THUNDER BAY – As the federal election looms less than two weeks away, candidates in Thunder Bay-Rainy River seem convinced the race will be decided by which party voters trust most to steer the national economy.
The four candidates in the southside city riding faced off in a Chronicle Journal hosted debate Wednesday night at the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium, with jobs and government spending emerging as primary themes.
Liberal candidate Don Rusnak defended his party’s decision to be the lone one to go into deficits over the next few budgets, citing the commitment to spend $125 billion over 10 years on physical and social infrastructure.
He also took direct aim at the budget habits of the Conservatives during their time in power.
“When you’re not spending on veterans, not spending on Coast Guards and not spending on environmental protections, again the analogy goes back to a house and you’re selling the windows, the carpet for what in an election year yet. The (Conservatives) didn’t run balanced budgets the whole time they were in government,” Rusnak said.
“By selling (General Motors) shares and underspending in programs they balanced a budget this year, in an election year? Smoke and mirrors.”
NDP candidate John Rafferty referenced the amount those Conservative deficits added to the country’s national debt.
“(Prime Minister Stephen Harper) has added $118 billion to our debt,” he said. “For Mr. Harper to talk about balancing the budgets in an election year and everybody is supposed to be happy about that, what about the $118 billion he has added to our total credit card?”
Conservative candidate Moe Comuzzi earlier in the night spoke out against running a shortfall, though she was reminded by the rest of the candidates the Liberals had run seven straight deficits.
“Deficit spending, in any family, is toxic. It raises taxes and it kills jobs,” Comuzzi said.
Green Party candidate Christy Radbourne did not sugarcoat much during the two-and-a-half hour debate, especially when she confronted Comuzzi about the Conservative’s approach to large-business taxes.
“You don’t create jobs by corporate tax cuts. That costs us $12 billion annually and corporate tax cuts lead to $695 million sitting in dead funds, dead funds that weren’t reinvested in this country, dead funds that weren’t reinvested into machinery and equipment,” she said.
“Raising a tax rate four per cent isn’t actually sending them across the way. Trade agreements, like the (Trans-Pacific Partnership) sends jobs away to other countries.”
Comuzzi argued low taxes across the board are the best way to foster business development
“We need job creation here in Thunder Bay-Rainy River,” she said. “We don’t need to look outside. Small businesses grow into corporations. That’s how we run Canada. Small business is the engine to this whole country and everybody else wants to penalize us. Corporate businesses provide jobs. Small business people, low taxes, that’s what creates jobs.”
Rafferty said the jobs created on the Conservatives’ watch aren’t the quality ones Canadians need to live sustainably and cited the NDP proposal to raise minimum wage in federally regulated industries to $15 per hour.
“Eighty per cent of them are precarious jobs. They are part-time jobs. They are low-paying, often minimum wage jobs,” he said in response to a question about how to assist people struggling financially and have to rely on services such as food banks.
“These are not people who are not working. They are working maybe two or three part-time jobs to try to make ends meet to feed their families but they fall short every pay because they can’t do it.”
That promise does not sit well with Rusnak.
“It’s federally regulated industries and as you all know there aren’t many people in a federally regulated industry who doesn’t make $15 an hour,” he said.
“The smoke and mirrors of the NDP is they want the people at Tim Hortons and the people at McDonald’s to think they’re going to get $15 per hour. That’s not true and it’s disingenuous on behalf of the NDP.”
Radbourne said it’s not simply enough to create a job for the sake of creating a job.
“You can’t take advantage of opportunity if you can’t decide whether you’re going to pay the rent, put some clothes on your kid’s back or eat. I see it every single day where parents make that decision,” she said.
“The poverty in this country is crippling and it creates mental health and addictions issues that we cannot overcome without addressing those first. You can’t suggest making a job, whether it’s at Tim Hortons or Starbucks or wherever it might be, might be the solution for these people to pull themselves out of poverty.”
