New Grit leader keen to get seat

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This article was published 21/10/2017 (2371 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Dougald Lamont isn’t the first Liberal leader in recent years to be without a seat in the legislature, but he’s eager to change that.

Lamont told reporters late Saturday that he’s eyeing any constituency that comes open for a byelection and doubts there will be any shortage before the 2020 provincial election.

“Those are the odds,” the 48-year-old digital-media communications specialist said. He has no inside knowledge of political aspirations or health problems, Lamont said, but noted, “People might step down to run federally in 2019. I do want to run before 2020.”

He lives in Fort Rouge, which is held by NDP Leader Wab Kinew, and his only attempt to win office came in 2003 in St. Boniface, an unsuccessful try against then-NDP finance minister, Greg Selinger.

Lamont’s win drew shocked gasps from many of the Liberal delegates Saturday night. While he survived the first ballot, Lamont had 301 votes, behind MLA Cindy Lamoureux’s 363 votes. She was immediately endorsed by MLA Jon Gerrard, who gathered 230 votes.

Kewatinook MLA Judy Klassen had stepped down as interim leader in June to run for leader herself, only to later drop out and back Lamoureux.

So Lamont will be meeting with a caucus that opposed him throughout the leadership campaign.

In a day of lengthy delays Saturday that pushed the start of voting on a second ballot beyond 6 p.m., hundreds of members went home. Lamoureux’s vote plummeted, even with a commanding first-ballot lead and Gerrard endorsing her seconds after he was eliminated.

Lamont’s team had made a special effort to identify his support and keep those people from going home. That raises questions about the commitment of new members who signed up during the leadership campaign.

“I have to sit down with the caucus, learn some of the ropes of the legislature,” Lamont said.

Technically, Lamont succeeds Rana Bokhari, to whom he finished second in the 2013 leadership race. Bokhari didn’t have a seat, and didn’t win one in the 2016 election, stepping down not long after Progressive Conservative Leader Brian Pallister took office.

Lamont expects to be in the legislature regularly and to meet with reporters after question period. He may attend evening committee hearings on contentious bills this week and possibly sign up to speak.

Lamont told delegates his party can form government in 2020.

“The NDP are in very serious problems,” he said. “In 2016, I don’t think a lot of people voted enthusiastically for Brian Pallister.”

Lamont listed three policy proposals he’ll put to the caucus and party right away. He’d create a Manitoba business development bank to boost private-sector job creation and he wants health-care reforms, beginning with the end of regional health authorities and their boards.

“We want to dismantle them and return control to local communities,” Lamont said.

The Liberals would significantly reduce the number of children taken into care by social workers, he promised. “We have a CFS-to-prison pipeline,” he declared.

Lamont told reporters he’s not starting a policy platform from scratch: “It would take a planning document two inches thick to explain what I was going to do,” he said with a laugh.

Lamont said he’ll soon meet with the party’s board and will raise the possibility of getting a salary. The party’s constitution does not mention a leader’s salary, although the board negotiated a salary with Bokhari.

All the candidates acknowledged Saturday that the Liberals have money problems and aren’t well organized in all 57 ridings.

Two veteran Liberals said Saturday they spent a year working on a policy platform before the 2016 election, only to have Bokhari abandon it once the writ was dropped — echoing other Liberals who’ve made similar claims.

Bokhari was nowhere in sight Saturday. Gerrard asked the convention to acknowledge her and received scattered applause.

The Liberals need four members to gain official party status, which would mean additional staff and resources.

The Liberals still have only three seats in the legislature, though a Probe Research poll conducted for the Free Press gives the Liberals 24 per cent support in Manitoba and 30 per cent in Winnipeg — without any leader or policies.

Lamont told the Liberals he offers hope, but cautioned, “Hope is a fine breakfast, and a poor supper.

“It’s easy to divide people. It’s harder to bring people together.”

The Tories and NDP “govern for everyone who elected them and abandon everyone else,” Lamont said.

But governing is more than accounting and it’s more than reading KPMG reports, he said.

“Everyone matters. Sometimes we forget that,” Lamont said.

nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca