NDP official joins Progressive Conservatives
Posted Oct 20, 2011 06:13:49 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A former constituency president with the NDP has resigned and says she plans to join the Progressive Conservatives.
Cheryl Newcombe stepped down as constituency president of the Waverly-Fall River-Beaverbank riding last week.
Newcombe left the Tories to join the NDP in 2006 after raising concerns about the party’s direction. She says her return was prompted by a lack of confidence in Premier Darrell Dexter’s leadership.
Newcombe says she was particularly concerned by the recent directive to health authorities to cut their budgets.
“A three per cent cut? I think that’s a little arbitrary,” she said. “I don’t think that’s showing leadership. I think that’s just saying: ‘Okay, we need to cut.’ We need to be saying: ‘We need to cut three per cent, but we’re going to help you find those places.'”
Newcombe says she prefers Jamie Baillie’s leadership style and likes what she’s hearing about a “revitalized” PC party.
She says she’ll seek the PC nomination in the next provincial election to run against Percy Paris, the current Minister of Economic and Rural Development.
