Thunder Bay Superior North candidates debate jobs, health

'Heartbreaking' unemployment rates and 'undignified' health care were the focus of Conservative and NDP attacks on the Liberals during CBC's Superior Morning debate among candidates in the Thunder Bay Superior North riding.

Incumbent Liberal Michael Gravelle, the NDP's Andrew Foulds and the PC's Derek Parks joined host Lisa Laco for an hour-long debate centred on health care and job creation.

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"It's hard to articulate when you walk down Bay Street in Toronto and you talk to mining companies and they tell you they don't want to come back to Ontario,"  an emotional Parks said in his opening statement.

"Effectively all the majors have left. They were telling majors not to come here. It's a kick."

Parks then accused Liberal bureaucracy of pushing mining company Cliffs Natural Resources out of northern Ontario's Ring of Fire.

When talk turned to health care, Foulds outlined the NDP plan to create 24-hour health care clinics across the province and hire more nurse practitioners.

"Right now, we are not doing health care very well and we are not doing it very efficiently," Foulds said.  "We have anywhere of 30 or 40 long term care patients in that hospital. They shouldn't be there. It's expensive and it's not dignified. Our health care platform makes a difference."

Gravelle met criticisms on both the health care and jobs front by outlining the Liberal record.

"When we look at job creation it's one of the real priorities of our government," Gravelle said.

The four-laning project in Thunder Bay Superior North "has been about a $600-million project so far" and provided people with work opportunities.

"Bombardier is a good example of that as well, with the investment in public transit," he added, going on to talk about steady progress in job creation in the mining and forestry sector under the Liberal watch.