Horwath vows to twin Hwy. 3 ‘within two years’
An NDP government would begin twinning the rest of Highway 3 within two years, leader Andrea Horwath promised at a campaign stop in Leamington on Wednesday.
“We’re going to get to the work right away,” Horwath said at the TSC Stores off Highway 3. “We expect within a two-year time frame we should be able to be well underway with construction.” Widening the rest of the highway is in the party’s Southwestern Ontario platform. Horwath seemed much better briefed on this key local issue than Conservative Leader Doug Ford when he was in Lakeshore last week. She cited three collisions since the campaign began.
She also referred to the Ontario Ministry of Transportation’s letter to Essex County council this month stating that improvements planned between 2019 and 2021 include resurfacing but not widening.
“That’s not good enough,” she said. “Highway 3 needs to be twinned now.”
The problem will worsen as the greenhouse industry grows, she said.
“We talk a lot about encouraging more agricultural activity, so the very least we should be doing is making sure transportation routes that help products get to market are ones that are safe,” she said.
“That gives us a time frame we can work on,” said Essex County Warden Tom Bain. Horwath also promised “a real commitment” to increasing safety on Highway 401 between Windsor and London, saying her government would consider measures such as concrete barriers along the median and widening the highway from two lanes in each direction to three. “We’ve heard loudly and clearly the need for more concrete barriers, so we’re going to take a hard look at that,” she said. “We’re going to have transportation experts look at what the best solutions are.”
She also promised to work with communities on what infrastructure is needed.
Bain called the stretch of the 401 by Tilbury, where there are only two lanes in each direction and no barriers, “very dangerous.” “We know we have a high volume of accidents,” he said, saying he was in a collision there several years ago. He also called it “really depressing ” when senior governments “just go ahead and we don’t have a voice.”
HORSE RACING
Horwath was also asked about the current government’s plan to invest $105 million a year for 19 years in horse racing. Rural residents and people in the industry weren’t consulted, a man complained. Horwath promised to review the plan and work with the industry “to breathe more life into the industry.”
Horse racing, which accounted for about 2,000 jobs in this region, was devastated when the government pulled slot machines out of race tracks in 2012. Windsor Raceway and farms closed. Now, the same class of horses race for double the money in London than in Leamington, Sarnia and Dresden, said Bain, who fought to preserve racing here. He wants to see “some equality.” “I think there’s a real future for horse racing in this area,” he said. Before going to Leamington, Horwath visited Debby and Santparkash Aujlay in Forest Glade to talk about the party’s plan for dental care. Two-thirds of seniors, or 1.5 million retired people, don’t have dental benefits, she said. Under the NDP, they could use their OHIP cards to pay for dental appointments. The Aujlays pay almost $500 a month for drug and dental insurance, but it only covers teeth cleaning. He had to have root canal treatment, and she needs a crown. Neither is covered. The NDP would pay for the plan by increasing taxes on the richest and corporations and operating deficits for at least five years.
The NDP “won’t give up on” the auto sector and manufacturing, Horwath said but was vague about the party’s plan.
“We have a strategy that’s outlined — lightly, but outlined — in our platform,” she said. “We need to have a co-ordinated approach. We need to engage more investment in the auto and manufacturing sectors. We need to make sure we have the skilled workforce that’s needed.”
NEW HOSPITAL
She acknowledged the “vigorous debate” about the location of the planned new hospital, but said “the location is something that the local community has to hammer out. What my priority would be is to get the hospital built and up and running to ensure people have access to that service.”
If the NDP is elected provincially and re-elected in Windsor and Essex County, there is “more than a chance” that at least one of the three local MPPs will be named a cabinet minister, Horwath said.
Horwath travelled to Sarnia later Wednesday. Ford was also in Lambton County and London on Wednesday and will be in Windsor on Thursday for a rally at the Fogolar Furlan Club. Both leaders have made several trips to Southwestern Ontario. There are fewer seats here than in other regions, but there’s opportunity. The NDP holds all three seats here and two in London, and the Conservatives hold the four rural ridings between. There’s one vacant seat in London.
Many of the ridings have both urban areas, where there is NDP support, and rural areas, which are often Conservative. Races in three ridings, including Chatham-Kent-Leamington, are expected to be close.