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Horwath hoping to bring northern issues back to Queen’s Park

The Ontario NDP is holding its caucus meeting in Thunder Bay where issues including Bombardier layoffs and funding cuts will be discussed
Andrea Horwath
Ontario NDP leader, Andrea Horwath, and MPP Judith Monteith-Farrell, will be taking part in NDP caucus meetings in Thunder Bay this week. (Photo by Doug Diaczuk - Tbnewswatch.com).

THUNDER BAY - The Ontario NDP leader, Andrea Horwath and MPP Judith Monteith-Farrell are hopeful their colleagues in the NDP caucus will help bring issues affecting norther communities front and centre at Queen’s Park when sessions resume in October.

“I think it always helps to see a place and put something in your mind that this is real,” said Judith Monteith-Farrell, MPP for Thunder Bay-Atikokan. “Sometimes people have ideas of what the north is all about. We have a lot in common with southern Ontario, but there is a uniqueness. I think having those conversations and meeting the people will be beneficial to our caucus.”

The Ontario NDP is holding caucus meetings in Thunder Bay all week, with issues such as homelessness, funding cuts by the Ford government to programming and services, and recent layoffs at Bombardier and how the north is impacted are being discussed by the more than 40 caucus members and staff.

“To do so in this setting is an acknowledgement that sometimes the voices in the north are not heard in the south,” NDP leader Andrea Horwath said of holding the caucus meetings in Thunder Bay.

“When we talk about jobs in the north, many of them in the resource sector, that often means jobs in the south,” Horwath continued. “I think people in Queen’s park just don’t get the connection that the prosperity in the north brings to the entire province.”

The loss of 550 jobs at the Thunder Bay Bombardier plant is one of the examples that Horwath said shows how the Ford government is not doing enough to protect jobs in the north.

“The provincial and federal government have been asleep at the switch when it comes to recognizing that there needed to be orders placed and that processes needed to be streamlined to get those orders in,” she said.

“Mr. Ford kind of flew in like a pigeon, made some comments, took some shots at the federal government and you don’t see anything as a result,” she said. “We already asked the government to get active to make sure the supports and services for those workers affected are in place. We know Thunder Bay already has struggles trying to meet the needs of community when it comes to social services, and counselling and those kinds of things. People are going to be in crisis when they lose those well-paying jobs.”

Horwath took a similar stance to her federal counterpart, Jagmeet Singh, leader of the federal NDP, who said changes are needed to procurement policies to ensure Canadian content is being produced by Canadian workers.

“For a very long time, we have taken the position that we need to have Canadian content with public infrastructure dollars,” she said. “Whether it’s rail lines, any kind of public infrastructure, when public dollars are being used, we should be making sure that Canadian and Ontario workers are getting the benefit of that public money.”

“The other piece has to be how do we make sure that federal, provincial, and municipal governments, who all say that they want transit projects, how do we make sure we are using that opportunity to keep good jobs at this plant in Thunder Bay. There is no way that we should be in a situation where there are no orders when everyone talks about mass transit projects.”

Horwath added that the recent talks to close of the homeless shelter in Kenora and the struggles of similar organizations in other communities represents struggles facing the entire region.

“We have an economy that is not meeting the needs of many people,” she said. “Just talking this morning about the increasing homelessness we are seeing and can’t afford to put a roof over their head and the growing opioid crisis. This government is not doing anything on those fronts. It’s very troubling. Its real people whose lives are being shattered.”

The return to Queen’s Park to resume sitting being delayed until October also had Horwath questioning why the government is not willing to answer questions on the decisions it is making.

“If we were going back in two weeks, we would make that exact point,” she said. “This is one of the things the Ford government is trying to do. They are trying to avoid the scrutiny and the work that the opposition does to hold them to account.”


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Doug Diaczuk

About the Author: Doug Diaczuk

Doug Diaczuk is a reporter and award-winning author from Thunder Bay. He has a master’s degree in English from Lakehead University
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