"From the Left"

The 1998 Guelph Tribune columns

June 17, 1998

Tomorrow, NDP members from across Wellington County will assemble at St. George's Church to choose their candidate for the next provincial election. This kicks off the local campaign to bring a measure of social justice back to Ontario. The three declared candidates, Phil Allt, Elaine Rogala and Bruce Abel, all bring a wealth of experience to this task. Allt and Abel are both high school teachers and active members of their respective locals of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation (OSSTF). Rogala is a community activist from the rural area of the riding. Their unique strengths make the outcome of tomorrow's nomination meeting anything but certain.

The one thing that is clear is that our incumbent Tory MPP, Brenda Elliott, will not be re-elected. She embarrassed her constituents during her sorry term as Minister of the Environment, and has been all but invisible ever since. A community as environmentally committed as Guelph is unlikely to send her back for another kick at the can. She knows this, and her local riding association knows it. Speculation is that she will cite "personal reasons" for not even seeking re-nomination. Then they will face the problem of finding a credible candidate to run in her place. Although financially healthy, with about $28,000 in their bank account, the local Conservative Association is suffering from organizational and political ineptitude. A bungled attempt to control municipal politics, ending last week with the sudden resignation of Lynda Prior, has destroyed their credibility.

Similarly, the Liberals locally are thrashing about in search of a candidate. The only person to declare so far is former Tribune columnist Maggie Laidlaw. If she is successful, her biggest problem will be reconciling her own environmental and social positions with those of Dalton McGuinty. The official Party line is that the only thing wrong with Mike Harris is that he is going too far, too fast. They don't disagree with the direction in which he is taking the province. If the Liberal establishment has its way, we won't have the chance to watch Laidlaw twist and turn as she attempts to deal with this obvious contradiction.

With the local Tories in disarray, and after the local Liberals turn their backs on a committed environmentalist and social activist, the field will become wide open here. Regardless of which candidate wins the nomination tomorrow, the NDP will have as good a chance as anyone of sending the next member to Queen's Park. In the last federal election, Rogala held onto the NDP vote in the face of a general decline in support across the province. In the 1994 municipal election, Allt came within 75 votes of defeating Dan Schnurr. Although untested in public elections, Abel has been waging an enthusiastic campaign to win the nomination. Put any of these three into a campaign, armed with the policies adopted at the NDP's recent "Dialogue for Change" convention, and anything can happen.

There was a time, back in the days of Alf Hales and Harry Worton, when Guelph voters were famously loyal to the incumbent. Now, things are different. Incumbents have a short political life expectancy these days. On top of this, I can't remember a time when Guelph sent the same Party to both Ottawa and Queen's Park. Those two facts alone should give Abel, Allt and Rogala good reason to crank up their campaigns for tomorrow's nomination.