She is Liberal’s Trinity-Spadina provincial candidate
After last year’s mayoral run, she’s aiming for MPP
Kris Scheuer
(Written Mar 10 for Town Crier/Toronto Today)
Sarah Thomson is seeking a seat in the provincial legislature on the Liberal ticket. Giordano Ciampini/Town Crier file photo.
Sarah Thomson has accepted an invitation from the provincial Liberals to be their candidate in Trinity-Spadina this fall.
She made the announcement March 9 in a Facebook post.
“I’ve said I want to run in a nomination,” she said hours later, in confirming the report for Toronto Today.
Herman Ng, Trinity-Spadina riding association president, confirmed Thomson will be the only Liberal candidate at a nomination meeting held March 27.
“I investigated both the Ontario Liberal Party and the Ontario PC Party to find which party today best represents my core values,” Thomson stated in her Facebook announcement.
Thomson, a midtown Toronto resident who once lived in the Annex, is a business woman who ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Toronto in last year’s municipal race, dropping out before election day and throwing her support behind second-place finisher George Smitherman.
“There are politicians who critique others but never actually initiate anything — they run because they want a job or news headlines,” wrote the Women’s Post publisher on her Facebook page. “And there are politicians who stick their neck out and do what they believe is right — they run because they want to contribute to building a better world.”
If nominated Thomson will be taking on incumbent Rosario Marchese, who has represented the riding since 1990.
“We don’t have someone who is a doer,” Thomson told Toronto Today. “(The riding) is getting poor representation in the legislature.
“He has been there for 21 years. What has he done?”
Marchese, who was part of the Bob Rae government and has been in opposition to both the PCs and Liberals, defended his record.
“I’ve been a strong advocate for education,” he said.
He said the Liberals have decreased funding for special education and parents have fundraised $600 million to supplement school needs, creating a two-tier education system for poor and richer communities.
He’s also put forward three private member’s bills to make amendments to the condo act that the Liberals have rebuffed.
If Thomson is serious about reforms, Marchese said, she’ll have to defend the Liberals’ non-action on issues of housing, education and healthcare.
“I’m hard pressed to see what Sarah thinks she will accomplish as a backbencher or minister, assuming this government gets re-elected,” he said. “What would she be proposing?”
Marchese won with 41.1 percent of the vote to then-Liberal candidate Kate Holloway’s 31.5 percent in 2007. In 2003, he got 47.5 percent to Liberal Nellie Pedro’s 31.8 percent.
Kris Scheuer 