The MPP for Lambton-Kent-Middlesex is running in hopes of becoming the leader of the Ontario PC Party.
Monte McNaughton officially announced his intentions today.
“I am running because our party needs an alternative to the establishment candidates,” McNaughton stated on his campaign website – monte.ca. “We need to do something different.”
McNaughton added: I’m a young dad, a small businessperson, and not part of the Queen’s Park elite which has dominated the party for too long. I’ve been touring the province with my wife Kate and our one year old daughter Annie in our Dodge minivan. The goal has been to talk to the everyday PC party members and see what I can do to help us win again. We are going to visit every riding.
McNaughton said he has toured 54 ridings in the past six-weeks, and has plans to visit each of the 107 in total.
“Everywhere I went from Windsor to Ottawa to Sudbury to Scarborough, I’ve heard the same thing… we need to fix how our party runs and we need to reconnect with the voters who left us… we can no longer be seen as the party of big business and the wealthy,” he stated. “As leader I will build a modern conservative coalition by reaching out to young families, blue collar workers and new Canadians.”
The parties leadership became vacant when former leader Tim Hudak stepped down after the latest provincial election, where the Liberals won a majority government.
McNaughton is the second declared leadership candidate as Whitby’s Christine Elliott, the deputy PC leader and the widow of former finance minister Jim Flaherty, has already declared her intentions.
Others across the province are rumoured to be considering bids as well.
A PC leadership convention is not expected until next year.
