Tory leader fires up party faithful

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This article was published 23/01/2016 (3900 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Progressive Conservative Leader Brian Pallister is promising an ambitious provincial tour leading up to the election in April, with plans to stop in “virtually every riding.”

“It’s perhaps the most ambitious I’m aware of — ever,” he said.

Pallister made the comment while in Brandon this week, but details were sparse — a common theme for the PC party throughout the pre-election campaign.

Following Pallister’s recent pledge to spend an average of $1 billion on infrastructure if his party forms the next government, he was asked which projects would be a priority in Brandon and Westman.

“I won’t talk about specific projects because I want to build a priorization program in partnership with our local governments that works,” he said.

“If I start talking about my priorities without doing that, then I’m contradicting myself. So no, I’m not going to start picking special projects — I’ve seen enough of that done by other political people and I won’t.”

Health care, education and infrastructure have been identified as key issues for Pallister. At a party fundraiser in Brandon earlier this week, Brandon East PC candidate Len Isleifson spoke about the “ludicrous” ambulance costs that people are faced with in Manitoba, giving the example of his mother buying a round-trip plane ticket to Florida for less than it cost to take an ambulance ride to the hospital within Brandon.

“It doesn’t make sense why it costs so much,” Isleifson said. “We have people that try to bypass an ambulance when they should be taking one because they can’t afford it, so there’s some serious issues.”

Pallister was asked how the PC party plans to address the ambulance cost issue and emergency room wait times in the province, to which he said he will elaborate during the writ period.

“If you want to effect change, you have to focus … on the key issues,” Pallister said. “For me the key issues right now are the inaccessible nature of our emergent care system, the problems with doctors leaving our province at a record level. We have to look at these issues — and they’re urgent issues — because let’s face it, when people need emergent health care, they’re not doing it as a virtual exercise.”

Pallister said he expects to provide more details on PC ideas and policies by next week; however, he doesn’t want to jump the gun.

“If you want it in the news, you don’t release it in February for April consumption,” he said.

Both Isleifson and Brandon West PC incumbent Reg Helwer say economic development is a concern of many Brandon voters.

“What we’re hearing out at the doors over the past few months, is people are concerned about economic development and jobs — that is top of mind especially with changes in the oilpatch,” Helwer said.

“We do hear some education concerns with the school division news that’s been out there, and of course, health care is fairly top of mind, too. But really, it’s economic development and jobs.”

From the City of Brandon’s perspective, there is a list of major projects that Mayor Rick Chrest hopes will continue as planned, no matter which party forms government.

“We definitely have some infrastructure items on the go that we want to see through. Of course, there’s the First Street bridge, and then immediately following … comes the 18th Street bridge, which is extremely important,” Chrest said.

Ongoing flood mitigation work is slated to be completed by 2017. The city partners with the province on a number of initiatives, including funding for the Keystone Centre, Renaissance Brandon and the Western Manitoba Centennial Auditorium.

“We did earmark $500,000 towards the Keystone’s five-year capital plan, contingent on that funding being matched by the province,” Chrest said.

The city also approved $50,000 in additional funding for Renaissance Brandon for a total of $300,000 — again, contingent on the province matching that number.

The city has some larger projects coming up that will be seeking provincial support, such as an upgrade to the water treatment plant. Master plans for both the Assiniboine River corridor, and an outdoor sports field will be unveiled soon.

“We’re hopeful that senior levels of government will be able to have a look at that,” Chrest said.

The mayor also noted a resolution that was passed at the last Association of Manitoba Municipalities convention regarding taxation. The goal is to have the provincial government either rebate or exempt municipalities from provincial sales tax.

“It’s kind of a standard practice that one level of government is not taxing the other,” he said. “But municipalities actually do pay PST on most everything we buy, other than large construction projects.”

The city paid approximately $1.2 million in PST last year, Chrest said.

Other projects that have been promised by the NDP government include a new kindergarten to Grade 8 school in Brandon’s south end, which is “badly needed,” Brandon University student housing, ACC redevelopment and a potential joint business school between ACC and BU.

“I hope that continues to move forward,” Chrest said. “I think it would be a real feather in Brandon’s cap, in terms of just a unique hybrid school that could attract a lot of attention in Brandon.”

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