Gates ready to hammer away on top issues
GO, south Niagara hospital and race track at forefront
Wayne Gates has four more years at Queen’s Park, and says he can’t wait to get back to work now that the election is over.
“I’m so thankful to the people of Niagara Falls, Fort Erie and Niagara-on-the-Lake for giving me the honour of being their
MPP again,” said Gates. “I’m so excited to show them all the passion I have for this job over the next four years.”
Gates is ready to hit the ground running, and said there are three key points he will be hammering away at over the term: A push to get GO trains running to Niagara Falls earlier; continued support for a new south Niagara hospital; and further revitalization of the Fort Erie Race Track.
“The track is off to a great start. They’ve already had a couple million-dollar wagering days, they’ve got more horses in the backstretch, and their race fields are bigger. There’s a lot of excitement in the air around that track,” said Gates, who was a regular fixture at the track long before he entered politics. Premier-elect Doug Ford visited Niagara shortly before the election, and he pledged to undo the Liberals’ decision to remove the slot machines from Fort Erie; Gates said that’s an important promise and he wants it followed through.
“He made this promise, and just this week he went on TV and said he never breaks his promises, so I hope he does exactly like he says he would,” said Gates, who has already sent Ford a letter reminding him of his campaign vow. “The slots should never have been taken out in the first place — that was a mistake, and it would be an even bigger mistake now to not put them back.”
The slots provided more than 200 local jobs and also pumped more than a million dollars annually into town coffers — money which Gates said is badly needed to help fix Fort Erie’s aging infrastructure. The track had one of its most successful opening days ever this season, and Father’s Day is the second biggest day at the track after the Prince of Wales Stakes; Gates said he’s looking forward to hitting the track that day and supporting the event.
On the health-care front, Gates said getting the new south Niagara hospital — which has been mired in the planning stages for years — to finally start putting shovels in the ground will be a priority over the next few years. When those shovels do hit the ground, Gates said, it will be important to make sure it’s Niagara workers who are holding the handles.
“I’ve been very clear that if we’re going to spend all this taxpayer money on this hospital, we should make sure it’s local workers doing those jobs, and local engineers doing those designs; that’s very important to me,” he said.
And finally, the long-elusive GO train expansion is something Gates is happy the government finally committed to, however, he thinks the timelines should be adjusted.
According to the Ministry of Transportation, the earliest GO trains could start rolling into Niagara Falls would be 2023, but Gates said that would be missing a major event for the region.
“With the Canada Summer Games coming here in 2021, this is an incredible opportunity for us,” said Gates, who insists it’s possible the timeline can be adjusted to meet the 2021 deadline. “All the partners need to sit down and get this going to Niagara Falls by 2021 because the Games will be a great environment to start this initiative and get people to here and also get some of those cars off the highway.”