Prime Minister Stephen Harper topped off the first day of his annual northern tour with a speech at a private Conservative function Thursday evening that highlighted the government’s tough-on-crime agenda, economic record and stance on international affairs.

The “summer reception” drew about 200 invitees — a relatively sparse turnout of mostly Conservative Party members in light of the 3,000 invitations sent out — to former territorial minister Archie Lang’s waterfront property along the Yukon River, east of the Meadow Lakes Golf and Country Club.

The speech, similar to one delivered to party faithful in B.C. earlier this week, took aim at Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau and served as a blueprint for campaign speaking points in the lead-up to the federal election scheduled for October 2015.

“For too long, our criminal justice system was twisted to make the rights and the welfare of the criminal its central concern,” Harper told guests.

“Remember Justin Trudeau’s reaction to the (April 2013) Boston bombing: the terrorists, he proclaimed, must be victims — victims of ‘social exclusion.’”

The prime minister highlighted his government’s reforms to the Canadian Criminal Code that upped mandatory minimums and reduced judicial discretion in sentencing.

“Do the crime, do the time,” he said. “On our watch, the crime rate is moving in the right direction — down.”

According to Statistics Canada, the crime rate in Canada has been on a slow decline for 23 years, more than half of that time under a Liberal government.

The battle over sentencing and judicial discretion came home for Yukoners last April, when the Yukon Court of Appeal heard a case that could soften a key plank of Ottawa’s tough-on-crime agenda, with potentially nationwide implications.

The Crown was appealing a ruling by a territorial court judge last year that declared unconstitutional a new provision of the code that precludes inmates who languish in pre-sentence custody from “enhanced credit” in certain circumstances.

The hearing brought constitutional issues and aboriginal status into stark relief and cut to the core of the Conservatives’ Truth in Sentencing Act, passed in 2009.

Last evening, the Prime Minister stood at the podium flanked by children perched on cubed bales of hay, one of whom sang the national anthem as the event kicked off.

An oversize Canadian flag sprawled across the opposite bank of the Yukon River, staked on the canyon walls such that it formed a background halo to Harper’s figure.

Harper stressed Canada’s relative economic success, with more than 1.1 million jobs created since the recession as well as multiple tax cuts.

“The bottom line is this: notwithstanding all the difficulties of a fragile global economy, our economic fundamentals are rock-solid, the model among the world’s most advanced nations.”

The Prime Minister caricatured NDP and Liberal approaches to economic policy: “Spend more, spend now, spend always — let the deficit rise and then start increasing taxes.”

During the final decade of Liberal rule, ending in February 2006, the government worked out 10 surplus budgets in a row and paid down the national debt.

The Conservative government delivered eight deficits in a row, though came up flush with a $6.4-billion surplus this year.

Since 2006, Tories have upped spending by 30 per cent, adding more than $160 billion to the debt.

Earlier this year, Harper’s proposal on income-splitting, which would allow couples with children under 18 to split up to $50,000 of their income for tax purposes, caused significant controversy.

While reducing some households’ overall tax bill, the plan would benefit only about 1.8 million households and prove valuable mainly to families where one spouse stays home while the other earns an above-average income.

At the reception, hosted by first-term MP Ryan Leef, Harper told guests of the benefits to Yukoners since he took office.

He pointed out transfers to the territorial government for “vital social services” are 70 per cent higher than in 2006.

“Here in Whitehorse, we invested in the Whitehorse waterfront, the Kwanlin Dun Cultural Centre, the Whitehorse landfill and upgrades to the Range Road,” he told attendees.

Harper also underscored “a clear and principled approach” on international affairs and ridiculed the Opposition’s “soft power approach.

“They talk in code: Canada must be an ‘honest broker”; we should have ‘a balanced foreign policy,’ whatever that means.”

The Prime Minister touched on ongoing conflicts in eastern Ukraine, northern Iraq and the Gaza Strip, mocking his opponents for past criticism of military investment, particularly in the North.

“Canada must be strong in a dangerous world, strong in our values, strong in our words, strong in our actions,” he said.

The Conservatives’ northern focus includes an Arctic training centre for the military — opened last year — a $1.3-billion polar ice breaker, set for completion in 2021 — and a $130-million deep-water docking and fuelling facility, beginning next month.

The government has also invested $200 million in the Dempster Highway extension from Inuvik to the Arctic coast in Tuktoyaktuk, N.W.T.

After concluding his speech, Harper accepted a gift from the Yukon Conservative Association, a framed Jim Robb print.

Vegetable platters and cheese-and-cracker spreads courtesy of Bridges Café and the Challenge-Disability Resource Group awaited the Lang estate guests following the talk.

The property host’s brother, Senator Dan Lang, spoke briefly, while Premier Darrell Pasloski and Mayor Dan Curtis were in attendance.

Earlier in the day, the Prime Minister kicked off his ninth northern tour with the launch of a new $17-million research plan — flowing partly through Yukon College — that will draw in industry partners and focus on technology geared to the North.

In the bowels of the college’s Cold Climate Innovation hub at the Yukon Research Centre, Harper unveiled the National Research Council’s Arctic program, an eight-year plan for North of 60.

He and four federal ministers continued the tour today, flying to Fort Smith, N.W.T..

They will also visit four communities in Nunavut — Cambridge Bay, Pond Inlet, Iqaluit and York Sound — by Tuesday of next week.

Harper plans to take part in the military’s Operation Nanook exercise aboard a naval vessel as well.

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