New Brunswick party leaders trade jabs on transparency, bilingualism

Government transparency and bilingualism inspired the most heated exchanges at Friday night's party leaders' debate.

Rogers TV and Brunswick News Inc. hosted the second debate this week at Centre Communautaire Sainte-Anne.

NDP Leader Jennifer McKenzie, Liberal Party Leader Brian Gallant, People's Alliance Leader Kris Austin, Green Party Leader David Coon, Progressive Conservative Party Leader Blaine Higgs and KISS Party Leader Gerald Bourque participated in the English and French-language debates.

On the question of transparency, all six agreed that informing people of how the government operates is important, but Coon and Austin both accused Gallant of being overly protective and secretive.

"Secrecy in New Brunswick has reached epic proportions," Coon said. "It makes it difficult for people to tell the difference between spin and substance."

Gallant said he's been working to make the government more transparent by ensuring that there "could be no longer corporate or union donations to political parties."

He said MLAs have to put expenses online, and political parties have to cost their promises during campaigning.

But Higgs pointed out those policies were set up by the previous Conservative government.

"When the premier talks about donations to union and getting rid of that, we brought that motion forward," said Higgs.

In response, Gallant said, "we are very pleased to support the motion brought forward by Conservatives to ban corporate and union donations," only to be interrupted by Austin repeating, "to help the big parties."

Austin brought up the Atcon group of companies, which Auditor General Kim MacPherson found to be poorly managed and using questionable accounting when the Liberal government of Shawn Graham gave it $63.4 million in loan guarantees. The company went bankrupt in 2010, 10 months after receiving the loan.

Austin blamed both Liberals and Conservatives for what that cost taxpayers.

"The PC government could have dug on it and made sure the public knew where their money was going," Austin said.

Higgs said his government "actually did push for the auditor general to do that," by increasing the budget.

MacPherson's final report on that issue was released in 2017.

Bilingualism

Moderator Mike Therien asked the leaders for their stance on the importance of the premier being bilingual.

Gallant, who's fluently bilingual, said it's important and reiterated his promise of providing free second-language training for New Brunswickers.

Higgs, who doesn't speak French fluently, said he supports bilingual programs, but said being bilingual isn't everything.

"I agree it's a very important skill but it's not the only skill you can bring to the premier's office," he said.

McKenzie said while she's not fluently bilingual herself, she's been learning.

"To reopen the language debate at this point is really counterproductive and irresponsible," she said, alluding to Austin's promise to end duality in the healthcare system.

Bourque said he doesn't believe it's important for the premier to be bilingual, and said translation technology can be used to communicate. He then took a jab at Gallant which elicited laughter from the audience.

"If you really want a bilingual premier, well you better vote Mr. Gallant back in. He's put the province in debt in both official languages," he said.

Gallant later said the jab was "pretty funny."

Other topics

Though there were no revelations such as a sworn affidavit of job offers, Higgs and Gallant made several pointed comments about each other.

Gallant accused Higgs of cutting education and teacher positions, while Higgs said Gallant is inexperienced and spends irresponsibly. Higgs also accused Gallant of "manipulating voters" with attacks such as releasing a report about planned cuts.

Otherwise, the leaders didn't stray far from their messaging on the campaign trail regarding education, fiscal responsibility, healthcare, seniors' care and municipal freedoms.

Higgs said he will balance the books and Gallant said he will try to keep young people in the province. Coon reiterated his promise to provide a guaranteed basic income, McKenzie said she will support nurse practitioners and Austin said if elected he will abolish the Language Commissioner's office.

French debate

At the French-language debate, Higgs, Austin and Bourque were wearing headphones for simultaneous translation and debated in English, while McKenzie, Gallant and Coon debated in French.

Radio-Canada previously cancelled its debate after Higgs confirmed he couldn't participate in French.