Reid says Spruce Woods can do better than PCs

The Manitoba Liberal Party candidate in the Spruce Woods byelection says he can do better than the Progressive Conservatives who have represented the riding since it was established in 2011.

“I think my chances are really good if people realize what’s been happening,” Brandon teacher Stephen Reid said on Wednesday. “The past few MLAs in the riding have not done much for the riding.”

Reid teaches at Vincent Massey High School and lives in Brandon, although not in the Spruce Woods electoral district.

He said not living in the riding would have no bearing on how he would represent it.

Reid said he was picked by Liberal Leader Cindy Lamoureux as the byelection candidate because of his leadership skills and his long history as a Liberal member.

Reid grew up in Brandon and has lived in the city for most of his life, aside from four years spent teaching in the United Arab Emirates, Mexico and Ukraine. He said his stints abroad will help him represent Spruce Woods.

“I’ve got a little bit of a global perspective I can bring back to the riding,” Reid said in an interview with the Sun. “As far as the Spruce Woods riding goes, I have lots and lots of fond memories as a kid — Kiche Manitou, Oak Lake and all that kind of stuff.

“I’m tied in with the community really quite well, and I quite love all the communities in our riding.”

Reid said he would be a better representative than Progressive Conservatives Cliff Cullen and Grant Jackson, who were the last two MLAs for the riding.

Jackson, he said, only used the riding to springboard into federal politics, having resigned his provincial seat in March to run in the federal election, where he was elected in Brandon-Souris. Jackson represented Spruce Woods for less than a year and a half. His resignation triggered the byelection.

“I don’t see how Grant Jackson’s voice was for the people in the riding,” said Reid.

He said people shouldn’t vote PC just because it’s what they’ve always done, and should instead vote for what’s best for them.

“I think it’s time for people to kind of wake up and go, ‘What’s best for the riding?’” he said. “What’s best for the riding is someone who’s going to listen, someone who’s going to fight for the people there.”

Reid said if people vote PC or NDP, their representative would be “lost in the shuffle” among the other dozens of MLAs. If people elect him as a Liberal, he said, he would be only the party’s second member in the legislature, and would have a much larger voice.

“I firmly believe that Liberals are on an uptick in gaining seats in the legislature, and I would love to be the one that starts that kind of domino.”

The NDP government has broken a lot of promises since it came to power in October 2023, Reid said, adding his priorities if elected would be health care, investing in agriculture and small rural businesses, and investing in young farmers.

“I’ve set up some meetings to go speak to some young farmers of Carberry about that because I think that if we invest in them, we can get some really exciting and stable new things going in that profession.”

Reid also said fixing the Highway 5 and Trans-Canada Highway intersection north of Carberry, which is presumed to be redesigned as an RCUT intersection by the NDP government, is also a priority of his. He said he has spoken with residents in the area who want an overpass instead of an RCUT, as they believe an RCUT intersection would be dangerous.

The Liberal party has finished in either third or fourth place in every election since the Spruce Woods riding was created in 2011. Michelle Budiwski received 14 per cent of the vote last election, the highest the Liberals have ever received in the riding.

Premier Wab Kinew has to call the byelection for no later than Sept. 24, six months after Jackson stepped down.

Both the PCs and NDP didn’t return calls asking if they had other candidates running in the byelection.

» alambert@brandonsun.com