now leads the NDP, Thomas Mulcair. Cauchon’s interest in the leadership remains undaunted however. He hosted a hospitality suite at the Liberal convention in Ottawa earlier this year and acknowledged in an email to the Star that he would be out this summer talking to Liberals across Canada about his leadership prospects. He’ll be turning 50 in August.

Borys Wrzesnewskyj: On July 10, the former MP for Etobicoke Centre will be at the Supreme Court of Canada, arguing for last year’s election results be overturned in his riding. One court has already done just that — the Ontario Superior Court ruled that technical irregularities call for the vote to be held over again. If the Supreme Court agrees in this appeal hearing requested by the Tories, Wrzesnewskyj, 51, will be running to reclaim a seat he lost by just 26 votes to Conservative Ted Opitz. That battle is at the front of his mind right now, but he’s also content to let his name float as a potential leadership contender. He believes the Liberals should be using the next contest to reshape the party of “pragmatic, good governance coupled with idealism.” Wrzesnewskyj, before becoming an MP in 2004, was a successful businessman, founder of the Future Bakery in Toronto.

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Who?

Some not-exactly-household names

George Takach: A well-respected technology lawyer in Toronto, Takach, 54, has been testing the waters, confirming to the Star this week that conversations are ongoing in Liberal circles. His big interests lie in using his tech-sector experience to “turbocharge” the economy and address unemployment and underemployment among Canada’s young people. “I also want to start intelligent discussions around bold policy initiatives like repealing our policy of telling Canadians they can’t exercise their own judgment when it comes to a relatively safe substance like marijuana (which costs us massively in so many ways), and reconsidering our approach to supply management,” Takach said. He has a background paper he’s circulating to Liberals, which acknowledges his relative-unknown status in any future race. “While many will say they want to lead the Liberal party and Canada through the 21st century, George has the unique skills to do that successfully, having amassed legal, societal and technological expertise that is truly one of a kind; expertise that transcends conventional political experience. . . While other politicians have spent their lives focusing on getting re-elected, George has spent his championing innovation and how it can fuel both economic growth and societal change.”

David Bertschi: He ran unsuccessfully as the Liberal candidate in the Ottawa-Orleans riding in 2011 and, almost since that defeat, has had his eyes on a higher prize — the leadership. A formal “exploratory committee” has been highly active at Liberal events and on social media. He even enlisted the help of a professional U.S. filmmaker, Lucas Baiano, to create some ads and buzz, as the CBC’s Alison Crawford reported earlier this year. Baiano is the same filmmaker used by U.S. presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, John McCain and Tim Pawlenty. The Bertschi ads, in fact, bore a strong resemblance to the ads done for Pawlenty, and were presumably expensive — a measure, one assumes, of Bertschi’s commitment to prospective candidacy. This week, Bertschi, 52, will be holding a pub night in Toronto’s Leslieville as part of what appears to be a very busy campaign to build a leadership bid from the grassroots.

Deborah Coyne: She’s been creating a platform for herself with her blog, Canadians Without Borders, and isn’t ruling out the prospect of turning these ideas into a full-fledged leadership run. She’s a passionate advocate for more vision in politics, summing up her own vision for Canada this way: “Our destiny must be to show the world that a progressive multi-ethnic democracy can thrive in the 21st century and be a model of good governance and good citizenship for a troubled world.” Though Coyne lost as the Liberal candidate against NDP leader Jack Layton in 2006, in the riding of Toronto-Danforth, she has also made it clear in subsequent years that she would like to be more active in elected politics. And like most cited in this article, she agreed to let her name be floated in this long list of leadership aspirants. For people with long memories in Canadian politics, Coyne, 57, is probably best known as the mother of 21-year-old Sarah Coyne, the only daughter of the late prime minister Pierre Trudeau. A contest that pitted Coyne against Justin Trudeau could introduce a soap-operatic angle, to say the least.

Jonathan Mousley: Like the man who is now prime minister, Mousley is a former political aide and economist. He has a web page, in which he explains why he’s thinking of stepping out of the shadow of the civil service and the party backrooms to take a run for the top Liberal job. “We can’t move our party forward by looking back. We can’t expect that our Liberal brand — however successful it may have been in the past — will carry us to victory,” Mousley writes, calling for new ideas. Mousley, 44, says the Liberals have to be the party that doesn’t veer too far right or left, which believes in an active government, but not too active. “It means a government that’s focused on laying the foundation for a more prosperous society, one that’s able to support the programs and services Canadians want and expect, and where all Canadians can enjoy the fruits of this prosperity.” Mousley worked for former cabinet minister David Collenette during the Chrétien years and has run — unsuccessfully so far — to win nomination races for the Liberals at the federal and provincial level in Ontario.

