The leaders of New Brunswick’s three main political parties clashed Wednesday night over major issues for the province, like health care, education and the housing crisis.
Liberal Leader Susan Holt and Green Party Leader David Coon repeatedly criticized Progressive Conservative Leader Blaine Higgs for not doing enough, either by not spending more money or by not changing his government’s approach to major problems.
Higgs doubled down on his stance that his government is already spending historical amounts on health care. He said throwing more money at the problem won’t necessarily solve it.
CBC News hosted the debate in Moncton at the Capitol Theatre on Wednesday, with CBC New Brunswick TV host Clare MacKenzie and political reporter Jacques Poitras as moderators. You can watch the full debate here.
Our newsroom summarized each topic in the debate below.
Higgs accuses Holt of using false statistics
Holt and Higgs clashed on the first topic: collaborative care clinics.
Higgs said the issue with getting more clinics off the ground was a lack of staff. It’s hard to find people with the right qualifications, he said, which is why his party promised, on Monday, to change the scope of practice for some health-care professionals.
He said giving more responsibilities to those workers would free up doctors to see more patients, and many patients often don’t need to see a doctor to get the care they need.
On the primary care issue, Coon said the province needs a better funding model to support health-care workers.
But the real reason Higgs is taking so long to improve primary care, according to Holt, is because his government is
“inflexible,” not willing to spend more, and not willing to act quickly.
She said there’s 180,000 people in the province who don’t have access to a family doctor, and his government promised to build collaborative care clinics in several cities but hasn’t delivered on those.
“Saying we’re unwilling to invest is an absolute falsehood. The 180,000 is not an established number. It’s a poll number. We don’t even know where it’s coming from,” Higgs said.
His party released a statement Tuesday that said 38,446 people registered with the New Brunswick Health Link have no family doctor. However, 62,940 are registered without a family doctor but get primary care through other services.
This number neglects anyone in the province not registered through the New Brunswick Health Link.
A study from the New Brunswick Health Council, a crown corporation primarily funded by the Department of Health, found 79 per cent of people in the province had a family doctor in 2023. A Liberal Party spokesperson said they based their number on this study, according to the CBC.
The population of the province was about 840,578 by the fourth quarter of 2023, according to Stats Canada. That means about 664,057 had a family doctor at the end of the year.
Where Holt said about 180,000 had no family doctor that year, a more accurate count would be 176,522.
Greens, Liberals have no plans to open or close safe injection sites
All three parties were asked if they would create more safe injection sites.
The Greens and Liberals agree that there need to be more services available for people with addictions, like mental health care and housing.
But Holt and Coon didn’t say if they would close or open any of them.
A recurring theme for the debate was Holt criticizing Higgs for promising something and failing to deliver. She said his government vowed to create residential addiction treatment beds in Moncton and that hasn’t happened yet.
Higgs’ opinion on safe injection sites was resolute: he would not open any new ones. However, he said they would work with the communities who already have safe injection sites to determine how helpful they are.
Local hospitals: three parties, three plans
Higgs planned to close several emergency rooms in small hospitals across the province, but the plan was eventually cancelled, and staffing is still an issue, the moderators said.
To fix this, Coon said restoring some authority to local hospitals, so they don’t have to report to managers at larger facilities, would help them solve issues more quickly.
Higgs reiterated his campaign promise that giving certain health-care workers different responsibilities would let them help patients who don’t necessarily need to see a doctor.
Some people are afraid the Conservatives would cut more health-care services, Holt said. Small hospitals need to thrive, she said, because they take some burden away from larger ones, and her government would make sure of that.
PCs, Liberals clash over new school construction
Regarding building schools, Holt hit again on her point that the Higgs government is taking too long to deliver on a promise. She said it took eight years for them to build a school in the south end of Saint John.
She added that the government is only building two schools a year, which is not nearly fast enough.
The Higgs government failed to plan for the province’s growth, Coon said, so the Greens would build schools urgently.
To correct what he called “another misstatement,” Higgs said his government is currently building six new schools and doing major renovations on four.
The Acadia Broadcasting newsroom has not yet independently verified these claims.
