The Honourable Monique Smith, MPP for Nipissing and Minister of Revenue looks at the Revenue homepage in her Frost Building office Monday afternoon. Photos by Kate Adams
Other than missing a few pieces of artwork and one policy advisor the Honourable Monique Smith, MPP for Nipissing and Minister of Revenue has settled down to work quickly in her new office in Toronto that has a prime view of Queen’s Park.
BayToday caught up with the busy MPP for a little question and answer period as well as a tour of her new digs in the Frost Building.
What your day is like now versus when you were just the MPP?
“More meetings now as a Minister of Revenue, I’m on two cabinet committees I’m on Treasury Board which is one of the busiest cabinet committees, I’m also on the Justice Intergovernmental Relations Aboriginal Affairs Policy Committee, so they each meet at least every two weeks as well as cabinet meets every week, although in the off season we’re a little bit less ... sometimes every two weeks.
Today I was back from my Justice Intergovernmental Relations Aboriginal Committee and then I’m back on Thursday for cabinet, but I’m flying home in between because there is stuff going on at home. So it is busier in that sense, in more committee commitments and certainly a lot more briefings leading up to those committees, but I also have the benefit of having more staff here at this end which is nice as well.
So when you look at that Monique let’s be honest, people were criticising you leading up to this election that you weren’t home a lot...
Nobody criticised me for not being home.
Some in the general public were saying you weren’t home often...
I didn’t hear that at all actually Kate, I really didn’t. I didn’t hear that, no and I was home all the time most people I spoke to were amazed at how often and how many events I got to ... I honestly didn’t ... I’m surprised to hear you say that because I honestly didn’t hear it.
It may have been another camp that said it repeatedly...
Well yes, Bill Vrebosch made up a lot of things in the last campaign. Certainly most people I spoke to were amazed at how many local events that I got to and I continue to be committed to getting home as much as possible. And I stuck to it since I’ve been appointed, I am home every Friday, Saturday, Sunday and I’ll continue that, when the house isn’t sitting I try to be home as much as possible and you know I’ve managed that so far I’ve been home more than I’ve been in Toronto since my appointment so that’s been good.
In terms of challenges or new projects, you really accomplished a lot in those 4- years 3-4 years leading up to the previous election what do you see yourself doing now? I know that the Library (Nipissing/Canadore) is on big deal.
Absolutely, absolutely I mean we’ve got a number of projects we want to continue to monitor and see the progress.
The hospital is about 20% completed so far which is great, the Mattawa Hospital is I’d probably say 60 to 70% completed so they’ll be in the summer that’s wonderful, of course the highway continues to be four laned and we’re on schedule for 2012. And the Children’s Treatment Centre we’re hoping to have go to tender and shovels in go in the ground in the next 8 months or so, and of course the library project being the big project that’s still the variable ... the big unknown., it’s a lot of money and it’s a big project but I’m hopeful that we’ll get that started in the not too distant future.
People say good things happen to communities that have ministers...
I don’t think that’s true because I think we’ve had a lot of good news come to our community and I wasn’t a minister or four years, so I don’t know that I could have done anything more than we accomplished in the first four years.
Certainly we accomplished more than my predecessors who were in government you know and one of them was very much involved with the government, so I think that you know it’s strong advocacy, it’s the stars aliening in a number of situations, it’s a lot of hard work locally by a lot of people that make our projects come together, we have a lot of organisations that are really engaged in working cooperatively with other stakeholders you know the Children’s Treatment Centre comes to mind where they brought together a number of stakeholders in support of their project. Canadore and Nipissing obviously working in partnership have worked really hard to present a common front for their library and I think those kinds of initiatives are rewarded.
Give me an idea as to what your day consists of here in Queen’s Park and how you pay attention to your portfolio as Minister of Revenue and how you represent Nipissing at the same time?
Well when I am here when I am in Toronto I often start my day listening to the radio at home because I stream it online so I’ll often be listening to Dan and Jamie in the morning when I am in my apartment in Toronto, and I always read the Nugget first thing in the morning I get it online so I have a good sense of what is going on, I check BayToday so I have a good sense of what is going on at home. And then my ministry obviously I have ministerial staff, I have six staff and they keep me apprised of anything that is going on in the ministry.
A typical day ... there is no typical day actually which is really hard so when I go to the classrooms and such they always ask me what a day is like and there are no typical days .
But for instance today I started the day with a drive out to Mississauga and I went to visit my regional office in Mississauga I have about 210 employees out in Mississauga, we did a tour of the offices and met pretty much all of them and then headed back. Here I had a meeting at 12:30 a briefing with people from Treasury Board for an upcoming Treasury Board meeting and then I had my Cabinet Committee meeting at 2 and that got out a little bit early and I’ve been doing signing of letters ... actually I did constituency letters and now I’m doing Ministry of Revenue letters and then I’ll get on the plane and go home.
At the end of the day, a day like that you are really tired, what to you here from (Mom) Martha?
Martha’s out of town so I won’t hear from Martha tonight (she laughs), so no I am often on the 6:55 plane I get in about 8 -8:30 pm and that’s the end of a long day for me. I’m always happy to be on the 6:55 and not the 10:45 because when I get in at midnight I’m very tired the next day.
Tomorrow (Tuesday) I am in Powassan in the morning I’m at St. Gregory’s School to visit the grade 5 class and in the afternoon I’ve got two different meetings with stakeholders and residents and Wednesday I have a full day with the Minister of Training Colleges and Universities, he is coming to visit Canadore Nipissing. Wednesday night I fly back to Toronto, Thursday morning I have cabinet at 10am and at 1:30pm I get in the car and drive to Kitchener where I meet with my regional staff in Kitchener and Friday morning I have a caucus meeting in Kitchener and Friday night I have a Liberal Party gathering, so I won’t be home this Friday but most every other.
