Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles reaffirmed her commitment on Saturday to enhance highway safety in northern Ontario, vowing to expand key highways and end private highway maintenance contracts.
Her remarks in Thunder Bay followed a heated debate on Friday in North Bay, where the province’s four major party leaders discussed pressing northern issues, including infrastructure, road safety, and the growing addictions crisis impacting many communities.
“Nobody relies on highways as much as the people in northern Ontario,” Stiles stated at an education center. “It is crucial to be getting anywhere, and, frankly, crucial to be able to do just daily things.”
She emphasized that all Ontarians deserve safe, well-maintained roads and promised that if elected, her government would:
- Widen Highway 11/17 and Highway 69
- Restore snow clearance and highway maintenance to public control
- Transfer responsibility for certain municipal roads back to the province
- Increase training for truck drivers
- Accelerate passenger rail projects in the north
While Stiles did not specify a timeline for these projects, she pledged to initiate them within the first 100 days of her term if she becomes premier. She also did not provide a cost estimate but insisted that the province “can’t afford not to do this.”
Political Moves from Other Parties
Elsewhere, Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner made campaign stops in Huntsville and Gravenhurst, reiterating his party’s push to increase per-student funding, reduce class sizes, and address Ontario’s school repair backlog.
Meanwhile, neither Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford nor Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie had public events scheduled on Saturday. However, both parties focused their efforts on digging into opponents’ pasts.
Political Attacks and Controversies
The Progressive Conservatives unearthed an old 2012 social media post from Liberal Ottawa-Centre candidate Thomas Simpson, which read:
“Consent is not sexy #success.”
The PC Party slammed the post as “offensive” and “a slap in the face to survivors of sexual violence.”
In response, Liberal press secretary Bahoz Dara Aziz dismissed the attack, stating, “Doug Ford must be pretty desperate if he is digging up social media posts from more than a decade ago.” She countered by highlighting controversial past remarks made by Ford, offering no indication that Simpson would be removed as a candidate.
This follows a similar attack by the PCs on another Liberal candidate the previous day. That candidate issued an apology, and the Liberal Party stood by its position that the comments were made over a decade ago.
Looking Ahead
With election season heating up, infrastructure and road safety remain at the forefront of northern Ontario’s concerns. Stiles’ promises signal a major shift in how highways are managed, but questions remain about timelines, funding, and execution.
Meanwhile, political mudslinging between the major parties continues, with opposition leaders focusing as much on each other’s past mistakes as on future policy promises.
