Mike Bossio, who won election over long-time incumbent Daryl Kramp by 225 votes to become the MP for the new Hastings, Lennox and Addington riding, has taken on a new role.

Earlier this week he was elected as chair of the National Rural Caucus by 50 of his fellow Liberal MPs.

“We need to take a holistic approach to rural Canada. Rural Canada includes agriculture, forestry, and fishing of course, but it also includes access to high-speed Internet, cellphone coverage, tourism, small business development, mining and many other issues. There are common issues in rural Canada, but no rural riding is completely alike,” he said in response to his appointment.

Bossio, who lives in Tyendinaga Township, located between Belleville and Napanee in Hastings County, has visited the northern townships in his new riding since the election, including Addington Highlands. He has set up a riding office in Napanee and has a satellite office in Bancroft.

The new Liberal government finds itself dealing with harsh realities even before they deliver their first budget, as promises that looked good when sketched out as headlines in campaign literature documents get bogged down in the endless details of being turned into viable long-term policies and programs.

The bold promise by Prime Minister Trudeau during the campaign, “This will be the last election ever held in Canada under the 'first past the post' system” is certainly a case in point.

The campaign literature outlined the process, which the government, thus far at least, is committed to following. They will form a committee of parliamentarians, which will travel across the country to talk to Canadians about a number of systems that are used in other parliamentary democracies around the world. In 18 months or so the committee will recommend a system. The government will prepare and pass a bill that will institute a new system, which will be in place by October 2019, when the next federal election takes place.

Scott Reid, MP for Lanark Frontenac Kingston, and the Conservative Party critic for the Ministry of Democratic Institutions, has been one of those advancing the argument that the process the Liberals are setting up is flawed. In the first case, he argues that given their majority on both the committee that will come up with a system, and the parliament that will approve it in the end, they are bound to choose a system that either favours them in the next election, or is at least neutral to their chances.

Secondly, he argues that something as fundamental as the way we choose a government needs the endorsement of the entire population, through a national vote.

While Reid makes a strong case, the government is rightly wary of a referendum on electoral reform.

While a national referendum would not be binding on the government, it might as well be because if a voting system is rejected by a free vote, a government that then brazenly implements that system would appear to be anything but democratic.

All previous referenda on electoral reform in Canada have lost. And the Liberals' election promise was to implement a new system, not to hold a referendum on a new system. If they hold a losing referendum they will appear to have wriggled out of an election promise.

But it is not a given that a referendum would be doomed to lose. The latest one to lose in BC actually received 57% support, and lost because the bar was set at 60% instead of a simple majority of 50%. And when a referendum was held in Ontario nine years ago, the McGuinty government did not take a stand in favor or against it, and people had difficulty understanding the proposal.

However they intend to ratify a new system, what the Trudeau government needs to do to is come up with an electoral system that balances the need to represent the geography and demographics of the country while making sure that every vote has a consequence.

If the new system is difficult to understand it will be difficult to support, and difficult to implement no matter how it is ratified.

The process that chooses the new system must be seen as non-partisan. It must be able to achieve a broad consensus of support, even if it does not go to a referendum.

The option also exists for the government to develop and implement a new system and put it in place for the 2019 general election, and they can hold a referendum on the system during that election as well.

That way, the voters will be able to learn how the system functions when put into practice, which will likely be easier than explaining the system in the abstract. As they are voting, voters will be in the best position to evaluate the system they are using.

The other advantage would be cost. Holding a referendum during an election is cheaper than holding a stand-alone referendum.

The chief drawback to this idea - and it is a big one - is that if the referendum fails, not only will it be back to the drawing board on electoral reform, the government that is elected in 2019 will have been chosen using a system that voters will have rejected, which is not an ideal situation.

Nothing is simple about electoral reform, from how it is carried out to the way the new system works, to how it is ratified and ultimately accepted and understood by the public and the parties.

But the basic issue holds, the current system created a democracy gap and leads to divisive politics and needs to be replaced or at least modified.

Scott Reid, MP for Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston, is stepping forward in response to a lack of clarity from the new Liberal government on the process they will use to come up with a new electoral system.

