Voters, take note: I'm a strong woman

Election: Provincial labour leader wants to represent the riding of Saint John East for the NDP

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Karissa Donkin
TELEGRAPH-JOURNAL

SAINT JOHN - A provincial labour leader and mother of five is trying to paint Saint John East orange.

Sandy Harding was nominated in November as the New Democratic Party candidate in Saint John East for this September's provincial election.

Harding is the president of CUPE 2745, the union representing 3,500 educational support staff in the province. Her involvement has led her to lobby the province against its wage restraint policy. She also sits on provincial coalitions for pay equity and child care.

Harding works as an administrative assistant at Dr. A. T. Leatherbarrow Primary School in Hampton, where she's from originally. She has lived on the east side for 18 years.

"We lobby government, so I understand (the) inner workings. We have to understand and be able to dissect budgets. I'm well-trained in those sorts of things," said Harding in a phone interview from Ontario, where she's finishing training for a certificate in labour studies.

"But I'm also a mother and a wife, and I think that those give important qualities to being a voice on the floor of the Legislature as well. I'm a strong woman," she said.

Harding is fundraising for her campaign, and has begun going door-to-door, listening to residents' concerns.

"All too often, people are told what the issues are. But I think it's very interesting to knock on the door and say, 'Listen, what do you feel the issue is?'" Harding said. "You can build a very different platform from that."

Harding is up against the Progressive Conservatives' nominee Glen Tait. while Coun. Bruce Court, Kevin McCarville and Jon O'Kane are competing for the Liberal nomination in the riding.

"It will be a three-way race in Saint John East next election because everywhere I go across the province, people talk about Sandy Harding," said New Brunswick NDP leader Roger Duguay. "She's a fighter."