Nova Scotia goes to polls end of May

Nova Scotians will go to the polls May 30 as Premier Stephen McNeil’s Liberal government seeks its second mandate following a term in office largely marked by frugal spending and public sector labour strife.

McNeil kicked off the campaign Sunday with a rally at a Lebanese cultural centre in the heart of a key Halifax riding, shortly after meeting with Lt.-Gov. J.J. Grant at Government House.

In a speech before a packed room of enthusiastic supporters and party workers, McNeil acknowledged his government had made some unpopular decisions since being elected in 2013.

“We had to make tough choices, choices that weren’t always popular,” said McNeil. “I believe you either shape change or change shapes you. We had to shape our own change.”

At dissolution the Liberals held 34 seats in the 51-seat legislature, the Progressive Conservatives had 10 and the NDP five. There was one Independent and one seat was vacant.

The election follows nearly two months of election-style spending announcements by the Liberals, and a budget tabled Thursday offering a broad, though modest tax cut to about 500,000 low and middle income Nova Scotians.

It was the second consecutive balanced budget for the Liberals. The government has exercised strict wage restraint for public sector unions, including nurses and teachers, while making a series of cuts to programs affecting areas such as seniors’ long-term care and initiatives run by public service organizations.

“Thanks to our choices the province is in better shape than it was three and a half years ago,” McNeil told the crowd.

He also took shots at his campaign opponents, accusing the Tories of being “negative about the province’s future” and saying the NDP were ready to “write a blank cheque to big labour.”

The government’s budget died with the election call, leaving McNeil to explain to reporters why it wasn’t voted on in the legislature before the writ was dropped. He said it’s a matter of letting the public decide.

“I’m not presumptuous enough to believe that all of them (the public) agree with my vision,” McNeil said. “So let me present my vision to them, we will let the other two parties present their vision, and then Nova Scotians will decide.”

McNeil also made no apologies for his government or its policies.

“There will be some who obviously in the last three-and-a-half years have not been happy with us, he said. “I am not running from the record.”

Tory Leader Jamie Baillie pitched himself Sunday as a sunny alternative to four years of Liberal austerity, which he said has hurt Nova Scotia’s rural communities, allowed infrastructure to crumble and sent doctors and young people away from the province in “droves.”

“(Nova Scotians) will have to decide if they want to invest in jobs and in their communities, or if they want more McNeil cuts,” said Baillie, surrounded by Tory candidates. “Only the Progressive Conservative party has the plan to allow Nova Scotians to stand proudly on their own two feet once again.”

Baillie said the premier’s heavy hand in dealing with public sector unions has resonated through the province, and said if elected, he would push for a “middle way” that would keep wages at roughly current levels but increase investment in public services.

Baillie’s speech was replete with promises of prosperity, but when pressed for specifics, the Tory leader often pivoted back to attacking McNeil.