On December 8, during question period in the House of Commons, Minister of Democratic Reform Maryam Monsef reiterated a commitment made during the election campaign that last fall's election would be the last in Canada to be held using the so-called “first past the post” electoral system.

Monsef was asked if the government will hold a national referendum before instituting a new voting system, and her response was to say, “We are committed to an open and robust process of consultation and I will not prejudice the outcome of that process by committing to a referendum.”

Reid then stepped in to ask, “Is the minister really saying that the Canadian people are incapable of deciding in a referendum how they should be governed and how our elections should take place?”

Monsef responded that the “people of this country deserve to be consulted on a matter as important as democratic institutions” and added that consultation would take place from coast to coast to coast.

Monsef's refusal to commit to a referendum was followed, just after Christmas, by a statement by Government House Leader Dominic Leblanc on the CTV show Question Period, which appears to have closed the door on a referendum on electoral reform.

“Our plan is not to have a national referendum; our plan is to use parliament to consult Canadians. That’s always been our plan and I don’t have any reason to think that’s been changed,” Leblanc said.

“The response to the government's refusal to hold a referendum has been overwhelming,” said Scott Reid in an telephone interview on Tuesday. “All of the press - the Toronto Star, the Globe and Mail, and others - have said the same thing: a referendum is the only way to make the process of changing something as fundamental as our electoral system legitimate.”

The process that the government has committed to is to form a special parliamentary committee, which will hold hearings across the country and will report back to Parliament in 18 months. Legislation will then have to be prepared, reviewed by a parliamentary committee at least once, passed through the house and then passed through the Senate. All this must be done with a view towards giving Elections Canada enough time to prepare for an election under a new system.

“I think they have set themselves a very difficult time line,” said Reid.

As opposition critic, Reid expects he will sit on the special committee.

He is convinced that the process being chosen flies in the face of democratic values because the system through which the Liberal government will face the electorate the next time will have been determined by the Liberal Government by virtue of their majority on the committee and in Parliament. He also thinks the committee's mandate is too broad because it includes issues such as electronic voting, which he said brings a whole series of its own technical challenges.

Reid said he would be fine with the special committee preparing a report to Parliament, but said that, “the government should produce a piece of legislation, which includes all the details about how the system will work, and then bring it to the people for a referendum before passing it through Parliament. In our system a referendum is not binding on the government, but it would have a lot of moral sway.”

The details matter, he says, because every nuance of the system will confer an advantage to one party or another in the next election.

For example, if a ranked ballot system is chosen, in which voters place a number next to each candidate indicating their 1st, 2nd , 3rd choice and so on, it matters whether the rules say that voters must place a number next to each candidate or they have the option of placing a number next to each candidate.

“A poll by Nanos research showed that 40% of Conservative voters, when asked what their second choice was, said they had no second choice,” said Reid. “If voters need to rank all the candidates in order for their votes to count at all, then the Conservative Party would lose votes, potentially a lot of votes.”

In both 2001 and 2005, Scott Reid published papers about electoral reform. At one time he argued that two referenda are required, one to establish that the electorate wanted to make a change, and one with three or four options for change that would be decided using ranked voting.

This week he said that those were policy papers and what he is concerned with now is dealing with what is on the table today.

“A groundswell of opinion says the public needs to vote on a new system to avoid the perception that the government will be serving their own interests with a system they force through. I think there is a chance that we can make the government alter their plans.”

He said that he has met, at his request, with Minister Monsef and her Chief of staff to express his views on the matter.

Reid also said that, in his view, a simple majority, 50% plus one, is sufficient to win a referendum. Historically, referendums on electoral reform in Canada have required a 60% yes vote to grant the yes side a victory.

Another aspect of the debate is precedence. In Canada there have been four referenda on electoral reform in provincial jurisdictions. No Canadian government has attempted to change the voting system simply by passing a piece of legislation.

In June of 2005 Scott Reid, who was already the Conservative Party critic for the FedNor department, which oversees economic development in north and eastern Ontario, was given the added task of being the party critic for Democratic Institutions.

He remained in that role until the Conservative Party became the governing party in 2006. While the party was in power, Reid served as deputy house leader and as a committee chair but never sat in cabinet.

