MP-elect for South Shore-St.Margaret’s Rick Perkins. Photo contributed by office of Rick Perkins

The recently elected member of parliament for South Shore-St.Margaret’s will be sworn in this week.

Rick Perkins defeated incumbent MP Bernadette Jordan to win the seat in September’s federal election.

Perkins says the process to take your seat in the House of Commons after winning an election is a long one.

“Elections Canada has to certify the results in the riding first, which took about a week. Then they send it off to Elections Canada in Ottawa which takes another week or two. They actually do it by Canada Post,” said Perkins. “Then once Elections Canada have certified the result, they transfer it to the Speaker’s office in the House of Commons who then has a whole process where it has to be published in the Canada Gazette and then they schedule your swearing-in.”

Perkins will be sworn in this Wednesday.

In the month since he was elected, Perkins has been busy flying to Ottawa for orientation with other new MPs and setting up his constituency offices in Bridgewater and Barrington.

Perkins will take over the same space in Bridgewater occupied by his predecessor at 129  Aberdeen Road.

He is also establishing a satellite office in the municipal building in Barrington to service constituents in Shelburne County.

Perkins says often when an outgoing MP is vacating their office, files they had been working on will be destroyed for privacy issues and he doesn’t want anyone to fall through the cracks.

“If there were active cases with the previous MP’s office, we are totally unaware of them. So, obviously, encouraging people who had an active case to try and reconnect with the office,” said Perkins.

That can be done by contacting Perkins through e-mail: rick.perkins@parl.gc.ca or by phone (902) 527-5655.

During the election campaign, Perkins was a strong proponent for the fisheries and is set to continue his advocacy for that group in Ottawa.

In the meetings he has had with Conservative Party leader Erin O’Toole, Perkins has been very clear about his desire to work on the fisheries file.

“He’s even started to call me Mr. Fish when he introduces me to people. I hope that’s done with respect, but I don’t mind being called Mr. Fish ‘cause that’s a critical industry in our community,” said Perkins. “I gather from that, that he has some idea and inclination about what I’m going to be fighting for.”

Perkins expects his offices will be online and ready to serve constituents later this week.

His swearing-in ceremony will be broadcast live on Facebook at 2:30pm Wednesday.

E-mail: edhalversonnews@gmail.com
Twitter: @edwardhalverson

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Candidates (L-R) Rick Perkins, Bernadette Jordan, Thomas Trappenberg, Olivia Dorey. Photo Ed Halverson

The four candidates vying to represent South Shore-St.Margaret’s met Tuesday for what will likely be the only debate this campaign.

The event, organized by the Bridgewater Chamber of Commerce, was hosted at the Best Western in Cookville.

Candidates Olivia Dorey with the NDP, Liberal Bernadette Jordan, Conservative Rick Perkins and the Green party’s Thomas Trappenberg took turns answering five questions provided to them in advance by the chamber.

Questions focused on the housing crisis, healthcare, the environment, infrastructure and support for small and medium-sized businesses.

All candidates see a role for the federal government in increasing housing stock, providing more funding to provinces to address healthcare shortfalls, protecting the province’s coastline from sea-level rise and ensuring smaller businesses survive and thrive through the pandemic.

Naturally, how those aims are achieved vary widely along party lines.

The evening was a relatively tame affair punctuated by jabs between the PCs Perkins and Liberal Jordan.

Perkins took aim at Jordan and the Trudeau government’s record while Jordan poked holes in the Conservative platform.

The Greens’ Trappenberg took all parties to task and called for government to look for new ways of solving problems while the NDP’s Dorey highlighted the fact that at 27 years old, she was a generation younger than the other candidates and would be feeling the brunt of the decisions made by whomever is elected for much longer.

After the candidates were through the pre-arranged questions the moderator opened the floor to the public.

When asked when Canadians could expect to see a return to balanced budgets Perkins says the Conservatives have a plan to do so in ten years. Jordan said the priority for the country is getting through the COVID recovery not balancing the books. Trappenberg said now is the time to invest and Dorey cautioned people to temper their expectations, as there is no way to balance the books in the next ten years.

All candidates agreed more supports should be extended to veterans, especially those dealing with PTSD. They also agreed conversion therapy should be banned, more should be done to prevent gender-based violence and increasing immigration needs to be a priority to fill vacant jobs and grow the population.

The candidates reinforced their talking points in their closing arguments. Jordan stepped off-script to comment on the level of anger on display in this election, citing the rock throwing incidents and verbal assaults being lobbied at Justin Trudeau. She says she and her campaign workers have had similar experiences campaigning in this riding.

This was the only time all four candidates were scheduled to engage in a public forum together prior to the election.

Voters will go to the polls September 20.

E-mail: edhalversonnews@gmail.com
Twitter: @edwardhalverson

To listen to the broadcast of this story, press play below.