Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (Ontario Section) - 1945 Election Aftermath

1945 Election Aftermath

After the LeBel Report was published, the Ontario CCF still had to go on with the business of running the party, and hold its annual convention. It had been over 18 months since the previous provincial convention was held. The convention was held from Thursday, 22 November to Saturday, 24 November at the Toronto Labor Lyceum on Spadina Avenue. Jolliffe made it publicly known before the convention that he intended to continue on as leader. He ran despite the elements within the party that blamed him for the election defeat. His critics charged that the CCF did not stress policy enough during the election; that the party's platform was too vague; too leader-based; and was too sloganistic. Jolliffe was attacked for how he handled the last weeks of the campaign, especially over the "Gestapo" speech. These critics also blamed labour's involvement in dumbing-down the campaign, which was seen as the trade unions doing anything to achieve power. It got so bad, that a motion to expel both Jolliffe, and David Lewis over these perceived grievances made it on to the convention floor. The motion read, "the campaign tactics of the 1945 election had been decided by Mr. Jolliffe with the advice of Mr. Lewis and the democratic processes within the CCF had been ignored." It was defeated, but it also demonstrated that the party's establishment had angered its socialist militant base.

On Saturday afternoon, after the grievances were aired, the convention unanimously passed a resolution condemning Premier Drew asking him to stop spying on labour and political officials. After that, the party's establishment candidates held on to their positions: University of Toronto professor, George Grube remained as president, while Jolliffe remained leader.

1946 was the year of major labour strife in Ontario, and the CCF made it clear they were on the side of the unionists. Breaking with tradition, the party's annual convention was held outside of Toronto for the first time. The convention was held at the Royal Connaught Hotel in Hamilton, Ontario from 9–11 December 1946, the city where the United Steelworkers of America (USWA) went through a long protracted strike about reducing the work-week to 40 hours. Jolliffe faced a leadership challenge at this convention from former Toronto Controller Lewis Duncan. There were rumblings in 1945 that Duncan would take over from Jolliffe, but that was rumoured to be only if he were able to defeat Drew in the High Park constituency, which he failed to do. As party chairman John Mitchell stated at the time, it wasn't even close, as Jolliffe was easily re-elected CCF leader again for the fourth time. Professor Grube stepped down as the president, and Andrew Brewin succeeded him after defeating former York South MP, Joseph W. Noseworthy by four votes. The main resolution that would have an impact on the upcoming provincial election was one that condemned Drew's government for its hastily approved legislation allowing for cocktail bars to operate in Ontario.