Now, under interim leader Rona Ambrose, he has again been named to the shadow cabinet as critic for the department of Democratic Institutions, a role that fits with his political and academic background. During the recent campaign, he once again expressed his interest in reforming how politics is done in Canada, whether through more free votes in Parliament, citizen referenda, or changes to the electoral system.

Reid has long advocated for a “ranked ballot system” to choose officials such as party leaders and speakers of the house, and in general elections as well.

With the new Liberal government having made the commitment to come up with an alternate electoral system in time for the next election, Reid may be in a position to influence that process as critic for this department.

When the matter was last considered in 2005, he advocated for a citizens' forum to come up with a system, rather than a Parliamentary committee. He has also done work on open democracy and the functioning of Parliament for 25 years, having started his career as a constitutional advisor to Reform Party leader, Preston Manning, in the 1990s.

The new Minister for Democratic Institutions is Liberal Maryam Monsef, who represents the riding of Peterborough. She is the first Afghani-born member of the Canadian Parliament, having emigrated to Peterborough in 1996, when she was 11. She is a graduate of Trent University and ran for mayor of Peterborough last year.

In her mandate letter from Prime Minster Trudeau, Monsef was given the explicit responsibility to oversee changes to the way senators are elected, and to lead the process of electoral reform, among a long list of other duties.

She was also tasked with maintaining: “close collaboration with your colleagues; meaningful engagement with Opposition Members of Parliament, Parliamentary Committees and the public service.”

On two occasions over the past week, the four candidates vying for the Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston seat in the October 19 federal election appeared at public meetings to answer a broad range of questions from the public.

Well-attended meetings took place at the Sydenham Legion on Wednesday, Sept. 30, and at Granite Ridge Education Centre in Sharbot Lake on Monday, October 5.

A broad range of questions was asked at each meeting, and after two hours there were still questioners waiting as the meeting ended. On the whole, the questioners opposed the current government direction on particular issues and the three opposition candidates spent most of their time outlining how their party would make changes.

In many cases, incumbent Scott Reid took issue with the premise of the questions, citing dollar amounts spent to address problems.

For example, when asked about health care funding, Reid pointed out that the federal transfer has been increasing by 6% per year over the last five years, and will be pegged to economic growth over the next five years, with a minimum increase of 3% per year if the Conservatives are re-elected.

By contrast, NDP candidate John Fenik said that the federal government has shown a lack of leadership by not sitting with the provincial premiers to talk about “innovative ways to deal with what is coming, issues such as the need for more clinics and more doctors.”

Phil Archambault of the Liberal Party, who has worked as a consultant in the heath care sector and currently works at Providence Care hospital in Kingston, said the “major problem is we have a system designed for the acute care needs of the past, not the chronic care needs of an aging population. It takes leadership at the federal level to manage this, and that starts with sitting down with the premiers.”

Anita Payne of the Green Party said that the Greens “would convene a council of Canadians so all levels of government would be involved.”

One of the issues that came up at the Sydenham meeting but not at the meeting in Sharbot Lake was the closure of the prison farms in Kingston.

On that issue, Phil Archambault said if elected he would meet with advocates for the return of the prison farm to talk about bringing it back. John Fenik said the NDP would bring back the prison farm program, and Anita Payne said she would also work on the issue.

Scott Reid, however, said that the research showed that the prison farm was not effective.

“In terms of preparing inmates for job placement once they are released, and since recidivism is greatly reduced when former inmates have employment once they leave prison, the focus has shifted to other programs.”

Anita Payne said that in her career as a teacher, “The reason for teaching many of the subjects was to prepare students to live in the world, not always to get a job. The healing effect of working with soil for people in institutions cannot be tossed out so easily,” she said.

This issue also had an airing at a candidates’ meeting in Kingston on Thursday, October 2, which was attended by three of the four Lanark-Frontenac-Kington candidates but not Scott Reid, who had a prior commitment. The four candidates in the Kingston and the Islands meeting also attended that meeting. The prison farm issue strikes a chord in that riding and even the Conservative candidate Andy Brooke, a retired RCMP officer, said he supports the reinstatement of the prison farms.

