Posted on 07/29/2005 2:36:59 PM PDT by Clive
TORONTO (CP) - The federal Liberals slammed the door shut Friday on any notion that Independent MP Carolyn Parrish would be welcomed back into the party fold. An aide to Prime Minister Paul Martin stifled speculation that he was about to invite the maverick MP from Mississauga, Ont., back into caucus after she was banished for criticizing Martin and stomping on a doll of U.S. President George W. Bush.
"He's not even entertaining the thought of welcoming Carolyn Parrish back to the caucus," said Marc Roy.
Martin did meet with Parrish after she threw her support behind the government in the crucial May 19 confidence vote that kept the Liberals in power, Roy said. But she has not been asked to return to caucus.
"Did the prime minister talk to her, go see her after the vote? Yes. But the fact remains that the prime minister is not entertaining the idea of welcoming back Carolyn Parrish."
In Timmins, Ont., Martin shot down questions surrounding Parrish's possible return to the Liberal party.
"The fact is, that's not an issue," said Martin, who was in the northern Ontario city discussing the region's economic development.
Martin turfed Parrish last December after she criticized him and his team and stomped on a Bush doll as part of a TV skit satirizing her opposition to the U.S. president's ballistic missile defence scheme.
But Parrish garnered respect from her former colleagues when she voted for the government's budget on May 19, helping Martin cling to power by the narrowest of margins.
She showed up for the confidence vote despite suffering severe abdominal pain from what she described as a suspected ovarian cyst.
At the time, Parrish said "lots of colleagues" were urging her to rejoin Liberal ranks.
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Forgive me for my ignorance of Canadian politics but wasn't Carolyn Parrish at one time a conservative who crossed party lines to save the Liberals goverment from falling in a vote? From reading this it sounds like she was always "lefter" than the even the liberals.
I am probably confusing different people.
Sorry, ignore that. I was thinking of Belinda Stronach.
Oh.
It means "Project Management Office" where I work.
I was confused for a second. ;-)
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