Premier Ford Offers Ringing Endorsement for Canada's New Finance Minister

Tuesday, 18 August 2020 at 14:32

Conservative Premier Doug Ford says Chrystia Freeland is going to do an incredible job as Canada's new finance minister saying if there is one person I have confidence in, it is Chrystia Freeland.

ONTARIO - The Premier of Ontario is giving a ringing endorsement to Canada's new Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland.

Freeland is the country's first female finance minister, following the resignation of Bill Morneau. Morneau made the announcement yesterday amongst growing speculation about a rift between him and Justin Trudeau. Morneau was also in the middle of the WE charity scandal.

Ontario Conservative Premier Doug Ford says he has the complete trust of Chrystia Freeland who is also the Deputy Prime Minister of the Federal Liberal party.

"It's no secret, I think the world of Chrystia, I sent her a message this morning. She was swamped as Deputy Prime Minister and if there is one person I have confidence in, it is Chrystia Freeland."

Ford says he will be asking her for federal funding soon.

"One of the first calls, and I am going to let her settle in but we need money for the transit system. We are building a $28.5 billion dollar transit system in collaboration between municipalities and the Province and it is just tradition that the Federal Government comes in and supports the projects by 40 percent. There is no better person that I would rather work with than Chrystia Freeland. She is going to do an incredible job, she is a great friend and I can't wait to start working with her to move our projects forward."

He was also asked to endorse a candidate for the Federal Conservative race and was hesitant to do so.

"I am going to work with anyone who gets elected, whether it be the Federal leader of the Conservative party or the Federal leader of the Liberal party. Don't get me wrong, I am proud to be the leader of the PC party but our family wasn't elected by traditional all PC voters. Our family was elected, myself and my brother by traditional NDP union members, Liberals and fiscal Conservatives. I don't like the political stripes, our family is there, we are the party of the people, we support the people, I don't care what flag they are flying. That is the approach we have always taken in politics."

Ford was also asked if he thinks Prime Minister Justin Trudeau should resign.

"I'm not going to get into that federal politics, that is up to the Prime Minister to deal with and we have been working very collaboratively together."

You can listen to Ford's comments below: