OTTAWA –
As the Conservatives prepare to welcome a new leader this week, the party’s interim leader has said she will not run in the next federal election.
Candice Bergen took over as interim opposition leader after Erin O’Toole was ousted by the Conservatives in February following a disappointing election defeat last September.
Bergen, 57, was first elected in 2008 on Manitoba’s Portage-Lisgar ride, and was appointed Parliamentary secretary to the state’s public safety and social development minister under Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
She was elected leader of the House of Representatives in 2016 and became deputy leader of the party in 2020 under O’Toole.
Bergen said she will continue to be a member of Parliament in the immediate future and looks forward to seizing new opportunities.
She said she would support whoever is chosen as the party’s new leader and in a statement said she was “extremely optimistic” about the future of the conservative movement.
This Canadian Press report was first published on September 6, 2022.