Shane Geschiere: Some people say the Liberal party is on life support. If that’s true, perhaps Liberals may be shopping for someone with experience as a paramedic. And that would give an edge to Shane Geschiere, a father of two from Manitoba, who turns 33 next week. Geschiere has announced his intentions on a Liberal web page: “I have made a decision to run for the Liberal leadership of Canada. This is because I am pretty much the complete opposite of most of the leaders that have ever led or want to lead the party. I am a regular middle-class person, who has a mortgage, debt, is paying for school and I am also young. Most of all I have not been playing the game of politics. I believe I am closer in touch with the everyday Canadian as I am the everyday Canadian. My biggest criticism will most likely be that I have no political experience. This is in fact true, however I actually believe that this is my greatest strength. We have had ‘experience’ leading the party and where has it left it? A defeated third party.” Geschiere acknowledges that he may have some trouble coming up with the entry fee — which could go as high as $500,000 — so his candidacy may remain unofficial.

What?

Wild Cards/Mischief/Conversation Starters

Elizabeth May: Wait a minute. Isn’t she the leader of the Green party? But May, 56, has been open to Liberal-Green co-operation for several years now. When Stéphane Dion was Liberal leader, he and May negotiated a co-operation deal, which saw Liberals standing down in her riding to help her (in vain, it turned out) win a seat in the 2008 election. More recently, May was working with the Liberals this month to try to amend the Conservatives’ omnibus budget bill. And Dion is slated to be the keynote speaker at the Green party convention this summer in B.C. Conspiracy theorists love this stuff — a Liberal-Green merger in the works, with May leaping in as a surprise leadership candidate. So far, though, it’s just a theory — though an entertaining prospect.

Belinda Stronach: She saved the Liberal party once before, in her dramatic, 2005 floor-crossing from the Conservative benches, straight into Paul Martin’s cabinet, as human resources minister. Would she make a similarly stunning move today, to walk from private life back into a Liberal leadership race? Stronach has a habit of shaking up parties, as she did when she entered the 2004 Conservative leadership race. Now 46, she has never ruled out a return to public life, and she maintains an interest in Liberal politics. But the timing doesn’t seem to be right. At the moment, Stronach is busy with her work in the private sector and her philanthropic foundation.

John Manley, Brian Tobin and Frank McKenna: Do they only play hit records once? Manley and Tobin, high-profile members of Jean Chrétien’s cabinet, were once seen as the major challengers to Paul Martin. Tobin, who had also done a successful stint as Newfoundland premier, abandoned the nascent Liberal leadership race in 2002 and walked away from politics. Manley, deputy prime minister, hung in almost to the end, finally withdrawing in the summer of 2003. Meanwhile, McKenna, the former New Brunswick premier and Canadian ambassador to the United States, remains for many the best Liberal leader the country never had. But all three of them have secured firm and lucrative places in the private sector, which they would be unlikely to abandon for a long-term rebuilding project at the top of the Liberal party. Manley, now the head of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives, hosted a summer open house in his Ottawa offices this week. He simply laughed when asked whether he was thinking of reviving his political ambitions.

Liberal premiers: Yes, they’re busy running their provinces, but when people are casting about for big names in the Liberal leadership campaign, someone eventually will raise the possibility of sitting premiers entering the race. Most often mentioned is Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, who turns 57 in July. He has his hands full running a shaky minority at Queen’s Park and has made it clear he’s not looking to jump into federal politics. Quebec Premier Jean Charest, 54, is similarly preoccupied after months of student unrest and the possibility of calling his own election in looming months, even weeks. Robert Ghiz, in Prince Edward Island, has squelched any talk of trading his premier’s job for a leadership candidacy.

Former prime ministers Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin: If the Liberals are looking for experience in the next leader, you can’t get any more experienced than a former prime minister. Some Liberals like to imagine that if Martin had stayed on as leader after the 2006 defeat, he might have been able to wrest power back from the Conservatives in 2008, simply on his economic credentials during the financial crash that year. Chretien, meanwhile, keeps talking about the Liberals’ need to merge with the NDP. Perhaps he’d be interested in coming out of retirement to be the pro-merger candidate and fold his old party down into the big orange tent?

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