Higgs also said he was proud with how much growth the province has seen, but to say the government should have had “schools just waiting is not real.”
Coon and Holt layout housing promises
To bring more housing to the province, Coon says he would get the New Brunswick Housing Corporation to “focus like a laser beam” on creating non-market, not-for-profit, and cooperative housing, which would be affordable. He would also incentivize private developers to build apartments with low rent.
To do that, they would change the way they pay property taxes. The tax would be based on the how much the landlords charges for rent, so the lower the rent, the lower the property taxes.
It’s a bold idea, Coon said, but we need bold ideas to solve this problem. He added that the Greens would put in a permanent rent cap.
Holt promised to take the provincial tax off multi-unit developments to kickstart more construction. She also said she would reform the way property taxes work, but she didn’t say how.
Rent control is an option for the PC government, Higgs said. He also said they’ve been working on subsidized housing.
‘People can spend money better than government’
To explain his proposed tax cut — dropping the HST from 15 per cent to 13 per cent — Higgs said they look at how efficiently they spend their money.
“People can spend money better than government,” said Higgs.
He added that using the entire network, a virtual care system, and having the province’s two major health authorities work together would improve health care.
Holt said Higgs’ tax cut is the most expensive thing any party has promised in the campaign.
“And then to hear him say that new Brunswickers are better at spending their money themselves, sounds a lot to me like he thinks we’re moving into private health care, where new Brunswickers are going to spend their money to access health care,” she said.
Holt said more people need access to health care, and New Brunswickers can’t fix that with the money in their own pockets.
Coon agreed that spending more is necessary, reiterating his promise to increase health-care spending by $380 million annually.
“What Mr. Higgs wants to do, it’s unbelievable to me,” he said.
As a rebuttal, Higgs said he had no intention to pursue private health care in the province.
Negotiating with First Nations
The Wolastoqey and Mi’kmaq nations in the province have filed two land title claims in court.
The negotiating process could be long and tough, but Coon says he wants to do it and figure out how best to share the land.
Higgs said the land claim that’s currently in the court is for territory that was never ceded in historical treaties. He said his party would make sure private citizens are respected through that negotiation process.
Liberal Leader Holt said she would get the agreement out of the courts and to the table and that her party would work with First Nations communities to find the best way forward.
Higgs won’t condemn misleading sex change flyers
The Campaign Life Coalition has sent flyers to people across the province. They state that teachers want to facilitate a student’s sexual transition without their parents knowing. But under current New Brunswick laws, no one under 18 can have sex change surgery.
The moderators asked if Higgs would say these flyers are misleading.
He said the groups is entitled to free speech and their own opinion, and that has nothing to do with whether he agrees with it or not.
“It’s really disappointing to hear that the premier refuses to condone the postcards or even acknowledge the fact that they attack teachers here in New Brunswick,” said Holt.
She said she wants to see a premier who will defend teachers for their hard work.
Teachers create an atmosphere of love and care for students, according to Coon. But these “vile” flyers and Higgs don’t recognize the importance of teachers.
“He’s not a problem solver, he’s a problem creator, and that’s exactly what he has done with the changes to policy 713,” said Coon.
The Higgs government previously changed the rules of Policy 713, so teachers now require parental consent to use the chosen pronouns and names of children in schools.
Leaders answer what gaps in knowledge they have
Coon said he’s learning all the time, wherever he travels across the province, and he loves learning.
Leadership isn’t easy, said Higgs, and it’s tough to say ‘no’ to decisions that matter. He said he’s focused on always asking how the province could do better.
But Holt disagrees.
“Over these last years, we’ve watched his team abandon him. More than 12 MLAs quit the PC team because they didn’t appreciate his leadership that showed that he couldn’t learn,” she said.
To close the debate, each leader gave closing remarks.
The Greens are an alternative to the Liberals and Conservatives, the two parties who’ve governed the province for years, Coon said. He would take the province to a sustainable future for everyone.
To wrap things up, Higgs said the election is not about whether people like him. It’s about the future of the next generation. The Liberals and Greens would undo all of his government’s progress, he said.
Again, Holt disagrees. She said after six years of the Conservative government, health care is worse than ever and New Brunswickers are struggling to make ends meet.
