HEATHER BOA Bullet News HURON COUNTY – Huron County’s member of provincial Parliament isn’t convinced incoming premier Kathleen Wynne is up for the task of running a government that will focus on jobs and the economy and be accountable to the people.
“I’m just concerned it’s going to be much the same,” said Lisa Thompson, Huron-Bruce MPP, after hearing a victory speech that promised to build on nine years of work done by outgoing Liberal premier Dalton McGuinty.
“That legacy is about gas plant scandals. It’s about taking away the decision-making process in rural Ontario through the Green Energy Act and having everything imposed on them in that regard,” she said. “At the end of the day, we need a province that is focused on generating and running on all cylinders.”
Wynne was elected leader of the Ontario Liberal Party Jan. 27 during a leadership convention at the former Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto this past weekend, after McGuinty prorogued the legislature Oct. 15 when he announced his resignation.
Thompson said she’s ready to go back to the legislature and demand answers from the Liberal government.
“It’s time to hold this government accountable in the forum that we have, which is the house. It’s been 127 days and it’s time we get back to business,” she said. She said the focus of her PC Party will be to get to the bottom of the gas plant closures in Oakville and Mississauga, a move the Liberals estimated to cost at least $230 million.
She said Wynne was also in cabinet for the ORNGE air ambulance scandal, botched teacher contract negotiations, the cancellation of Slots at Raceways program, and wind energy development and the Green Energy Act “and had many opportunities to stand up and make a difference at various junctures.”
Thompson will also watch to see how the MPP for the urban riding of Don Valley West reconciles the needs of her constituents with the job of premier.
“I look forward to seeing how she marries the true priorities of her constituents with anything she takes on. She’s MPP first in an urban riding and over and above that she’s got her premiership responsibilities. It will be interesting how she marries experience and priorities all together,” she said.
It’s expected the legislature will reopen Feb. 19.
10 Comments on "Thompson unimpressed by incoming premier"
Lisa may not be impressed with Ms. Wynne as Premier-elect, but even more to the point is the fact that her own leader, Mr. Hudak, has impressed very few Ontarians, including PC supporters with his leadership abilities. These early pronouncements smack of the knee-jerk response of federal and provincial conservatives to treat all opponents as enemies or at least incompetents. Lisa disappoints me in falling into this kind of cheap politics. I thought she was above that.
I am as disgusted as anyone with the Ontario Liberal government under McGuinty. I sincerely hope that we will see some positive changes in the coming months. However, I am not at all confident that the PCs under Hudak or the NDPers will offer anything better if they were to take the reins.
Brock – Do you or anyone else have any idea of how many schools have closed under the McGuinty government across the province? Seems to me that there have been more closures than EVER, yet the government spin is to suggest that they’re building MORE schools than ever.
I’m not buying it. I just wondered whether anyone has kept a tally.
Ms. Thompson’s comments seem to parallel the thrust of John Boehner’s remarks about newly elected President Obama – within 48 hours of that election. The creeping Americanization of Canadian politics by those on our right, is scary. The attack ads against Wynne were out almost same day. Ouch!
(Did anyone else chuckle at the ‘Freudian’ final quote? I am sure that Kathleen Wynne would have had a great laugh.)
- Comments from an ageing conservative liberal who usually sides with the democratic left…
Horwath came out swinging yesterday too with the NDP’s demand for an inquiry in to GasPlantGate.
I’d say that both oppositions came out very assertively.
I’m just fed up with all provincial politics and politicians of late.
I think that Thompson’s comments are a tad naive. I don’t underestimate for one minute that Wynne and Horwath will not carve out a deal to keep their like-minded perspective in power.
I am very cognizant of the school closures, having worked with a large group of groups across the province who were fighting against the loss of their school, Lisa Thompson was very helpful to us, presenting our 631 name petition to the Legislature several times. I talked with Tim Hudak personally about our situation and he appeared to understand, but in the end neither opposition party did a thing to pressure the Liberals to diverge from their destructive path. The Ministry of Education and the Avon Mailtland DSB lied their way through the process of snatching our only schools. They even proceeded to build a new 24-room school that was not needed in Wingham in an area which presumable had too many schools and not enough children. Just another crime against rural communities. But two opposition parties with the power to challenge this government stood by and did nothing.
I’ve always felt that the Accommodation Review process was flawed from the beginning, Brock.
I seem to recall that when McGuinty was in opposition he and the NDP’s pet parent organization used to throw around the number of schools closed in the province to make a point on how the gov’t was raping our communities.
These days, it appears that all school boards do is close schools, that more schools have closed under this government than any other. That neither opposition is taking advantage of that is pathetic.
Why do we even have boards if they’ve simply become extensions of the MOE? Trustees have no clout any more to guarantee anything local is advocated for.
Has Lisa Thompson or our MP ever stood up in the house to support small schools like this MP did yesterday in the Legislature?
“Mr. Scott Armstrong (Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, CPC): Mr. Speaker, last night the Chignecto-Central Regional School Board, at the request of the Nova Scotia provincial department of education, voted to put five small rural schools on the path to closure.
When you close a small rural school and it is the only school in that community, it makes it very difficult for a small rural community to grow. It makes it difficult to attract new, young families to rebuild the rural economy. I call upon the minister of education and the school board to work with those communities and do what they can to keep at least one school open in each of those small rural communities.
Closing a small rural school when it is the only school in the town has the same effect on that community as closing every school in the city would have on Halifax. It would be devastating to the city of Halifax, but the same thing happens to a small rural community when all of its schools are closed.”
Hmm? It seems some of the more radical and weird ideas of the far right Tea Party have drifted north with a Harris tint. Eight years of the last Neo-Con bunch was 7.99 years too long.
What about accounting for the spending of taxpayer dollars deserves a Tea Party or Neo-Con lable Roger? Enlighten us. That’s the odd thing about accountability, it’s pretty much a non-partisan issue.