Not a classy act

Josephine Wren | Oct 08, 2015

On Sept 30 I attended the All-candidates’ meeting at the Sydenham Legion Hall, hosted by the Frontenac News.

I was appalled by John Fenik's, NDP candidate, response to the audience when they made their displeasure known to the conservative candidate Scott Reid. Fenik addressed us as though we were high school students who had forgotten our good manners. This dressing down was made to an intelligent audience who had given up their family evening to listen in respectful silence for the most part until they heard statements that they felt were totally unacceptable.

The statement that aroused the most ire was when Reid quoted the Conservative party line about his government's spending being responsible. Heckling followed this statement and one question called out asked about the one billion dollars, that is one thousand million dollars spent for a three-day entertainment for the G8 leaders and their entourage June 2010, whilst elsewhere in Canada severe cut backs were taking place touching all Canadian citizens due to the 2008 financial collapse.

When the audience made its displeasure known it was not personal to Mr. Reid but in response to the government he represents. However Mr. Fenik seemed unable to grasp the fact that we were not assembled in a school hall to be addressed by head teachers, but present as adults to listen to what the candidates had to say and respond as we saw fit.

Mr. Fenik's defence of Mr. Reid sounded as though Reid could not take the heat for his party and that they, Fenik and Reid were good fellas and neighbours and we should be grateful that they had made the effort to come talk to us. Fenik's poor grasp of political dynamics and the right of constituents to respond as they see fit makes me wonder if he is a suitable candidate to represent any constituent. His response to democratic discourse seems more in keeping with the Harper government's well-known tactics of silencing and ignoring dissent.

The reason I titled this letter 'Not A Classy Act' is because when Scott Reid gave his closing statement he thanked Mr. Fenik and called his defense a 'classy act'. But then he would, wouldn't he, having been under the Harper tutelage for the past ten years.