Nate Erskine-Smith saw firsthand how the federal Liberals were able to rebuild and rejuvenate their party en route to forming government eight years ago.
He’s now hoping to do the same thing at the provincial level.
The MP for Beaches-East York since 2015, Erskine-Smith was the first entrant into the Ontario Liberal leadership race, throwing his hat into the ring in May.
“The Liberal party at that time federally was in third place and in need of desperate and generational grassroots renewal,” Erskine-Smith said while in Thunder Bay last week during a tour of Northern Ontario.
“All of the same parallels apply provincially right now. We need someone to come in, who is going to build this for the next 15 to 20 years.”
Erskine-Smith is vying to take over a party coming off a dismal result for its second straight provincial election, having again failed to gain official party status after only coming away with eight seats last year.
The party was completely shut out in Northern Ontario, including in Thunder Bay, which had previously been a Liberal stronghold.
Erskine-Smith, who lists 2022 Thunder Bay-Rainy River candidate Rob Barrett and 2022 Thunder Bay-Superior North candidate Shelby Ch’ng on his Northern Ontario team, said rebuilding the grassroots of the party involves finding new, strong candidates or working with past candidates to give them long lead times.
He said a renewal of the party needs to include defining the party according to its members’ values — which he listed as competence, compassion and integrity.
While he said that also means offering “serious solutions to big challenges,” such as health care, education, social safety net reform, housing, and climate, Erskine-Smith pointed to the need to engage more people in politics.
“There’s a huge opportunity, especially for young people that haven’t been involved in politics before, to help build this together and make our politics the way we want it to be,” he said.
When it comes to housing, and addressing mental health and addictions challenges, Erskine-Smith said the province needs to take on a leadership role.
“You can’t download these responsibilities to municipalities that don’t have the resources to deal with them,” he said. “I don’t see the competence, I don’t see the compassion, and I don’t see the integrity that I want to see at Queen’s Park and I don’t see the seriousness in leadership that I want to see at Queen’s Park.”
Looking to jump to party leadership without having held a cabinet portfolio during his eight years in Ottawa, Erskine-Smith cited his track record of what he described as helping shape the Trudeau government’s agenda.
“There’s a more ambitious climate agenda because I’ve been in Ottawa. I’ve introduced legislation to push the government to go even further,” he said.
“The government passed legislation this past fall to divert people out of the criminal justice system and into the health care system to treat substance use as a health issue. That’s legislation I drafted.”
Candidates have until Sept. 5 to enter the contest. Party members will vote in late November, with results expected to be announced on Dec. 2.
