Job creation should be priority: Baillie
The dropping price of oil has left Nova Scotia Progressive Conservative leader Jamie Baillie worried more about local families than the economy.
“I’m mostly worried about families from here who are depending on a paycheque from out west,” said Baillie, who was in Kings County Jan. 15 to visit with local businesspeople and speak to residents.
“There are about 15,000 Nova Scotians who commute back and forth. It’s not just an Alberta problem, it’s also a Nova Scotia problem. We have to make sure there’s something here for them when they come home. Every day, we’re hearing more about people being laid off out west.”
The drop in prices, Baillie said, emphasizes the need to find ways to create new jobs. He points to fracking as one possibility, allowing those Nova Scotians who previously worked in the Alberta oilsands to do a similar job closer to home.
The Tories “vigorously oppose” the fracking ban the government put in place last year, Baillie added.
“To me, the opportunity is that we have people who have gained great experience in natural resource development, like fracking and gas development. We should not be banning fracking when it’s one of the ways we can create jobs here,” Baillie said.
He points to the Ivany report as another way; however, Baillie says the Liberals aren’t taking the action that the report called for.
“I am very concerned that, in this time, when all Nova Scotians really rallied around the Ivany report and its recommendations that we’re a year in and the government has done so little,” he said. “If there’s ever an opportunity to make real change in how our province works, the Ivany report gave it to us.”
Villages, towns not getting fair ment
Communities, Baillie said, are struggling across the province and need the government to take action. He points to
treat- his own area of Spring Hill, which has moved forward with the dissolution process. It’s a situation common to the Valley, where Hantsport and Bridgetown are also pursuing dissolution.
“One of the lessons we’ve learned is that the provincial government has no fair process with dealing with the situation,” Baillie said. “The amount of money the government gave to Bridgetown compared to Spring Hill – there’s no rhyme nor reason to it, and that’s not fair. Hantsport is coming up pretty fast and we’ll be watching to make sure the people of Hantsport get a fair deal from the province.”
Kings North MLA John Lohr added that the Tories are also determined to ensure villages get a fair hearing in the wake of the draft provincial-municipal fiscal review. Released late last year, the review advocates eliminating villages and forcing them to become towns or become absorbed in the municipality.
“The villages felt like they were blindsided,” Lohr said. “Not all villages are the same – we have some well-run managed and run villages here and they don’t feel it was fair they were just lumped in with all of them. They want to be partners in the discussion.”
While the Tories believe “we probably have too much local government,” he said, it needs to be consolidated in a rational way and none of the stakeholders can be left out of the discussion.