Cathy Dobson/The Independent

Several members of a new group organizing to defeat incumbent MP Marilyn Gladu were among the audience of more than 120 packing the room for an all-candidates meeting Tuesday.

They are willing to abandon their traditional party loyalties, they say, if it will mean Sarnia-Lambton-Bkejwanong will be represented in Ottawa by someone other than the CPC candidate. Gladu has been MP since 2015 and is currently projected to win again with 55 per cent of the vote (see Votewell.ca and 338Canada.com).

“If there is a chance of getting Marilyn out, I’d vote Liberal,” said Micheline Steele who said she typically votes NDP.

“Marilyn is very set in her ways,” said Steele.  “She says all the niceties but she doesn’t listen. And Pierre Poilievre is not someone I want leading our country.”

Steele has joined an online group called Sarnia Strategic Vote 2025, which was founded a month ago by local residents Wendy Starr, Elise Corbett and Yasmeen Ibrahim.   

It has about 70 official members but represents many others, said Ibrahim. 

“We don’t feel well-represented by Marilyn Gladu,” she said.  “We recognize there is a significant vote splitting issue in Sarnia-Lambton among progressive voters and our goal is to co-ordinate a strategic vote.”

Ibrahim conceded it’s a big challenge to unseat a 10-year MP who won 46.2 per cent of the vote in 2021, about 25 percentage points more than the NDP, and well ahead of the local Liberal candidate who won only 19.3 per cent of the vote. 

“But we have to start somewhere,” she said.  “We need to increase voter engagement.  We need to be talking about politics outside of campaigns.”

Ibrahim said she was once a Gladu supporter and helped with the local Conservative campaign in 2015 when Gladu won for the first time.

“Marilyn is an intelligent woman with a wonderful engineering background and she doesn’t hesitate to make her views known.  So, in 2015, I envisioned someone who would not toe the line,” said Ibrahim. “But I see her voting the party line and I realize she isn’t listening to her constituents.”  

Ibrahim said Sarnia Strategic Vote 2025 members will hold a vote of their own this week and decide if they will vote Liberal or NDP as a group. 

Sarnia’s Susan McCracken was also out to hear the seven candidates talk about issues at the all-candidates meeting hosted by the Sarnia-Lambton Chamber of Commerce and the Sarnia-Lambton Association of Realtors. 

These days, all-candidates meetings are less of a debate and more of an opportunity to see how the candidates present themselves, McCracken said. 

“I came to see a particular candidate because I may possibly vote for them but I wasn’t as impressed as I had hoped and now I’m not sure what I’m going to do,” she said. 

The realtors association wanted to co-host the meeting because of the impact that federal decision-making has on housing affordability, infrastructure and community development in Sarnia-Lambton, said president Jeremy Guerette.  “As realtors, we understand how closely tied our local economy, housing market and quality of life are to the policies and leadership decided by elections like this one.”

Chamber CEO Carrie MacEachran remarked on how full the upstairs meeting room at the Dante Club was, saying interest in this federal election is notably high.

That may translate into a higher voter turnout this time, a point that was driven home repeatedly by Rhino candidate Tony Mitchell as he explained why he is running despite no chance of being elected. 

“Any vote to any of the candidates on this stage is a middle finger to the Americans who think we would rather lose the Canadian flag and gain one tiny star on theirs,” said Mitchell who is a retired elementary school principal from Oil City.  “Not voting sends a message to the orange-haired orangutan that we are vulnerable.  It says that we do not care about Canadians and we are indifferent about being the 51^st state.”

Thirty-eight per cent of Canadians didn’t vote in the last election, Mitchell noted. “As a Canadian, it’s your responsibility to vote and get everyone else out to vote.”

During opening remarks, Gladu and Liberal candidate George Vandenberg illustrated the stark differences in their styles.

Gladu, who worked as a chemical engineer before entering politics, blamed 10 years of Liberal government for everything from higher taxes and increased housing prices to increased crime and longer lines at the food bank.

“And how did small business do under this regime?” she asked.  “Well, we’ve seen a record number of bankruptcies that we haven’t seen in decades.  Taxes went up, CPP and EI deductions went up, they’re constantly threatened with capital gains tax increases on their investment that, for most of them, is their retirement.”

A Conservative government will axe taxes on “everything for everyone,” Gladu said.  “And that starts with the carbon tax, the clean fuel tax , the proposed capital gains tax from the Liberals. In fact, every dollar of capital gains that is reinvested in Canadian businesses will be 100% tax free.”

On the other hand, Vandenberg, a former police officer who has owned his own business called Traffic Ticket Defence for the past 34 years, was less aggressive and more reserved than Gladu.

“I am a small business owner,” he said. “I have been impacted too by COVID and all these other things that have occurred.

“One of the things that I would do as your MP is to ensure that the federal government is aware of the challenges and opportunities that exist in this riding.  I would advocate to get part of the share of the $5 billion of new funding that the Liberals will establish to diversify markets for the products and supplies that our businesses need,” he said.

The local petrochemical industry “needs our full support,” Vandenberg added.  “We fuel all of Ontario and a lot of eastern Ontario and some of the United States so it’s important we keep the pipe lines, including Line 5, available and open.”

Liberal leader Mark Carney has announced if his government wins the election, they will invest $5 billion into a new Trade Diversification Corridor fund to accelerate projects such as ports, railways, airports and highways to create jobs, drive economic growth and develop more trade between provinces.

Libertarian Jacques Boudreau, who is his party’s leader and lives in Petrolia, picked up on Vandenberg’s comments, calling Carney a “climate zealot” and a concern to the future of the riding’s petrochemical industry.

Lower taxes and less red tape is what will help small business prosper, Boudreau said, emphasizing his stand for less government to allow the private sector to do well. 

On numerous occasions, People’s Party candidate Brian Everaert  and Mark Lamore of the Christian Heritage Party said many of their philosophies align with Boudreau’s including less government, a moratorium on immigration, and no public money invested in housing.

The NDP’s Lo-Anne Chan, like her federal party leader Jagmeet  Singh, is trailing in the polls behind the CPCs and the Liberals.  She is the owner of her own online specialty food store called Jiak by Lo-Anne and said she understands the pressures on small business owners.

An NDP government would lower credit card fees, she said. 

Chan said she believes Sarnia-Lambton-Bkejwanong needs to be ready for change, especially in the energy sector. 

Clean fuel standards will require a bigger shift to renewable sources and that will boost local agriculture, she said.  “It is possible to have good paying jobs while also creating low carbon fuels and clean technology.”

Advance polling stations are scheduled to open this weekend from April 18 – 21.