{"id":6572,"date":"2014-05-07T17:59:35","date_gmt":"2014-05-07T21:59:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=6572"},"modified":"2014-05-07T17:59:35","modified_gmt":"2014-05-07T21:59:35","slug":"newmarket-aurora-is-a-liberal-seat-and-should-be-a-liberal-seat-argues-health-minister","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/newmarket-aurora-is-a-liberal-seat-and-should-be-a-liberal-seat-argues-health-minister\/","title":{"rendered":"Newmarket-Aurora \u201cis a Liberal seat and should be a Liberal seat,\u201d argues Health Minister"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Premier Kathleen Wynne may have called the June 12 Provincial election on Friday afternoon, but the campaign got off to an early start last week with a fundraising visit from Health Minister Deb Matthews. <\/p>\n

Matthews was on hand at Highland Gate Golf Club on Wednesday evening to support the fundraiser of Councillor Chris Ballard, who was acclaimed the Liberal Party of Ontario\u2019s candidate for Newmarket-Aurora in March. <\/p>\n

Speaking to a crowd of about 40 supporters, Matthews told the crowd that in Newmarket-Aurora she saw \u201can opportunity to win a seat that is a Liberal seat, should be a Liberal seat\u201d and said Ballard had a \u201cdemonstrated track record\u201d in the community. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe is an idealistic person who gets things done,\u201d she said. \u201cHe brings that commitment to everything that he does and we need him at Queen\u2019s Park. There is enough partisanship down there, and what I call the WWF [of politics]. It is time we really focused on the things that are important to families and Chris will do exactly that.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the event was originally scheduled to be a fundraising for Ballard\u2019s campaign, focus was also firmly set on the Ontario Budget, which was to be delivered the following afternoon. For Matthews, it was an exciting time and an opportunity for a party to really put its money where its mouth is.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven though people say budgets are dry, boring and not important, they are so not that,\u201d she said. \u201cBudgets are an expression of your values. This is where you say, \u2018this is what is important to me and this is what I am actually going to be putting money behind.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Of particular interest to her, she said was an announcement of bringing the base pay for Personal Support Workers up to $16.50 from $12.50 over the next two years, as well as an $810 million \u201cgame changer\u201d in funds for persons with developmental disabilities.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are committed to getting to balance,\u201d she said. \u201cWe don\u2019t like having a deficit more than anybody else, but we\u2019re not going to reach balance at the expense of our most vulnerable and that is what others are suggesting we do. We will hear on the campaign with Tim Hudak and others of his candidates that we can\u2019t afford the changes that we are making. I totally reject the idea that we can\u2019t afford to pay personal support workers a decent income. I reject that. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe can\u2019t provide care in the community without personal support workers if we don\u2019t have enough personal support workers. Nobody can convince me that we can\u2019t support people with developmental disabilities. We must do that and we are going to do that. We will get to balance but we do not have the attitude we can\u2019t do anything else. We will invest in people.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Liberals, she said, would also support infrastructure, touting high speed rail. On the other hand, the New Democrats \u201cwant everything but they don\u2019t want to pay for anything\u201d, Matthews claimed, adding it was something which left her \u201cdisappointed\u201d with a party she once \u201cknew and respected.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t even care whether they vote for the budget or not,\u201d said Matthews of the NDP. \u201cI would like them to vote for the budget. I would like to be able to carry on and implement what we are talking about, but if they force us into an election I am so ready to fight. I am so proud of Kathleen. I am so proud of the candidates like Chris that are running across this province. Kathleen has attracted wonderful candidates and we are going to have a fantastic campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt matters who is in power. If you care about the education our kids are getting, if you care about the health care we all need at some point in our life, if you care about building a strong, prosperous province, if you care about investing in the people of this province, then we need to be back there. We need to be able to continue to implement the kind of change I think the people of this province want.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ballard also shared his support for his party leader, stating he admired \u201cthe openness and transparency\u201d she has brought to the Premier\u2019s Office.
\n\u201cAs someone who is involved in government, albeit at the local level, it is very important and I so appreciate her take and what she has brought to the table. She defines what leadership is to all of us and brings a new tone to elected office.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe we are bringing leadership with heart to Newmarket-Aurora.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Premier Kathleen Wynne may have called the June 12 Provincial election on Friday afternoon, but the campaign got off to an early start last week with a fundraising visit from Health Minister Deb Matthews. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6529,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/2014-05-08-07.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1I0","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-01 08:51:50","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}