Ken Cheveldayoff brought his bid for the Saskatchewan Party leadership to the Battlefords on Wednesday night.
Cheveldayoff held a campaign event at the Blend restaurant in North Battleford, a chance for local party members to meet the candidate and hear his policy positions, and determine whether he has what it takes to take over from Brad Wall as Premier.
He is one of five contenders in a race that will be decided next Jan. 27. It is also one many observers believe is dividing along “rural” and “urban” fault lines among the candidates. But Cheveldayoff looks to be staking out a middle ground.
His campaign slogan is “rural roots, urban strong,” a reference to his own background. While Cheveldayoff is the longtime MLA for Saskatoon Willowgrove, his roots are in Blaine Lake where he spent the first 18 years of his life.
Cheveldayoff points to that experience as “the best of both worlds”, something he says will help the party win.
“For the Saskatchewan party to win government next time around, we need to win the urban seats as well as the rural seats,” said Cheveldayoff in speaking to the News-Optimist.
“I think I’ve got the experience. I think I’ve got the background to do that, along with the five cabinet positions that I’ve held over the years, everything from Crown corporations to environment and several in between. I think that I have a very strong case to be a very strong Premier in this province.”
The Northwest region is already one the candidate is familiar with. Cheveldayoff ran federally in Battlefords-Meadow Lake for the Progressive Conservatives.
Unfortunately, he was buried in the infamous Kim Campbell election of 1993 in which his party was reduced to two seats. Despite that, he took away positives from that experience. “I made so many great friends and some of them are here tonight,” he said.
His campaign has gotten off to a fast start, he said “It’s been fantastic. We had 300 people at our launch in Saskatoon, and we have hit the ground running and been working hard ever since.”
The candidate has been travelling the province, which included stops the previous day in the Watrous, Lanigan and Humboldt.
Cheveldayoff has also wasted no time making his way to the Northwest region. In addition to North Battleford, Cheveldayoff had also gone to Meadow Lake earlier in the week at the urging of party members who had planned to support local MLA Jeremy Harrison, who withdrew from the leadership race a few days earlier.
Cheveldayoff recently picked up the endorsement of Lloydminster MLA Colleen Young, who was at the Battlefords event, and says he now has eight MLAs supporting his leadership bid, with another six leaning his direction.
One MLA Cheveldayoff is still trying to convince is Battlefords MLA Herb Cox. Cox was at the North Battleford event where he introduced Cheveldayoff, but he told the News-Optimist he was there as a caucus colleague and was not yet officially endorsing any candidate.
Nevertheless, Cox had good things to say about Cheveldayoff in his remarks, thanking him for coming to the Battlefords to help his campaign in the 2011 election.
“Whenever there’s something that needs to be done, Ken was there lending a hand to do it,” said Cox to supporters.
As for the leadership race going forward, Cheveldayoff said he would be running a policy-oriented campaign. He told the News-Optimist his priorities will focus on economic development and more jobs, so that there would be resources the government could put into health care, education, and social services.
He said the province needs to be ready when the economy returns to create jobs in Saskatchewan
“People are going to be making decisions across the country. Do they invest in Saskatchewan, do they invest in Alberta, do they invest in Manitoba? I want to make it very easy for them to say ‘invest in Saskatchewan’,” he said.
He gave some indication of some of his policies on Wednesday night. He told the audience he would make a major policy announcement the following day in which he would call for the PST to be removed from insurance premiums -- a reversal of a decision in the provincial budget this past spring.
Cheveldayoff also spoke about the Global Transportation Hub, acknowledging “mistakes were made.” As for the future, he supported divesting the government’s portion of the GTH.
When asked if that sounded a lot like what Jeremy Harrison had been proposing, Cheveldayoff says “not really -- you know, there are some similarities there.”
“Instead of looking backwards on the GTH the most important thing is looking forward, to realize the mistakes that have been made, admit the mistakes that have been made” said Cheveldayoff. “But more importantly demonstrate to the Saskatchewan people that we can sell that asset, that they wouldn’t have lost a dime on it, and put it in the private sector. I think it will be better run in the private sector.”
As for Gord Wyant’s recent proposal of a public inquiry into the GTH, Cheveldayoff said he would not rule it out. “At some point we have to clear the air,” he said.
Another major part of Cheveldayoff’s efforts will be a “listening tour” around the province.
Cheveldayoff said it would start on the topics of small business and entrepreneurship, and groups from across the spectrum will be invited to come and present their ideas.
“That’s what this leadership campaign is all about, is about listening and then about articulating their ideas in the end, and providing a vision for Saskatchewan people,” said Cheveldayoff. “I’m very confident that I’ll have one that they’ll get behind and be part of.”
