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The federal Conservatives were saying all the right things after Maxime Bernier’s not-so-surprising announcement that he was quitting the party to start his own political movement.

You could certainly understand Andrew Scheer’s good riddance to bad rubbish attitude about Bernier’s move; Mad Max has been a monumental pain in the butt to Scheer since he defeated him in last year’s leadership race.

ANALYSIS: Conservatives may yet withstand Bernier’s gift to Justin Trudeau

Others, such as former prime minister Stephen Harper and Jason Kenny dismissed Bernier as an egocentric outsider who put his own interests ahead of the party.

There’s a lot more fact than fiction in that characterization, but secretly, the Conservative brass must be deeply concerned about the consequences of Bernier’s power play.

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When some disgruntled conservatives formed the Reform Party in the early ’90s, it split the right-wing vote and essentially allowed the Liberals to coast to victory in election after election.

I don’t think anyone expects a mass exodus of Conservative MPs to follow Bernier’s ultra-right-wing crusade — not yet anyway— but if there are two right-wing alternatives on the ballot in next year’s election, splitting that conservative vote could give the Liberals a clear path to victory.

That may sound outlandish to some, but let’s not forget that Bernier garnered almost half of the delegate votes in that leadership race.

Populist right-wing leaders seem to be in vogue these days and that could be bad news for Scheer and the Conservatives.

Bill Kelly is the host of the Bill Kelly Show on Global News Radio 900 CHML