LOCAL NDP TRIO RE-ELECTED
Despite a strong challenge from the Progressive Conservatives, the popularity of NDP incumbent Taras Natyshak in Essex was enough to stem the Ford Nation tide at the border with neighbouring riding ChathamKent-Leamington.
It was a three-peat for Natyshak, who was first elected MPP in 2011, and, while his party now has a larger presence and a larger voice in the legislature, he said the provincial results were “a little disappointing.”
He told reporters the NDP, now the official Opposition, plans to “voraciously” defend communities and criticize the government in the legislature. “We don’t know where this province is going to go,” he said, referring to the lack of costing and details by Doug Ford and the Tories on their campaign promises.
“There’s going to be a new reality we’ll have to come to terms with,” said Natyshak, who thanked, “from the bottom of my heart, the people of Essex” for their support. “The real beauty is that Ontario is now blue. We have a PC majority, one that we’ve needed desperately for so long,” said Progressive Conservative candidate Chris Lewis. “Unfortunately, for Essex, we’re not going to have a voice at the table.”
Lewis, 42, a past Kingsville town councillor, firefighter and married father of three, won several of the Essex polls, mainly in Kingsville. With almost 23,000 votes to Natyshak’s more than 26,000, Lewis had the best local Tory provincial showing in decades. For third-place Essex Liberal candidate Kate Festeryga ( just over 3,000 votes), the party’s defeat is also a personal loss — she now loses her Queen’s Park job. “I’m good — I don’t think anyone thought it would be different,” she said of Thursday’s vote outcome. Representing a new generation at age 26, she said she was excited at the number of young first-time voters she met. Widening Highway 3 between Essex and Leamington emerged as a top campaign issue in the Essex riding. Both the PC and NDP leaders promised at local campaign stops that the project would proceed. “There’s no more time for discussion,” Natyshak said of Ford’s Highway 3 pledge. “Highway 3 is dangerous. He (Ford) certainly made the commitment on Highway 3,” said Lakeshore mayor and Essex County Warden Tom Bain, who joined the Belle River Legion gathering to give his congratulations.
“We’re certainly not left out in the wilderness — we have a Conservative member (elected) in Chatham-Kent—Leamington,” said Bain. “Taras has been a tremendous representative for us,” said Bain.
Nancy Pancheshan of the Green Party received almost 2,000 votes.