Progressive Conservative leader Blaine Higgs released his party’s full platform Thursday, four days before the election.
The platform, unveiled during a campaign stop in Fredericton, contains dozens of recommendations under 10 focus areas.
Leader Blaine Higgs was asked by a reporter why he waited until now to release his party’s full platform.
“Why release it now? Because somebody would have said ‘the PCs never put their platform forward,’” said Higgs. “So here it is, but no surprises as we said all along. It’s what we’ve been planning and doing for the last two years.”
“Maybe people didn’t particularly think this would be possible to have a platform that actually reflects a real plan. A plan of substance. A platform that was really released back in March as a budget, spoken about in detail in the State of the Province back in January, and was a commitment we made back in 2018.”
Many of the promises and commitments detailed in the 28-page document have already been announced during the campaign.
The focus areas outlined in the platform are economic recovery, health care, mental health and addictions, population growth, education, internet, conservation, environment, housing and food security.
On the topic of mental health and addictions, Higgs said the province is dealing with a crisis party and his party will do something about it.
“Our government has been working over the last year on a new five-year action plan for mental health and addictions. We’re going to put walk-in services across the province. We’re going to build a virtual psychiatric network. And we’re going to expand mental health training for our professionals and educators,” he said.
Higgs also touted his controversial plan to spend $2 million a year to support a dedicated RCMP task force of 13 officers to crack down on drug traffickers.
The PC leader also reiterated his goal of increasing New Brunswick’s population to one million people.
“To achieve this long-term goal, we need to start right now to create the kind of environment that attracts investors,” said Higgs.
“We can’t go back, we must not go back to the old ways of spend, spend, spend, all on the backs of taxpayers. There will be no new tax increases under our government because we have enough money in the system, we just need to get results for what we’re spending.”
The PCs also unveiled the costs of their new spending commitments made in their platform.
It includes $2 million annually for food school programs, $1.4 million annually for extra-mural liaison nurses, $3.5 million annually for mental health, $3.5 million annually for early childhood educators, and $2 million annually for the dedicated RCMP drug trafficking task force.
Higgs said New Brunswickers can trust the PCs to stay focused, to be accountable and to deliver results.
