Immigration Minister Judy Sgro of York West and Veterans Affairs Minister John McCallum of Markham Unionville showed up at separate events to protest the Conservatives' positions on abortion and defence spending. The Markham event turned into a pushing and shouting match that had several dozen members of the new Conservative party, former Progressive Conservatives and Liberals all shouting at each other, jostling signs and chanting.

"When you have senior cabinet ministers at street protests, I think they're pretty worried. If the Liberals keep acting this worried, they'll keep building our momentum for us," said Mr. Harper.



"They've been out of practice. Usually when you do a protest, you get other people to pretend they're ordinary people, you don't send out your own front bench to do the protesting. I think they're running short of shock troops. They look pretty desperate."

When Ms. Sgro attempted to confront Mr. Harper over Conservative MP Rob Merrifield's comment that women considering an abortion should be required to be counselled by a third party, Mr. Harper brushed past her and scoffed: "You better go door knocking Judy, you're falling behind in your riding."