Another issue that surfaced in Sharbot Lake and Sydenham was climate change. There again the three opposition party candidates talked about what their parties’ plans were to reverse what they all saw as a dismal track record under the Harper regime.

Scott responded that emissions decreased by 3.1% between 2005 and 2013, while the economy grew by 12%, which he said “came about as the result of the sector by sector regulatory approach that the government has undertaken” (see sidebar).

When the fact that Canada has not signed the UN declaration of Aboriginal rights was raised by a questioner, Phil Archambault talked about the lack of action on the Kelowna accord and said the Liberals are willing to take the issues on, pointing out as well that he is one of 15 Aboriginal candidates running for the Liberal Party in this election (he is a registered Métis, a Micmac descendent on his mother’s side)

John Fenik said the NDP would form a cabinet level committee to look at all of the infrastructure issues on reserves.

“It's tragic how a prime minister can refuse to meet with the chiefs and how a government can neglect such an important issue,” said Fenik.

Scott Reid said that the government has spent $400 million over 2 years on social housing on reserves; built 18 water and waste water facilities benefiting 44,000 people; invested $500 million in 2014 building new schools; and invested $200 million over five years supporting First Nations students in post-secondary programs.

The candidates have one more all-candidates’ meeting scheduled, in Almonte. Advance polling for the election is set for this weekend, and Election Day is October 19.

(Editor’s note: We have conducted interviews with the candidates for profiles that will appear in next week's edition of the Frontenac News. We also plan to post those interviews at Frontenacnews.ca early this weekend to benefit those who are planning to vote in the advance polls.)

Fact Check on Climate Change

Environment Canada data confirms Reid's assertion of a 3.1% decrease, although the reason it came about is another matter. The province that drove the national decrease is Ontario, and the electricity and transportation sectors are those that drove the Ontario decrease.

(In 2005, emissions in Ontario were 211 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent. By 2013, Ontario was down to 170. By contrast Alberta's output was 234 in 2005 and 267 in 2013)

While federal regulations affect the transportation sector, the decrease in the electricity sector is attributed to the closure of coal-fired plants, which was a provincial initiative alone.

Granite Ridge students in Mr. McVety's grade 12 history class headed up a meeting of the federal candidates on October 5 in preparation for the school’s participation in the 2015 Student Vote program.

The program, which began in 2003, offers parallel election events for students under the voting age, and this year it coincides with the federal election. The program gives students an opportunity to experience the voting process and encourages the habits of informed and engaged citizenship in young students across the country. The student vote will take place on October 14, and it is interesting to note that during the last federal election, the student vote results closely mirrored the final election results.

In preparation for the Monday meeting at GREC, McVety's grade 12 history students prepared a school survey asking students to rank various issues from most to least important and the surveyed students were also invited to put forth questions to the candidates.

The main issues resulting from the survey were: health care, which ranked first, followed by education and employment, and last on the list were issues of security and safety.

All four federal candidates in the riding of Lanark Frontenac Kingston: Scott Reid, Conservative; Anita Payne, Green Party; John Fenik NDP; and Phil Archambault, Liberal, took part in the meeting and a total of seven questions, including ones on affordable post-secondary education; improving health care and unemployment; the protection of the environment; terrorism; as well as the use of recreational and medicinal marijuana, were covered.

I spoke to grade 12 students, Sadie Clarke and Emily Brooks, who helped organize the event and asked them following the meeting if the candidates’ responses had swayed their initial leanings. Clarke who said she, like her parents, was leaning towards Fenik and the NDP party said that she felt that Fenik answered the questions to her satisfaction and she will be voting for him. “I think John Fenik spoke really well and really managed to connect well with the students. Instead of just focusing on a lot of facts, he tried to focus more on our futures and what we as student are facing.”

Both Brooks and Clarke said that they came away confused by Conservative candidate Scott Reid's response to the question, put forth by grade 12 student Taylor Meeks concerning the candidate’s position on the use of recreational and medicinal marijuana. “The Conservative (Scott Reid) seemed to be disagreeing with his own party and I found that kind of confusing,” Clarke said, and Brooks agreed. At the meeting Reid stated that while he personally agrees with legalizing marijuana, his party does not. Brooks said that while she doesn't tend to pay much attention to politics prior to the Student Vote program, she does like a chance to meet the candidates in person and to hear their responses to the questions posed. She said she liked Fenik’s response to the question put forth by grade 11 student Corri-Lyn, who asked, “What is your party doing to make post-secondary education more affordable for students?” Fenik said that his party will be making more grants as well as interest-free loans available to those wanting to attend post-secondary schooling. Brooks said that that issue is important to her because “post-secondary education is the next step for me in my life.”

