With the provincial election coming up Oct. 10, voters in the Kenora-Rainy River riding will have four candidates to choose from when they fill out their ballots.
Incumbent MPP and party leader Howard Hampton, who was acclaimed as the NDP candidate on Saturday, said now is the right time to elect a government that will meet the needs of the region.
“For people all across Northern Ontario, this is going to be a very important election,” he remarked. “For the last four years under the McGuinty government, Northern Ontario’s been devastated.”
He noted soaring hydro rates have crippled the forestry industry—even after representatives from the forest industry made their case before the legislative committee dealing with the McGuinty government’s hydro policy three-and-a-half years ago.
“They went through it chapter and verse. They actually had graphs and charts,” Hampton recalled. “They said this is what’s going to happen. You’ll close paper mills first because they can’t afford to pay that rate of electricity.
“Pulp mills will close after that, and then saw mills will close. It will ricochet. You’ll destroy tens of thousands of jobs.
“The McGuinty government totally ignored them. And then they went ahead and drove up industrial hydro rates by 30 percent,” Hampton added. “And now we’ve had to live with the destruction.”
Hampton also said that with new technology and opportunities available, and other markets depleting their own wood fibre supplies, the forestry sector in Northern Ontario could have a positive future—if the McGuinty government actually would listen to forest industry leaders.
Hampton also charged the McGuinty government’s Local Health Integration Networks have opened the doors to privatization and contracting out of hospital and health care jobs, which may not be in the best interest of patient care.
Hampton noted the province also has to work together to negotiate fair agreements and better working relationships with First Nations to develop lands for mining.
Liberal candidate Mike Wood, a Dryden city councillor, has had 20 years’ experience in business and forestry, 18 of them as an entrepreneur, and says he understands what it takes to run a successful business and contribute to any organization.
According to his website, he has been directly responsible for bringing two highly-successful businesses to the riding. These businesses continue to provide employment for more than 150 people each year.
He lives in Dryden with his wife, Kate, daughter, Andie, 10, and son, Sean, eight.
Kenora resident Penny Lucas is representing the Progressive Conservative party.
She is an administrative assistant at Confederation College, as well as vice-chair of the Kenora District Services Board, vice-chair of the District of Kenora Homes for the Aged board of directors, and chair of the Wilderness Riders snowmobile club (Kenora branch).
“I have lived and worked here all my life,” she says on her website. “I want my children and grandchildren to have the same access to resources, tools, and technology as have the rest of Ontarians,” she said.
“I want my children and grandchildren to have access to a health care system second to none. I want my community to have guaranteed, sustainable funding to support our infrastructure—Kenora to Ignace and Fort Severn to Fort Frances.
“I want a government that will listen to our counsel and not bring their ‘Toronto’ solutions that do not work to our community,” she added. “Northwestern Ontario requires special attention because of the unique challenges it faces—large land mass [and] pockets of developed communities.
“We need someone in Toronto that is part of the government—not someone on the outside looking in,” Lucas also stressed.
And Jo Jo Holiday, also from Kenora, is the Green Party candidate. She is a professional homeopath at the BodyWorks Studio there.
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
