Does leadership really matter?

The stage was set for the return of a political chameleon at the Courtyard Marriot in downtown Toronto last night.

Political heavyweight Bob Rae, the former Ontario NDP premier turned Liberal leadership candidate turned Liberal Toronto-Centre candidate has been fighting to get back into the House of Commons for the last six months. He won - taking nearly 60 per cent of the vote.

But this was no ordinary contest. After poor by-election results in Quebec last year as well as lagging polling numbers the Grits have become desperate for a win with political pundits speculating that the Liberals may dump leader Stephane Dion if he didn’t produce a solid victory.

Toronto-Centre, the riding that former Grit MP Bill Graham won by about 15,000 votes in the Liberal nightmare of 2006 seemed like as good a place as any.

The country was waiting to hear the results.

Outside the hotel trucks from every major Toronto TV station were parked and inside camera operators struggled to set-up their equipment inside a room that has a maximum capacity of only 118 people.

By the end of the night the room would be stuffed full as people surged forward to listen to the victory speeches.

After taking a pasting at the polls over the last few elections the Liberals were trying out some new tactics, specifically around the dreaded L word – leadership.

Ottawa has become a place where the cult of the leader matters more then anything else.

There are no shortage of articles that paint Stephen Harper as a control freak and the last Liberal Prime Minister, Paul Martin, ran what many say was a heavily centralized government. Martin’s people went so far as to have a picture of him painted on the campaign signs of many of his candidates.

When Dion won the leadership he made at least one bad heavy handed decision. He appointed a candidate to run in a by-election in the Montreal Liberal fortress of Outremont. He lost - big time.

But Rae’s campaign was different.

Despite being a Liberal star he ran in a contested nomination, proving that he had the backing of downtown Grits.

In the room where he gave his victory speech there was not a single sign or logo promoting Liberal leader Stephane Dion. It was Rae, the local candidate’s face, that was splashed on election signs.

When Stephane Dion appeared to speak he didn’t spend much time talking about himself but instead touted the people he was bringing in – even referring to Rae as an “architect” for success.

“For Stephen Harper leadership is a one man show,” he said. “You can’t do it alone… I have a much better team then Stephen Harper.”

Dion then left the room leaving Rae to answer questions from a mob of reporters, no aids, no shoving Rae out the backdoor - it was just “Bob” and Toronto’s equivalent of the Ottawa Press Gallery.

But Dion didn’t need to speak anymore then he did, his message was clear. That leadership thing that the Conservatives keep hammering me on – it may be important – but having good people around you is even more important.

Last night, in Toronto-Centre at least, the voters seemed to agree.