Currie challenges Ghiz on rural record
Here’s a lump of coal for young Ghiz this Christmas
Georgetown-St. Peters MLA Mike Currie says he is surprised to hear that Premier Robert Ghiz has the gall to put his record on rural development up against any other Island premier.
“Rural Islanders know exactly what the Ghiz government has done for them and it includes wiping out the hog industry, desecrating our beef industry, shutting down the emergency departments in most of our rural hospitals and closing eight rural schools. ”
Currie questioned how the Premier could boast about his rural broadband initiative that was to have been fully implemented by December 31, 2009.
“There are still thousands of Islanders waiting for their service to be hooked up. The Premier has failed to deliver on broadband; he bungled the plans for future wind energy development in this province which could have meant jobs; he’s almost doubled electricity rates and many businesses right across this province have closed their doors. Those are the facts on the Premier’s record.”
The Opposition MLA said he anticipates the next blow to rural P.E.I. will be in the re-zoning of the remaining schools which is expected to result in more school closures by the Ghiz government.
“The Premier campaigned on change for our fisheries, but the only change I see is that our fishermen are receiving the lowest prices in a decade,” said Currie.
“The P.E.I. Medical Society told the Premier that we need 17 physicians, the premier’s response is to put a freeze on the hiring of new physicians, while patients in rural and urban P.E.I. hospitals find themselves having to wait hours to see a physician at our three functioning emergency departments.”
Currie said the Ghiz government has also failed to deliver on a promised Island-wide transit system, the tourism sector has spiraled downward, and the Premier’s job creation record is dismal.
“That’s the Premier’s record, and I would not hesitate to put that record up as being one of the worst of any Premier of this province,” said Currie.
One Response to 'Currie challenges Ghiz on rural record'
Let us not lose sight of the fact that the Aliant deal was not a broadband deal to benefit rural islanders, but a telephone deal to benefit the good buddies at Aliant. We will be paying way more for the province’s telephone services than we should for years after Ghiz and his buddies are consigned to the wilderness. Somehow Aliant have also ended up owning the provincial fiber network we the taxpayers paid for and we appear to be paying them to manage it as well.
The idea of an Aliant-based innovation fund is a poor joke. Aliant’s policy towards innovation in IT has always been “own or block”.
Makes you wonder what the real cost of this deal is.
And with this deal, which saddles rural PEI with 19th century technology and internet speeds about a tenth of what our city cousins get, our communications and IT strategy lurches decades into the past.
To add insult to injury, Aliant field techs are saying the DSL network may not be complete even by 2011.
These same geniuses are now negotiating our electricity future.
BroadbandNow
22 Dec 09 at 1:56 pm