Having never met Ontario liberal leader Steven Del Duca, I have not had much on which to base an opinion. All I know is that he never impressed me much in Kathleen Wynne’s cabinet. As transportation minister, he stuck his foot in it when he appeared to be pushing Metrolinx to approve another GO station in his riding. Nor did he appear to be doing much when he was moved to the economic growth and development portfolio.
But I was never at the cabinet table and that leaves me with little to go on.
For now, we can give him a chance. He has been in office for a year and the pandemic has gotten most of the media attention during that time. The bit of media coverage he received is to his credit. Not being in the legislature makes it tough to get coverage.
Del Duca has a lot of ground to cover this summer and fall. He has to be in full campaign mode next year for a June election. He has considerably more political experience than Doug Ford and he is probably smarter. That will hardly help if nobody knows him.
The better he becomes known, the harder Andrea Horwath of the new democrats will go after him. He is the blocker in her mind. She can hardly afford to lose any progressive votes to him. This will likely be her last run.
But he has to show how he can help take Ontario forward. The days of the pandemic will be behind us and he has to make it clear that a vote for Ford will take us back to the penny-pinching days of conservative premier Michael Harris. Ontario needs growth and progress and a liberal government can make that happen.
I make no promises but a liberal government in Ontario has the chance of being progressive and recognizing the need for quick rebuilding of the economy of Ontario, along with the rest of Canada. Good planning can make that happen.
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Copyright 2021 © Peter Lowry
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