Canada's conservatives vote wholly by mail for a new leader

VANCOUVER, Canada (AP) — Canada’s opposition Conservative Party is holding an entirely mail-in ballot election for a new leader to carry it into the next general election. Results are to be announced on Sunday.

Just over 269,000 party members are eligible to vote in the race to replace Andrew Sheer, who resigned resigned in December after the party lost to Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's Liberals.

The frontrunners appeared to be Peter MacKay, 54, a Cabinet minister under former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and Erin O’Toole, 47, a longtime member of Parliament and Royal Canadian Air Force veteran who finished third in the 2017 leadership race.

Also in the race are Derek Sloan, 35, a rookie Ontario MP who made headlines for tweeting his belief that being gay is a choice, and Leslyn Lewis, 49, who immigrated to Canada from Jamaica as a child and is now a lawyer with a master’s degree in environmental studies.

The four have similar platforms on issues like reducing the size of government, cutting taxes and taking a harder line on China’s involvement in the Canadian economy.

“To me, there’s not a whole lot of daylight in this campaign on those core issues,” said Sanjay Jeram, a senior lecturer and chair of undergraduate studies in political science at Simon Fraser University in Vancouver.

“This really more of a personality and kind of electability contest,” he said.

MacKay and O’Toole have promised to scrap the Liberal government’s carbon tax. O’Toole would support provinces that enact their own carbon pricing.

MacKay supports incentives for new oil and natural resource extraction projects.

Sloan opposes abortion and pledges to reduce immigration. Lewis would allow free votes for MPs on “issues of conscience” and would halt further...