Regarding their predictions for the outcome of the student vote, Brooks said though she is personally leaning towards the NDP, she thinks that the Liberal and Conservative candidates seemed to be ahead at the school prior to the meeting. Clarke said she feels confident that either the Liberal or NDP candidates would come out on top. “Both the Liberal and NDP candidates seemed more friendly and interactive with the audience whereas the Conservative and Green Party candidates just stated a lot of facts and the audience seemed more quiet when they were speaking”, she said.

The results of the 2015 Student Vote will be tallied up and announced on the CBC News on Election Day.

It would be a mistake to take the pulse of an election campaign, particularly one in a geographically diverse riding such as the new Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston riding, based on the tenor of a single meeting held in one of its corners.

The riding is actually even larger, in a sense, than its wide boundaries would indicate. There is no community connection between Sydenham and Almonte, for example. Sydenham connects to Kingston, Toronto, Leeds Grenville, Lennox and Addington Counties, the 401 and Lake Ontario. Almonte connects to Ottawa, Montreal, Renfrew County, the Ottawa River and the 417. There is little or no overlap and if you ask people in Sydenham where Almonte is or vice versa you might as well be asking them where Pointe-au-Pic is.

So, you can't extrapolate to the entire riding from a meeting in Sydenham.

As well, in the case of last night's all-candidates’ meeting in Sydenham, the Liberal Party Association pulled in their supporters in large numbers.

Still, the meeting brought to mind the first federal all-candidates’ meeting that the Frontenac News organized in Sydenham, which was 11 years ago.

That election was also the first one being contested in a new riding, Lanark, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington, and it featured incumbents from two former ridings. Larry McCormick was running for the Liberals and Scott Reid for the Conservatives. Even though Sydenham was a part McCormick's old riding, and he lived in nearby Camden East, where his family ran a store for generations, he had few friends in the hall that night.

The audience pummeled him repeatedly over the Liberal Party's record, scandals and failed policies after 11 years in power. By the end of the evening it was clear that he was going to lose the election.

Last night in Sydenham it was Scott Reid who was under attack, to the point where near the end of the meeting one of his opponents, John Fenik of the NDP, chastised the audience for cat-calling his opponent.

(As an aside I think politics is a rough and tumble game and an experienced politician such as Scott Reid can handle that sort of thing)

I did not come out of last evening thinking that Scott Reid is about to lose this election, or even that he will take fewer votes in South Frontenac than the Liberals or NDP. There were circumstances that were too specific to the event itself to go that far. But what I did come out of it thinking is that even with their savvy campaign strategies, and the growing tendency of the Liberal and NDP leaders to attack each other, such that vote splitting will be an issue in this campaign, the Conservative party has enough baggage after 10 years that a majority for them is very unlikely. Even if they win the most seats, they will not be in a position to govern unless they are only 10 or so seats short of a majority and that is also unlikely at this point.

The Liberals and NDP will have to work something out between themselves, and will have look to Conservative members from time to time to support certain initiatives.

Even Scott Reid talked last night, for the first time that I have heard, about the possibility of serving on the opposition benches or in a hung parliament after October 19. He said that his ability to work with the other parties would make him a valuable asset to the riding, and the country.

His stand on democratic reform, favoring ranked voting over either the current system or the mixed-member system, is realistic and defensible.

He would make a good opposition MP. He might end up being one.

(Note - this article was corrected on October 6)

Federal party leaders vying for Canada's top job in the upcoming October 2015 federal election are rarely known to make campaign stops in the hinterlands of eastern Ontario's federal ridings, but that was not the case for NDP leader, Thomas Mulcair, whose campaign bus arrived at the Crystal Place in Perth on Friday August 7.

