Liberals to run on their record

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This article was published 24/06/2019 (2681 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — Liberal MPs hope a spending bonanza will convince Winnipeggers to give them a second mandate this fall.

As the House of Commons rose for the summer, International Trade Diversification Minister Jim Carr recited from memory a series of funding announcements his government has allotted to Manitoba since taking office in fall 2015.

“We’re going to run on our record and our platform,” he said in a wide-ranging interview. “You set your narrative within the frame of what you can control.”

Earlier in their term, the Liberals had hoped they would easily keep their Winnipeg ridings and try to gain another in Manitoba during the October vote. The plan was to have infrastructure money spark a noticeable construction boom and boost employment.

Instead, the Liberals are only now recovering from a hit in the polls because of the fallout of the SNC-Lavalin affair, bypassing the Manitoba PC government to fund road repairs in Winnipeg directly and playing defence on everything from the carbon tax to China’s canola ban.

In addition, the federal party is having to contend with an unexpected election in Manitoba.

The Oct. 21 federal election will take place six weeks after Manitobans elect their MLAs. The provincial government is in a media blackout, meaning Premier Brian Pallister’s government won’t announce new spending.

As a result, the Liberals have delayed and restructured announcements they’d planned to make this summer; some involved cost-sharing with the province. A few could be jammed into the first weeks of October, after the provincial vote.

“There will be some impact for sure, but there are other initiatives that are our own,” Carr said.

He’s worried about voter exhaustion, a concern echoed by other Liberal and Conservative MPs.

“When you’ve got so much campaigning over a number of months, that is going to have an impact on volunteers and on people who are answering the doorbell,” Carr said.

The province has put a damper on the Liberals’ marquee infrastructure plan, which would repair rundown roads, boost transit and cut carbon emissions by spending $118 billion over a decade.

A dispute over how to fund flood channels in the Interlake led to the agreement being signed late, and the province has been slow to submit proposals. Elsewhere, provinces have cut back on their expenditures while using federal money to fix roads and boost transit.

That’s why the Liberals took the rare move to channel money directly to cities this spring. For example, Winnipeg will get an extra $40 million from a long-standing gasoline tax to repair roads.

Carr hopes certain projects will convince Winnipeggers to vote Liberal. This includes $182 million for mental health and home care, $35 million for the Diversity Gardens at Assiniboine Park and the money spent to build a road to Shoal Lake 40 First Nation.

An increase to the federal baby bonus has helped lift tens of thousands of Manitobans above the poverty line. Canada has its lowest unemployment in four decades, though economists note jobs are far less secure than in the past.

Carr is unsure whether the Kapyong Barracks land, which is in his Winnipeg South Centre riding, will be transferred out of federal jurisdiction to Treaty 1 First Nations before the election.

Last week, the bands presented renderings that include mixed housing, a sports facility, hotel, gas bar and an Indigenous hospice. Nearby residents have expressed concern there will be a casino, but Carr stressed any development is subject to city bylaws.

“We’re on a path, and I’m hopeful that that path will be a very important example of reconciliation, where the neighbourhood will be fully involved in any development plan. I know that’s in everybody’s interest.”

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca