John Wilson acknowledges that the Northern Ontario Party will never form the government in Queen’s Park.

But that doesn’t mean it can’t have some influence over the direction of government if – and Wilson insists it’s when – they elect some MPPs.

“There is a party now with two seats influencing the government” in British Columbia, he said, where the two Green Party MLAs have sat down with the governing NDP to set the course for that province.

“They have tremendous bargaining powers,” Wilson, campaign manager for the party for the next provincial election, said Saturday.

Wilson said the early projections for the 2018 provincial election show a slim majority government or possibly a minority government, which would give a small party a chance to hold the balance of power.

“People are so fed up with majority governments” in the province, Wilson said at a public get-together at the North Bay waterfront to talk to the public and let them know what the party stands for.

He was a Liberal for 61 years, he said, but “eight, nine months ago I realized there was no way I could continue to support that party.

“They are starving the North to support the (Greater Toronto Area). We are subsidizing their transit even as they took away our passenger train service.

“We have citizens in the North who have to travel for two or three days just to get medical attention.”

The problem, Wilson said, is that all three major parties – the Liberals, Progressive Conservatives and NDP – have to cater to their base of power in the GTA.

A party limited to Northern Ontario, he said, can devote its attentions to this area of the province and “represent the North properly.

“If we can have three, four, five, hopefully 13 members, we can have a major influence on what is going on in Toronto,” Wilson said.

Word on the party and what it stands for is getting out, party leader Trevor Holliday said.

“We are getting recognition,” he said.

He noted that the party has its roots in the Northern Ontario Heritage Party, which has been in existence for 40 years.

“We did not come out of nowhere,” he said. “We have relaunched it. We are renewing the party as a whole.”

He said no other party has focused on the issues of Northern Ontario like his party has.

“The cost of living – taxes, hydro costs – they make it hard for the people in the North. There is a lot of anger over the neglect from the south.”

Holliday also slammed Northumberland-Quinte West Liberal MPP Lou Rinaldi, who categorized Northern Ontario as No Man’s Land in comments in the legislature.

That attitude, though, is not unique to that MPP, he said.

“He is the only one who voiced it,” Holliday said. “But they all have mentioned it.”

He said when an MPP – and particularly one in the government benches – characterizes part of the province like that, they are failing the entire province.

The next provincial election is to be held on or before June 7. The NOP expects to have candidates in all 13 Northern Ontario ridings.

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