Provencher MP Ted Falk says the Conservatives have come out of their policy convention in Halifax last weekend as a united party, ready to take on the Liberals in the election next year. He says after the initial shock of Maxime Bernier's announcement Thursday that he was quitting the party to start one of his own, delegates got re-focused on planning on how to win the next election. Falk highlights two of the policy decisions he believes his supporters will appreciate; one on palliative care and the other on immigration.

"From a palliative care perspective, a policy would make sure that we have a national strategy that would enable all Canadians to have good access to palliative care. I thought that was a tremendous policy addition. We also agreed that we would close any of the loopholes or gaps in the Safe Third Country agreement and that the official party position would be that we stop all illegal entry into the country, recognizing that we are and we have a very generous and welcoming immigration policy."

But Falk says he was disappointed that delegates voted down a resolution that would have allowed the party to develop legislation on abortion.

"Yes, I was disappointed. As delegates from the pro-life caucus side, we were hoping that the convention would just delete that part from our policy book that rather than have a position of not supporting any legislation, that we wouldn't have a position on it at all. That would have freed up pro-life members to speak and make presentations that could move legislation forward that would protect the unborn child. The vote was 53% to 47% that the current policy remain in the Conservative Policy book."

Conservative leader Andrew Scheer, like Stephen Harper before him, says he will not wade into the abortion debate because it is far too divisive, both for the party and for the country.

Falk says they had a record number of delegates at the conference with over 3,000 people in attendance and, he adds, they all left the conference unified and committed to winning the next election.