Rana Bokhari believes the pieces are in place to bring the Manitoba Liberals back to relevance in Flin Flon and across the province.
Over the weekend, the lawyer-turned-politician became the first major party leader to visit Flin Flon this campaign season.
Joined by her Flin Flon candidate, Leslie Beck, and other members of her team, Bokhari hosted an informational breakfast at the Victoria Inn on Saturday, March 12.
She struck an optimistic tone, and with good reason: opinion polls have the Liberals in second place ahead of the April 19 election – far behind the first-place Progressive Conservatives but narrowly in front of the governing NDP. Considering the Liberals had only one seat in the last legislature, that’s a significant leap forward.
Bokhari is now characterizing the election as a battle between the Tories and Liberals, a statement that would have seemed far-fetched two or three years ago.
Following her breakfast address, The Reminder took time to speak with Bokhari about Flin Flon and northern issues, the Liberal platform and other matters.
Q: You talked about your priorities for Flin Flon, including economic development. Can you explain that?
Bokhari: So we said economic development, mental health, poverty and seniors are the least of it, but from a general level our party’s policies would also reflect those of Flin Flon.
So when it comes to economic policy, what we’re really talking about is diversifying the economy in Flin Flon. But that takes steps and that takes community members and stakeholders within that community to come to us and have those conversations with Leslie and ourselves, and see what is it that we need to do in Flin Flon to make sure that everyone has a home, everyone is being fed, everyone has a job – just to make sure that the community’s thriving.
And that’s really where the commitment lies, is having those partnerships with those communities to make sure we’re actually hearing what the needs are.
Q: If you had to pick one priority for Flin Flon, would it be economic development?
Bokhari: I think it would be right now because I don’t know how – if it’s not diversified, how do we, number one, keep people in Flin Flon [and] number two, how do we keep them employed, how do we keep them with jobs, how do we keep their child care, how do we keep their education? A lot of things are stemming from that [issue], so for sure, yes.
Q: Our mayor has said that the province has been committing infrastructure dollars to this area without giving city council a say in how the money is spent. We end up receiving investments for things that are not necessarily agreed upon as major needs. Your thoughts?
Bokhari: That’s exactly why [committing] one per cent [of the PST to municipalities, as the Liberals have pledged] is critical.
It’s a transparent fund. It’s based on municipal need. If it’s a community centre that’s breaking down and the municipality wants to fix it, good. They have to decide.
This isn’t about me telling communities what you need. I don’t know. You know. Your communities know. Maybe they want to be the next hockey municipality in the country. Build yourself a rink. Do something that betters your own communities. That’s what those dollars are about.
…Empowering municipalities is what this is about. Empowering municipalities to make decisions for their people is critical right now; nothing’s going to change if that doesn’t happen.
Q: It seems like the whole theme behind your campaign is partnerships. Is that your strong point?
Bokhari: Anyone who wants to govern in the 21st century should be committed to partnerships. This is just the way of all of us moving forward.
History has shown that top-down politics hasn’t gotten us very far. We wouldn’t be struggling in education, we wouldn’t be struggling in health, we wouldn’t be struggling with our deficit. Those issues would not be happening right now if our government truly believed in partnerships; and not just lip service, but truly believed that bottom-up stakeholders who are on the ground, who are meeting with constituents every day, [are] the ones who can feed that information up.
And then as leaders it’s our responsibility to make those decisions, but the information needs to flow from the bottom up, and that’s what we’re committing to.
So yes, partnership is a natural – it’s something that we just truly believe in as a values system. We are Liberals; we believe in that.
Q: Some people might want to support the Liberals but fear they’ll be left out if they do given that you have one seat in the legislature and are far behind the Progressive Conservatives in the polls. What would you say to someone who feels that way?
Bokhari: This is a race between the PCs and the Liberals, factually. So if people believe that a very right, very ideological government is what they want – similar to a Harper government – then that’s absolutely their choice.
But they do have a progressive, moderate alternative in the Manitoba Liberal Party. And one seat in 2011, after a new change and new leader, 57 candidates to be announced [makes for a] very, very different scenario [in 2016].
So it’s a very different party with a very different situation, with new blood, with a new vision, and we are the only hands-down progressive alternative in this province right now, so all Manitobans have that choice.
There’s hope and there’s opportunity in this party, and that’s what I would say to people: that the same old, just the negativity of all, you know, how toxic politics has become – we’re just not that.
We’ve chosen to rise above all the nonsense. We’ve chosen to just really do a grassroots knock-on-doors, meet-with-people campaign. We have people from the PC party running for us, we have people from the NDP party running for us… we have the interim Green Party leader running for us. When we say we’re the biggest open-door big tent [party] there ever was, like you will never find that visual anywhere [else].
And you know, history will tell [what happens], but I’m honoured. I just can’t believe that this is our team, and we truly just want to represent the people. And for us, it’s public service.
Q: One issue that came up this past term was the province’s decision to end a subsidy that ensured a fairly broad highway bus schedule for the northern region. As a result, we’ve seen schedule reductions. For what the subsidy cost, this move puzzled a lot of people. Where do you stand on that?
Bokhari: You know what, if it’s a subsidy that was cut and it was beneficial to the community, we will absolutely take a look [at] that. But I will assure you, just on principle, there is zero reason to cut a subsidy for a bus service for people who don’t have access to [it otherwise].
You know, it comes down to…what are our values? Who are we as Manitobans? Don’t we believe in making sure that everyone has equal opportunities and opportunity may very well be because of transportation? Isn’t that just who we are? Isn’t that what Manitobans are?
How have we as Manitobans started to accept this complete disconnect between government and who we are? That shouldn’t be happening. These things shouldn’t be happening…
If you don’t believe that northern Manitoba is a priority, then those are the things that happen. Northern Manitoba has been taken for granted, frankly. You’ve been – they’re going to show up when they want your vote and then once they’re gone, it’s gone and you’ll hear from them for minor promises.
That’s not the way that government should work. We’re allowing an entire caucus for northern and indigenous people to be here constantly and advocate for you. [Northern Manitobans] will always have a seat at the Manitoba Liberal table.
