NDP to release Toronto-centric mini-platform
Success of cities and GTA ‘vital’ to national interest, Mulcair says
OTTAWA— The New Democrats know the Liberals are the biggest threat to their fortunes in Toronto, so they are ramping up efforts to convince its undecided voters they have the best plan for the city.
“We’ve got a huge part of the economy here and a huge population here and we have to get it right here,” NDP candidate Andrew Cash, who is running for re-election in the downtown riding of Davenport, said Thursday.
“If we get this right here, we can get this right everywhere,” Cash said.
The New Democrats are rolling out a Greater Toronto Area version of their policy platform at the Centre for Social Innovation (CSI Annex) on Bathurst St. Friday morning, grouping together all the promises they believe would appeal to people living in the city and its surrounding suburbs and a breakdown of how much funding would flow to the area.
The NDP provided the Star with highlights from this mini-platform, which packages together policy proposals that include investments in affordable housing, $12.9 billion over 20 years for transit infrastructure in the GTA, income-averaging for cultural workers, phased-out interest on student loans, creating or maintaining nearly 165,000 $15-a-day child-care spaces, and reducing backlogs in processing immigration applications, with a greater priority on family reunification.
“The success of our cities is vital to our national interest. There is no greater urban centre in this country than the City of Toronto and its surrounding municipalities. We need a government in Ottawa that understands that,” NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair writes in a letter intro- ducing the “Building a Better Toronto” document, which is coming out before the NDP releases its national platform.
“It’s time to think big again, to be bold again, to reach higher,” Mulcair writes. The New Democrats won seven Toronto seats in 2011— but lost Trinity-Spadina to the Liberals in a 2014 byelection — and will need to hold and increase that result in the Oct. 19 election to have any chance at forming the government.
The NDP believes there are enough voters in the GTA who want the Conservative government out of office, but their challenge in Toronto and in the surrounding suburbs is convincing voters that Mulcair, and not Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, is the one who can pull off a victory.
So, in selling its vision for Toronto, the NDP will also continue building its narrative that Mulcair, a former Quebec Liberal environment minister, has more of the experience needed to be prime minister than Trudeau, and that Trudeau voted in favour of the Anti-terrorism Act, 2015 (Bill C-51).
The NDP also plans to keep pointing out that the Liberal fiscal plan released last weekend involves $6.5 billion in savings over four years, including $3 billion a year by fiscal 2019-20.
The NDP argues these savings would mean cuts to programming, but the Liberals have said they would find the money from items such as government advertising, boutique tax credits and the use of external consultants.
The NDP continues to have high hopes for Linda McQuaig in Toronto Centre and Jennifer Hollett in University-Rosedale, where Liberal Chrystia Freeland is running for re-election.
They also think they might pick up Brampton East, where the NDP is running Harb Kahlon against Conservative candidate Naval Bajaj and Liberal Raj Grewal.