The Conservative caucus has voted to remove Erin O’Toole as the party’s leader.
The majority of caucus voted Wednesday to replace O’Toole as the leader of the party, in a secret ballot.
In total, 118 votes were cast at Wednesday morning’s virtual meeting, 73 MPs voted in favour of replacing O’Toole, while 45 MPs voted to endorse his leadership.
One-third of the caucus signed a letter earlier this week to force the leadership review, an expression of what party insiders said was a broad dissatisfaction with O’Toole’s performance.
The party will now need to decide on an interim leader, before party membership will be thrust into its second leadership race amid the COVID-19 pandemic, and be asked to decide on a new leader for the third time since 2017.
O’Toole had been fighting to hold on to his role to some degree since the Conservatives’ September 2021 election defeat, reaching this point after a handful of electoral district associations put forward calls for a leadership vote before the one scheduled at the party's national convention in 2023.
The embattled leader framed this vote as “a reckoning” where the party needed to make a choice about what kind of party it wants to be going forward, a question the Conservatives have been grappling with for some time.
Over the last few days both current and former MPs have spoken out, issuing open letters making their case to their colleagues as to why they feel it’s time for O’Toole to go.
with files from CTV News