Ignatieff Crowned Liberal Leader

Michael Ignatieff formally claimed the Liberal crown Saturday and wasted little time throwing down the gauntlet to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Ignatieff was short on details about the kind of government he’d lead but he was precise in his critique of Harper’s Tories, bluntly accusing the prime minister of failing to unite the country.

“I want to speak directly to Stephen Harper,” he told about 3,000 cheering Liberals moments after being acclaimed leader.

“For three years you have played province against province, group against group, region against region and individual against individual. When your power was threatened last November, you unleashed a national unity crisis and you saved yourself only by sending Parliament home.

“You have failed to understand that a prime minister has one job and only one job which is to unite the people of this country. Mr. Harper you have failed us.”

Ignatieff added with a flourish: “If you can’t unite Canadians, if you can’t appeal to the best in all of us, we can.”

He repeated the “we can” refrain several times, borrowing heavily from Barack Obama’s wildly successful U.S. presidential campaign, whose slogan was “Yes, we can.”

A video tribute that was shown just moments before Ignatieff took the stage to claim his prize featured plenty of photos of the Liberal leader with Obama. They generated thunderous applause.

Like Obama, Ignatieff vowed to take a new, more civil approach to politics. He said Canadians are “longing for a new politics that replaces spite and spin with civility and common purpose.”

Although he’s been under mounting pressure to start spelling out his vision for the country, Ignatieff did not use his coronation to stake out any precise new policy turf.

He repeated his commitment to a common, national standard for Employment Insurance eligibility.

More broadly, however, the former Harvard professor did signal that one of his overriding priorities will be to develop a strategy for lifelong learning, which he said is essential if the country is to climb out of the economic cellar.

“A strategy for recovery must be a strategy for learning,” Ignatieff said.

“We must create a society where learning is a way of life and learning is life-long.”

He indicated that his strategy will include providing “world class early learning and child care,” “world class” education for aboriginal children, and ensuring every student with sufficient grades is entitled to “the best higher education in the world.”

And he said such measures are necessary to ensure that Canadians can innovate, create the jobs of the future and prosper in the knowledge-based economy.

“If you ask what I want for Canada, it is this: That we surprise ourselves, astonish ourselves, that we astonish the world.”

Ignatieff also attempted to deliver an upbeat message of hope for Canadians who’ve lost their jobs or their life savings in the recession.

“We are living this with you,” he declared.

“In opposition we are fighting to protect you and in government we will lead you back to prosperity.”

Ignatieff’s speech was relatively low-key, especially compared to the stemwinder delivered only moments earlier by his longtime friend and erstwhile leadership rival Bob Rae, who formally nominated Ignatieff.

But ecstatic Liberals in the hall gave him an ovation after almost every sentence. They were pumped as much by the speech as by opinion polls suggesting they’re on the road back to power.

The party’s prospects and its finances have been improving steadily since Ignatieff took over the helm last December from Stephane Dion, who led Liberals to one of their worst-ever electoral showings in October.

Moreover, the party has rarely been so united. After decades of internal feuding and backstabbing over leadership, Ignatieff’s uncontested ascension to the throne has heralded a new era, thanks in large part to his onetime university room mate, Rae.

Rae and Dominic LeBlanc had thrown their hats into the leadership ring, which was supposed to have culminated with a vote at this weekend’s convention. But in the midst of a parliamentary crisis last December, the two bowed out once the party decided to short circuit the democratic leadership selection process.

Rae, who would have given Ignatieff the stiffest challenge, formally nominated his old friend Saturday and LeBlanc seconded the nomination.

Rae was unstinting in his praise for Ignatieff, whom he called “a decent, intelligent and caring man who knows the world and who loves his country.” And he was direct in his appeal for all Liberals to rally behind the new leader.

“This is not a time for griping about what might have been,” Rae told delegates.

“It is a time to come together, to join hands and heads and hearts, to bind up the wounds that have divided us in the past and to build together a political movement that will speak to the deepest needs of the Canadian people, now and in our future.”

Earlier Saturday, delegates ensured that future leaders will be elected by a one-member, one-vote system.

And they adopted a series of policy resolutions – including one reviving the idea of a carbon tax, which helped sink Dion in the last election – that could prove pricey and problematic for Ignatieff. However, none of the resolutions are binding on the leader.