Liberal Party of Canada Rat Pack

The Rat Pack was the nickname given to a group of young, high-profile Canadian Liberal opposition Members of Parliament during the Progressive Conservative government of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney.

The Liberal Party had suffered the worst defeat in its history in the 1984 election. In the first years of the Mulroney government, the Liberals failed to mount an effective opposition to Mulroney, and were in danger of being overshadowed by the New Democratic Party (NDP), which had almost as many seats as the Liberals.

In the midst of this, a group of young, energetic, and unknown Liberals soon emerged as a vocal voice of opposition to Mulroney. They included Don Boudria of eastern Ontario, Sheila Copps of Hamilton, Brian Tobin of Newfoundland and John Nunziata of the Greater Toronto Area. Tobin had been elected when the Liberals regained power in the 1980 election; the others had been among the few bright spots for the Liberals in the 1984 blowout. Except for Nunziata, who held some socially conservative views, all of them came from the left wing of the Liberal Party. They made it their business to bring misery to the Tory government at every turn, with unrelenting attacks on Mulroney in the House of Commons and the media.

The members' high profiles allowed them to rise very rapidly in the Liberal caucus, even by Canadian standards. With the Liberal victory in the 1993 election, all of the Rat Pack members except Nunziata were given powerful Cabinet posts under Jean Chrétien. Conflict over the GST and other matters with Chrétien would see Nunziata expelled from the caucus.

Nunziata later ran--and won--as an independent candidate, but veered sharply to the right during the second term of the Liberal government. He was defeated by a Liberal in 2000, and later joined the Conservative Party of Canada. Tobin left Parliament in 1996 to become leader of the Newfoundland Liberal Party; he served as that province's premier until returning to Parliament in 2000.

Under the somewhat more right of centre Paul Martin, who succeeded Chrétien in 2003, Copps and Boudria were relegated to the Liberal backbenches. Tobin had already left Parliament in 2002 in protest of the stranglehold on the Liberal organization by Martin's supporters. In 2004, Copps' riding was merged with that of Martin loyalist Tony Valeri in such a way that most of the new riding's residents lived in Valeri's old riding. Copps was narrowly defeated for renomination. The last remaining member of the group, Boudria, did not run for reelection in 2006.