TORONTO — Green Party leader Elizabeth May touted her party's unity and suggested the grassroots were behind her at the party's convention Saturday, but lingering dissent remained visible among some delegates.

"The party is now quite visibly united," May told reporters after a rousing speech that garnered a couple of standing ovations.

"I think that there's really no question that any leadership questions are behind us and I will continue as leader of this party through the next federal election at least."

But two leadership motions were among the items that delegates were to spend the weekend debating, even after party members rubber stamped a pre-convention motion that would keep May as leader until after the next election.

May also received an 85 per cent approval in a motion to endorse her leadership.

The rumblings of discontent appeared to be coming from a faction headed by Sylvie Lemieux, a retired military engineer who has already said she wants to run for the leadership.

Lemieux, who does not expect an election this fall, said she would like the Green Party to be more bold.

"We have a lot of strengths but I'm not seeing these strengths on the radar of Canadians right now," Lemieux said.

"We're more than what's there right now."

Lemieux says also she's worried about the exodus of party members, saying they've lost about 3,000 of 12,000 members since the last election.

"If there's an election called in a month certainly we're not in as strong a position as we were in 2008," she said.

Lemieux presented one of the two leadership motions that were causing a stir.

Her motion asks that a leadership race be called no later than Oct. 31. The other leadership-related motion proposes that if a leader's term is extended, a race must be called no later than eight weeks after a federal election.

For her part May tried to mollify the dissenters, saying she would do "a lot" of things differently in the next election, including choosing a riding she has a better chance of winning.

Last election May put herself in what some would call a self-defeating position by choosing to try to unseat cabinet heavyweight MP Peter MacKay.

May lost the seat with 14% less votes than MacKay.

May said for the next vote it will be the "top priority" for her leadership and the party to get into the House of Commons.

"Up until after the 2008 election was over it had not even been on a list of priorities that the leader getting elected had any particular importance," May said.

"So this is a big change for us."

Very few attendees were willing to put their cards on the table and openly express any dissatisfaction with May.

Convention co-chair John Streicker said he's not aware of any "rumblings" that cause him concern.

"There's always going to be some acrimony within a party and we're experiencing growing pains because we're coming up in the polls, we're getting more votes," Streicker said.

"Slowly but surely, we're moving in the right direction."