They’re off! Grit candidates celebrate campaign launch
McKenna, Fergus hold events; others attend MacDonald funeral
Mere hours after Conservative leader Stephen Harper formally started Canada down the road on Sunday to an Oct. 19 federal election, two Liberal candidates launched campaigns in their Ottawa and Gatineau ridings.
Catherine McKenna for Ottawa Centre and Greg Fergus for HullAylmer kick-started their 11-week races, with both receiving surprisingly large supporter turnout on a long weekend.
“This is going to be a very long campaign,” McKenna said Sunday afternoon. “I don’t think there was a need to call the election this early; it’s very expensive for Canadians. I think it’s good to have a big launch, though, because it makes people excited and brings their attention to the campaign.”
At her campaign headquarters on Somerset Street West, McKenna received a symbolic pair of running shoes. McKenna said she and her team had knocked on more than 40,000 homes during the past year and will continue to do so next week as originally planned.
Fergus said Liberal candidates’ campaign launches in the region will be co-ordinated as Canada begins its longest federal campaign since 1872.
“We’re trying to make sure that the Ontario and Quebec campaigns are working together within the National Capital Region,” he said during his launch party at the Gainsbourg Bistro-Brasserie in the Hull sector later Sunday.
Due to the early campaign launch, Fergus also planned to stick with door-to-door campaigning for the next week before launching events the following week, saying he and his team had knocked on more than 10,000 doors since March 2015.
Other candidates weren’t in as much of a hurry to launch their campaigns. New Democrat Ottawa Centre MP Paul Dewar attended the funeral of former Tory cabinet minister Flora MacDonald, and PC candidate Damian Konstantinakos, who is contesting the same riding, was said to be focusing his efforts on “attending festivals and events with his family,” and “canvassing door-to-door for the most part in this campaign.”
Ottawa-Vanier Liberal MP Mauril Bélanger also attended MacDonald’s funeral rather than hold a launch party. Ottawa South Green candidate John Redins tweeted that his party was respecting MacDonald’s funeral date when asked whether he had anything planned for the day.
Ottawa-Orléans Tory MP Royal Galipeau was seen downtown Sunday, telling the CBC that the race will be difficult in his riding. Other Ottawa and Gatineau candidates were unavailable on the weekend.