Former prime minister Stephen Harper says Canada needs a ‘Conservative renaissance ‘

OTTAWA — Former prime minister Stephen Harper says Canada badly needs a “Conservative renaissance.” 

Harper was speaking to a room of party faithful gathered in Ottawa for an annual networking conference staged by the Canada Strong and Free Network, formerly called the Manning Centre. 

Wednesday’s public appearance is a rare one for Harper, who exited political life after losing the 2015 election to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberals. 

Introduced as a “statesmen” of the party, Harper mounted a defence of the term “populism,” which he says is often portrayed in a negative or imprecise light by what he called the “Liberal media.”