Infrequently Asked Questions
Churchill
Nikki Ashton (NDP)
- What is a pressing issue unique to your riding, and what would you do about it?
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"We're one of the youngest ridings in Canada," said Ashton, 26. The 2006 census reported that in Thompson, one in four people were aged 14 and under.
Pressing issues she sees affecting her constituents includes jobs, education, and the need for young people to be in safe communities. In talking to her peers, she said, she finds "the issues younger people face are of particular concern."
To address this, she said she would go door-to-door, meeting with constituents, and then taking action to address their concerns. "
The first step is to hear and the second is to speak out and fight for action," said Ashton. "A big thing is to have young people's voices heard."
- What do you like least about politics?
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"When politics goes away from ideas and issues to the personal," Ashton said. There is always room for asking questions, but the focus should remain on the issues and not on attacking an opponent, she said.
"People need to focus on what they're running for, rather than what they're against."
- What is your riding's best-kept secret?
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The people are the riding's best-kept secret, she said.
"[There's] Talk about Friendly Manitoba, but the people up North are even friendlier," she said. "Communities are smaller and we stick together."
- What is the best advice you've ever received?
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Ashton has learned the importance of visiting door-to-door.
"It's the best way to get to know the people and hear what their concerns are," she said.
- What book could you not finish?
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The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein
While Ashton really wants to finish it, she hasn't had time now that she is campaigning. As Ashton describes it, the book is an intense read about people with power taking advantage of others after a large negative event sends society into turmoil.
- What is your usual mode of transportation?
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"There's really no usual," said Ashton. "It's whatever works."
While she owns an all-wheel-drive Pontiac Vibe that she described as "good on gas and good on gravel roads," Ashton said she's not always able to use it.
She has used a car, boat, plane, train, and snowmobile to get around in the Churchill riding, one of the country's largest geographically, and Manitoba's most northerly.
View Niki Ashton's Canada Votes Profile »
By Christine Mazur, a student in the Creative Communications program at Red River College.
Wally Daudrich (Conservative)
- What is a pressing issue unique to your riding, and what would you do about it?
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Aboriginal First Nations land claims.
The Stephen Harper government has already set apart money and set up a commission to deal with native land claims that have been sitting in limbo for many years, Daudrich said.
For his part, Daudrich said he would like to broker an agreement between the local leadership, Harper and the minister of Indian and Northern Affairs to introduce free enterprise measures such as private property rights on reserves.
"As a man who is also a business person, I know the importance of being able to collateralize your property and to be able to borrow against that property," he said.
"One of the things that is missing on aboriginal First Nations communities," he said "is that core of small business: family business, entrepreneurs, young people starting something, it just doesn't exist."
- What do you like least about politics?
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Daudrich said politics creates "a certain type of phoniness.
"Because of the information age that we live in, people are looking for sound bites, the quick, one-sentence brochures," he said.
For example, his own brochure had to be boiled down repeatedly to get his message out quickly. He appreciates honesty and "the ability to communicate unhampered, one-on-one with people."
- What is your riding's best-kept secret?
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Daudrich considers Churchill riding's best-kept secret to be the long-term untapped potential of the area's natural resources, especially in the First Nations communities.
He blames unsettled land claims for preventing northern Manitobans from getting full benefits of economic development in the area.
Despite the current economic boom, Daudrich looks to the future.
"There's a lot of big mega projects and they kind of come and go, like the Wuskwatim dam project," he said.
"It's great, lots of employment, it's going to throw in a lot of money. One day we're going to be waving goodbye to all the construction and the ancillary employment that it creates on a short term basis, but I'd like to see long term consistency or like a straight line of development instead of ups and downs."
- What is the best advice you've ever received?
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"Meet people on their terms," is what Rob Clarke, MP for Desnethe-Missinippi-Churchill River told him.
"What that means for me is to go do research, get a better understanding of people that are not necessarily like me," Daudrich said.
"There's generic classifications, you know, of family, single, and so on, talking about different walks of life who may have different ways of thinking than myself, and so I need to be able to -- you know the old cliché: you don't know what another person is like until you've walked a mile in their shoes."
- What book could you not finish?
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You're Broke Because You Want To Be by Larry Winget, host of reality TV show, Big Spender.
"I am a good book-finisher. I usually don't not finish a book," Daudrich said, but in this case, "I think it was because I had learned a lot of those lessons already."
The book's goal is to motivate broke people to help them streamline their lifestyles, trim the fat, and give a new perspective on things, Daudrich explained.
"I read about a third of the book and I put it down and didn't pick it back up. I probably will finish it but I didn't see it as pressing, I guess."
- What is your usual mode of transportation?
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Daudrich drives a pickup truck because where he lives is remote and accessible only by train, plane, or biking or walking along the railway tracks, he said.
Also, as owner of the Lazy Bear Lodge and one of the three local snorkeling outfits, Daudrich regularly uses his truck to haul people and freight.
"I'm tempted to say I'm riding my bike, you know, because I want to be green, but I can't do that. Or I'm driving a smart car right now."
View Wally Daudrich's Canada Votes Profile »
By Christine Mazur, a student in the Creative Communications program at Red River College.
Saara Harvie (Green Party)
- What is a pressing issue unique to your riding, and what would you do about it?
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While health care generally may not be an issue unique to Churchill, Harvie said health care delivery has unique challenges in the large riding, which contains many small communities that are difficult to get in and out of.
Harvie, who works at Flin Flon General Hospital as a health care aide, said she would address the issue in terms of the unique needs of the riding's inhabitants.