It was standing room only as close to 300 supporters packed the venue early Friday evening to greet Mulcair, who was introduced by Perth Mayor, John Fenik.

Fenik, a former Liberal, recently crossed over to the federal NDP party and is now running as the federal NDP candidate in the new riding of Lanark Frontenac and Kingston. He introduced Mulcair as “the next prime minister of Canada” and the party leader with “the courage to stand up to Stephen Harper and the courage to win.” Fenik said that Mulcair has “demonstrated over and over again that he is a leader with a plan to get Canada back on track.”

Mulcair then entered the building to thunderous applause. He thanked the crowd for their “incredible energy” and said that what he and his crew have heard most often when traveling the country is: “People want change”. He was quick to call out Prime Minister Harper's job creation record as “the worst since the Second World War” and called his economic growth record as “the worst since the great recession of the 1920's”. He said, “Clearly Mr. Harper, your plan is not working.”

Mulcair then outlined some of his party's plans, which include scrapping Harper's income splitting scheme, which Mulcair said would only benefit 15% of some of the country's richest families. He said that Ontario families are spending as much as $2000/per month on child care and spoke of his plans to invest in a nation-wide program that will offer one million $15/day quality child care spaces across Canada. He said, “ffordable quality child care is just one election away”. He promised to maintain the retirement age at 65, and outlined his plans for 100,000 low-paid workers under federal jurisdiction, who would see their wages increased to $15/hour. Mulcair said that three-term Perth Mayor (on leave during the election) John Fenik is “an extraordinary NDP candidate”. He finished his speech by citing the party campaign slogan, “Let's work together”, recalling the party's success in 2011 in Quebec under Jack Layton, which spread to Alberta in May of this year. Following his speech, Mulcair posed for photos, signed autographs and spoke with supporters as he made his way back to his campaign bus. There he took questions from local media, and when asked how an NDP government would help farmers in the area, Mulcair said that farmers under supply management are “extremely worried about the current TPP negotiations” and that his party would “defend supply management tooth and nail.”

To another question concerning jobs in smaller areas like Perth, Mulcair answered, “We know that 80% of new jobs in Canada are created by small and medium-sized businesses, so instead of taking the same approach as Justin Trudeau and Stephen Harper, which is giving tens of billions of dollars in tax reductions to Canada's largest corporations, we will concentrate our efforts on the small and medium-sized businesses and give them a tax break to help them create the new jobs that we so dearly need in this country.”

Mulcair said that his party has “a clear plan to kick start the economy” by “also investing in infrastructure with municipal and regional governments in regions like this one.” 

(Editors note. In a previously posted version of this article, John Fenik's name was spelled incorrectly. The version above is identical to the one that was distributed in The Frontenac News -  Volume 15, no.34 - August 13-2015)

Liberal candidate for the newly formed Lanark-Frontenac-North Kingston riding, Phillipe Archambault, said that Perth Mayor John Fenik omitted some details when he announced he was seeking the NDP nomination for the riding.

Last week, Fenik announced that he is leaving the Liberal Party because of his concerns about party leader, Justin Trudeau, and will be seeking the NDP nomination at a nomination meeting in Perth on May 31.

While Fenik described himself as a “well known Liberal” in his media release, Mr. Archambault filled in some of those details this week.

Archambault said that he first met Fenik a year ago when both of them, along with Phil Somers, were invited to a number of Liberal riding association sponsored events aimed at introducing prospective candidates to the membership.

“In September John decided not to seek the nomination, but to run for mayor of Perth once again. After that I asked him if he would endorse my candidacy and he said yes.”

At the two Liberal candidate nomination meetings last October, one in Sydenham and one in Perth, Fenik was one of the speakers who introduced Archambault to the voters.

After Archambault was chosen over Phil Somers, John Fenik offered his services as campaign manager, and the offer was accepted.

While he would not go into details, Phillippe Archambault said that in early February, he decided to relieve Fenik of his duties as campaign manager.

“Things were not working out so I had to let John go from the campaign,” he said. “I am still on good terms with him and I look forward to debating the issues. We texted each other about that just this morning.”

The Liberal campaign in the riding has been underway for months now, and according to Archambault there is an appetite for change.

