Liberal Leader Sharon Cameron plans to charge right through Greens to power
'We get the job done, we take action and we don't defer our responsibility'
This is the first in a series of profiles of P.E.I. provincial party leaders this week, heading into advance polls that start March 25. Regular voting day is April 3.
This Prince Edward Island election is about the "big battle" for Liberal Leader Sharon Cameron.
For her, it's about policy and governance, getting into the P.E.I. Legislature and taking down the incumbent Official Opposition Green Party at its top.
"I would call it sending a message," Cameron told CBC News in a recent interview.
"Good governance means you have good Opposition, and I felt that even though the Green Party did some good things, they didn't oppose. They didn't offer the kind of criticism and ask the hard questions that held this government to account."
District 17: New Haven-Rocky Point is part of the heartland of Prince Edward Island, a South Shore district with rolling green hills that reach deep into the centre of the province.
But this isn't Cameron's home district.
P.E.I. politicians usually run in their own district, or in a neighbouring district. Party leaders have had an unwritten rule to refrain from running against each other, but that's not the case here.
We have a team of candidates that I'm so proud of … Historically, it's probably the most diverse set of candidates that we've had in the Liberal Party.— Sharon Cameron
Rather than run in District 16: Cornwall Meadowbank — a renowned Liberal stronghold that MLA Mark McLane flipped to PC blue in the 2021 byelection — Cameron is running in her neighbouring district to deliberately take on Green Leader Peter Bevan-Baker.
This is more than a shot across the bow — it's a winner-take-all contest.
"The goal is to form government, absolutely," she said, adding that it's also making this statement to Bevan-Baker's Greens: "'We just feel that you didn't do your job.'"
Who is Sharon Cameron?
Cameron originally comes from the world of education.
She spent more than a decade working with Island youth as a counsellor in the public school system and the P.E.I. health agency. After that, Cameron served as vice-principal of Tracadie Consolidated from 1999-2001 and then vice-principal and principal of Stonepark Intermediate in Charlottetown from 2001 to 2007.
Then came a career in the bureacracy and now politics.
From 2007-2018, she worked as a deputy minister across multiple government departments, including social services, seniors and labour, workforce and advanced learning, and executive council.
She's also been the CEO of the Workers Compensation Board and the director of academics and research operations at UPEI.
Over the decades she's held volunteer roles in organizations like Big Brothers Big Sisters, Crimestoppers, the Canadian Mental Health Association, P.E.I. United Way and most recently Meals on Wheels, serving as its chair.
Cameron was the first out of the gate and eventually the only person to run for the provincial Liberal Party leadership last fall, taking the reins in an uncontested nomination.
The Liberals then and now
She was the party's first official leader since former premier Wade MacLauchlan resigned after the party lost the 2019 election.
The position was first held on an interim basis by former MLA Robert Mitchell, who retired from politics in September 2019. Then it went to MLA Sonny Gallant until Cameron's coronation on Nov. 19, 2022.
She's charging into this election at the head of a party that spent four years in third place in the P.E.I. legislature, with six members elected in 2019 and only three incumbents re-offering.
It's also a party that had experienced its fair share of controversies in its last three consecutive terms in government. From e-gaming to questions around government transparency and the handling of the provincial nominee program, Liberal administrations in recent decades have had baggage.
Dennis King's Progressive Conservative government has made hay with that, often painting today's crises in housing and health care as problems it inherited from the Liberals.
Growing the party over the months has been a Herculean task with elected Liberals either resigning or not reoffering. Cameron inherited an organization that was more than $100,000 in debt from the previous election and rebuilding work needed to be done quickly to prepare for the possibility of a spring election.
"I've been in rooms where we've had maybe four or five people, six or seven months ago. Now we've got over 150 to 200 people and people that couldn't get in that want to be involved," she said.
"We have a team of candidates that I'm so proud of… Historically it's probably the most diverse set of candidates that we've had in the Liberal Party."
'We get the job done'
The big focus for Cameron is health care. While other parties champion slogans like "With you. For you" or "Make a Difference" or "A Better Deal," the Cameron Liberal signs say "Health Care First."
If given the opportunity to be elected and form government, she promised health care would fall under the responsibility of the premier.
"Right now it's not efficient, it's not effective, and that's why people are working extra hard in a system that's broken," she said.
"They're demoralized, and yet they go in and provide the service in the best ways they can and they have the solutions and they're not being heard."
Cameron also said the provincial government needs to take a larger role and be at the forefront of P.E.I.'s major issues, instead of "deferring" responsibility to those outside the premier's office and cabinet.
"During COVID we saw Heather Morrison, during Fiona we saw Kim Griffin, and then we saw reactions to crisis, and we saw what happened with the Red Cross. It just seemed like everybody else was doing what government should have been doing," Cameron said.
"I saw a government that deferred a lot of their responsibility and leadership to other groups that wouldn't have the tools and the resources available to them that government does."
She said that culture would change under a Liberal government. Her personal race against Bevan-Baker was one signal. Another was planting a "Health Care First" sign outside King's nomination meeting site the night of the March 6 election call.
"We have a number of examples that I would rest on and build on in terms of what Liberals do differently," she said.
"We get the job done, we take action and we don't defer our responsibility to someone else or delegate it out."
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With files from Mitch Cormier and Wayne Thibodeau