Navdeep Bains

We've also got new fundraising numbers.

Navdeep Bains dropped his list and it's a bit impressive.

And some new endorsements.

We'll assess what weight these things have and whether who vouches for you actually matters in this race.

Lea Fairclough put out a housing plan with a public builder in it, and we'll talk about that.

And Navdeep Bains released his own commitment on party renewal.

We'll, uh, we'll go through and, and, and discuss all three of those significant announcements, and we'll also spend, and this is what I think is gonna be really newsy this week, we're gonna spend some time on the party renewal question, and also get a deep dive on those membership numbers.

We have some intel for you about-

... it's, it's a, it's a way, it's a, it's a bridge into a lot of other conversations, and, uh, it would be well worth a lot of the, the candidates' time to, to focus on that.

But now we have to talk about something that is perhaps less on the minds of Ontarians themselves and more on the minds of some Ontario Liberal voters, and that is party renewal.

Um, so we got an interesting commitment this week, uh, from Navdeep Bains, which he calls his plan to modernize to win.

Um, it's effectively, uh, his campaign's answer to the question of party renewal.

So this is from The Canadian Gazette on June 24th 2019, and I wanna read this.

"Today, the Honorable Bill Morneau, Minister of Finance, on behalf of the Honorable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science, and Economic Development," the position Francois Philippe Champagne would later occupy, "confirmed the government of Canada's $275 million investment supporting LNG Canada's major liquefied natural gas complex in Kitimat, British Columbia." This is fascinating, folks, because you have them saying that this is going to help fund it.

Do you honestly think a $40 billion project with four or five different foreign owners, one of which is the People's Republic of China, do you really think that they need help funding that? $275 million is kind of a drop in the bucket to fund a massive infrastructure project like this.

And that wasn't the real reason for this money.

It seems like from the outside, just someone watching the race, that the party brass wanted to have, like...

It seems like the insider candidate is Navdeep Bains.

He comes in with a lot of, uh, of support already.

Did you feel that in there? Like, it, like, why did they do that, first of all, and is that something you...

Uh, he then eventually decided to quit, uh, in protest, and maybe made some choice comments about the party establishment and a loser mentality [laughs] in the party on his way out.

And now it seems, you know, we're, we've got a race, uh, between these four candidates, but there is a perception that perhaps Navdeep Bains is the front runner, um, with, with others, uh, coming close behind him.

I'm just curious, Andrew, from your perspective, um, does it matter, and is it even a handicap potentially going into this race to be perceived as a front runner, given how much that has, has shifted over the course of this race?

Oh, it's such an interesting question, right? [laughs] It's, uh, uh, you know, I think that i- in a perfect world, you wanna be ahead without anyone knowing it, [laughs] right?

Mm

... a few folks like, like Dylan Mirando and, and, uh, and Eric Lombardi who've come up out of, uh, you know, from, from, from the back ends of the party and as volunteers into the, you know, into the spotlight.

But, you know, for the most part, at least the three leading candidates that we have, Lee Fairclough, Stephanie Bowman, Navdeep Bains, these are people that have been involved in the party in different ways provincially or federally for a long time.

Um, and they also aren't coming to the table with their own populist movements.

Uh, the individual is Eric Lombardi, so that leaves four others.

Uh, Navdeep Bains, Lea Fairclough, Stephanie Bowman, and Dylan Miranda.

Now, I believe he has endorsed Lea Fairclough, ha- as has the, the former premier of Ontario, um, Kathleen Wynne.

Your thoughts on whether this changes the race at all or solidifies whatever your perspective might be on the race-

[laughs]

... was the, um, uh, morning brief, uh, person this morning on More in the Morning, and, you know, he made a point about ranked ballots as part of leadership races.

And so unless you can take yourself over the top, in this case, Navdeep Bains is, is sort of considered the front runner.

Unless you can get 50% plus one, then lining folks up, as Lea Fairclough has been doing, is not a bad strategy, uh, as long as you can keep the front runner under 50%.