Meet the Candidates: Tamara Johnson, Libertarian

Tamara Johnson has stuck by her personal policy of saying what’s on her mind.

Polarizing and controversial, she says the current Ontario government “cannot pander to one group of people because [they’re] afraid that they may threaten to blockade a road down the road.”

Johnson adds that she was specifically referring to the northern First Nations communities that would be directly impacted by the Ring of Fire infrastructure.

Now running for the Libertarian Party in the Thunder Bay – Superior North, she originally represented the Progressive Conservatives but was forced to resign in February after similar controversial statements about First Nations businesses.

Johnson’s time away from the provincial election campaign was short, as she was adopted by the Libertarian Party soon after her departure from the Tories.

“They have social left values, but fiscally they’re on the right” Johnson says of her new “I’m okay with that.”

In response to recent Ring of Fire job training, she says “I strongly stress that I would hope that job training would be available for all types of people and not just one group of people.”

She also says that the revenue should be shared with all northern communities, adding that she didn’t understand why there would be revenue sharing at all, because “the treaty specifically excluded minerals.”

Two other issues affecting voters are the proposed event centre on the city’s North side and overcrowding at the regional hospital.
Johnson says she doesn’t think there should be an event centre.

“I’m not anti-hockey, I’m anti-increasing taxes for people that may not use the centre, and I don’t think it’s the right time.”
Johnson was much more critical of the hospital gridlock issue, calling it “a failure.”

“It doesn’t function as a city hospital and it doesn’t function as a regional hospital,” she said.

“I think we need to give people choices when it comes to health care, and if that means a little privatization, why not?”