“I am hearing from a lot of people who want to unseat Mr. Harper, and I think the Liberals are in the strongest position,” he said.

He added that even though the NDP finished second and the Liberals third in the previous Federal election in Lanark-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington (LFL&A), the riding that makes up most of the territory in the new riding, a Liberal survey of voter intentions that was done in February shows them to be in a solid second place position with over 30% support, with the NDP a distant third at “under 15%” and the Conservative Party still leading but with less than 50% support".

In the most recent federal election, Scott Reid polled 57% in LFL&A.

As for John Fenik's chances when the NDP nomination meeting comes up next week, there are no other candidates who have come forward thus far, and at least one un-named long time riding association member expressed little concern about John Fenik's Liberal past, describing him as a popular mayor who is strong on community developing, and suggesting he will be welcomed with open arms on May 31. Later this week, it was confirmed that the nomination period has pased and John Fenik has been acclaimed as cndidate. The nomination meeting will become a campaign kickoff event, and MP Paul Dewar will be delivering the keyonte address.

It all speaks to a lively pre-campaign between the two opposition parties during the summer, perhaps joined by incumbent Scott Reid, followed by a lively exchange of views during the campaign proper, which will likely take place in late September and/or early October.

John Fenik, who has been the mayor of the Town of Perth since 2006, and was acclaimed to the position during the last two elections, will be a familiar face in Frontenac County this summer and into the fall as the expected federal election date nears. On Monday, he announced that he will be seeking the nomination to be the NDP candidate in the new federal riding of Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston.

Until recently, Fenick was a member of the Liberal Party of Canada.

“I believe our nation is at a critical crossroad,” Fenik said. “I have long been aligned with the Liberal Party, but I’ve decided to put my name forward to become the NDP candidate,” he said in announcing his candidacy. “I had considered running for the Liberals in the past,” he said in a telephone interview with the News. “but over time I've been increasingly concerned with Mr. Trudeau's poor judgement. I have been speaking with some members of the NDP in recent months, and I have been following Thomas Mulcair for a few years. He has the abililty and the vision to lead the country.”

The new federal riding of Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston includes about two-thirds of the soon to be former riding of Lanark-Frontenac-Lennox and Addington, which has been represented by Scott Reid of the Conservative Party since it was formed just prior to the 2004 election. The new sections of the riding, the Township of Mississippi Mills at the northeast corner and rural Kingston north of Hwy. 401 may be better territory for Liberals, but Scott Reid is the acknowledged favourite to bring home the new riding for the Conservative Party.

The Liberal candidate is Phillippe Archambault, who lives near Inverary.

Over the four elections since 2004, Reid has increased his vote each time, reaching 57% in 2011.

At the same time, Liberal Party fortunes in the riding have been sliding. In 2004, Larry McCormick, who at that time was a sitting MP from a former riding that had been swallowed by the LFL&A riding, received 30% of the vote. By 2011, Dave Remington polled only 16% for the Liberals. The NDP finished in second place in the riding in 2011 for the first time with 20% of the vote, riding the Jack Layton orange wave.

John Fenik said he considers Scott Reid a friend, whom he has been working with in his role as mayor of Perth and a Lanark County Council member for ten years. He also said he knows and respects Phillipe Archambault, and realises that he has a tough hill to climb in the new riding.

He said his decision to run for the NDP has to do with his view of the needs of the country at this time.

“If the Conservatives under Stephen Harper form a government for five more years, at the end of that term our country will be unrecognisable. I have decided to pursue the path to Parliament Hill because I sincerely believe that as a New Democrat I can make a positive difference.

“My political and work experience has exposed me to the issues faced by the people of this riding, and I want to do something to address these problems on a larger scale. I think the NDP is in the best position to be able to do this.” he said.

John Fenik began his working career with the Children's Aid Society of Ottawa and worked in children's protective services in Smiths Falls and Lanark County before taking a job with the Upper Canada District School Board in 2007 as a special services counsellor. He is planning to take a leave of absence from his postion as mayor of Perth if he secures the nomination, and will be retiring from the Upper Canada District School Board this June.

The NDP nomination meeting is set for Saturday, May 30 at the Crystal Palace in Perth. At this time, John Fenik is the only declared candidate.