"Absolutely we need more nurses and more doctors, and that's not a quick fix. I think we need more satellite service," she said, referring to the province's Telehealth program, which allows patients in northern communities to talk to a specialist about their medical conditions.
As well, more midwives and better dental care for remote communities are a big need.
"You see lots of kids with rotten teeth because they just do not have the ability to get in to see dentists," she said.
- What do you like least about politics?
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"It's top-heavy, it's lots of bureaucracy, lots of red tape," said Harvie.
"I have talked to so many people that are so frustrated they don't feel like their vote matters. They don't feel like anybody cares."
- What is your riding's best-kept secret?
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"[When] people think Manitoba, they think prairie, and our riding is definitely not prairie. We have thousands of lakes and we have tons of open space," said Harvie, "It's a beautiful, beautiful place to live."
The people also make quite an impression on Harvie, and she finds it hard to describe them. "The people are just very different here. I think living up in the north and, you know, kind of having to face the elements sometimes, you're kind of really close to nature."
- What is the best advice you've ever received?
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"That your voice does matter," she said. "Speak up when you see something that you see is wrong or you see is bad because your voice does matter. One person can make a difference."
This advice has made an impact on Harvie because, she said, "it gives the power to the person."
- What book could you not finish?
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The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
"He is just such a male writer," said Harvie, describing the book as being about "bullfights and mutilation.
"He's just such a hard writer to read like for a female, like for me," she said, adding that she has no interest in finishing it.
- What is your usual mode of transportation?
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"I drive a Saturn Ion," which Harvie described as subcompact that is good on gas. "It's not the smallest but it's the smallest I could afford."
Harvie also walks and uses public transportation, which she describes as "kind of patchy" in her hometown of Flin Flon.
Although train travel is common in the North, Harvie has never ridden the rails.
"It's one of my dreams," she said. "I want to go to Churchill. I want to go see places but actually we don't have train service to Flin Flon. It ends in The Pas, so we would still need the car."
View Saara Harvie's Canada Votes Profile »
By Christine Mazur, a student in the Creative Communications program at Red River College.
Tina Keeper (Liberal)
- What is a pressing issue unique to your riding, and what would you do about it?
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The Bay Line and the Port of Churchill are among the riding's priority issues, Keeper said. The rail line travels through the riding, ending at the port in the town of Churchill.
"Eighty per cent of the use of the Bay line is from the Canadian Wheat Board," Keeper said, adding that she is concerned about Conservatives' "effort to dismantle the single-desk marketing at the Canadian Wheat Board."
The privately-owned rail line is critical to many remote northern communities that rely on it for transportation to medical appointments and to get access to groceries and fuel.
"It requires federal support. The Conservatives actually did at some time, and I believe it was about a year and a half ago, make an announcement with the province that they were going to provide funding," she said.
She's not sure whether that funding came through, but emphasizes that as a "lifeline of the North," as one of her colleagues calls it, "it requires an infusion of funds for the port and the Bay Line."
- What do you like least about politics?
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"It's disheartening to see people play politics with critical issues," Keeper said.
As an example, she said, "we've had a number of public -ealth crises with First Nations in the Churchill riding," she said, referring to a tuberculosis outbreak that occurred the first spring she was elected.
Keeper doesn't appreciate it when politicians "play politics" with such issues, rather than addressing the real issues, such as, "why is it that First Nations people are left out of the governing council of the public health agencies? Why ... are they not having access to adequate health services and health arrangements between federal and provincial governments?"
- What is your riding's best-kept secret?
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"You know what I really am proud of is a lot of the Cadet Corps and Junior Rangers," she said.
Keeper said she is proud of the commitment of adults, volunteers and young people to supporting and taking part in such organizations, especially in rural Canada and in the North, where access is limited.
"A lot of times people who are in the south in the larger centres, they don't comprehend the nature of the challenges for rural ridings and Northern ridings," said Keeper. "So there they are in what some people would think of as really sort of middle of nowhere and they're part of a larger picture."
- What is the best advice you've ever received?
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"You work hard, you do your best and you do it because you believe in it," said Keeper.
"That's advice from my parents. Definitely."
- What book could you not finish?
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Radical Hope: Ethics in the Face of Cultural Devastation by Jonathan Lear.
"It hits a little close to home," Keeper said.
She has read about half of the book, which is about an American Indian tribe at the time when the United States was being settled.
Because of all the change that has happened in the North in the past 50 years with respect to logging, mining, hydro activity and residential schools, Keeper found the story of the American tribe's tragedy struck her personally.
"You know, both my parents are residential school survivors," she said. She found "a sadness" in the book and, "I just had to put it down."
- What is your usual mode of transportation?
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"Planes, trains and automobiles," Keeper said with a laugh.
She flies a lot and often uses motor boats to access remote communities. A lot of the time she drives. "I have a little four-cylinder old Rav 4 and it's great because it's got all-wheel drive," she said.
"I feel good about it in terms of, you know, gas consumption," she said. "I have communities where you know, you have to go two hours on a dirt road. It's pretty cumbersome travel."
Keeper finds that other Members of Parliament have trouble understanding the travel predicaments encountered in the North. She once told a Toronto MP of her difficulty attending two events in one weekend in her riding, she said. "So then she said, "Well just take a cab and go to both!"
"I thought that's so funny -- it's like she has no idea."
View Tina Keeper's Canada Votes Profile »
By Christine Mazur, a student in the Creative Communications program at Red River College.
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