Harper Critic Loses Lobby Group Job

Asked if his recent denouncements of the Harper government's free-spending ways had played any role in his departure – which the NCC denies – Nicholls said that because lawyers are involved in his talks with his former employer, "I really can't comment, I can't talk about anything." "It's very frustrating. I did a lot of work there and I helped make the organization really." Coleman denied that Nicholls' criticism of the Harper government had anything to do with the organization's decision, saying it "was the kind of thing we actually encourage." "We would never muzzle anybody and if anybody in the Conservative party called me and told me to not say something I'd tell them to get lost, quite frankly," Coleman told the Star. Nicholls' years at the NCC included the time Stephen Harper was president during the hiatus he took from elected politics. As a Reform party MP from Calgary, Harper had disagreements with then-leader Preston Manning and decided not to run in the 1997 election. He then took the top job at the NCC. Harper left in 2002 to run for the leadership of Reform's successor, the Canadian Alliance. http://www.thestar.com/News/article/199808

Note: http://www.thestar.com/...