By Kamloops This Week
A little more than a year after his quest to become Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo’s next MP came to an end, former NDP candidate Bill Sundhu is gearing up for another round of campaigning.
With the province headed to the polls in May, Sundhu will be pitching in to organize and support the efforts of B.C. NDP candidates, as well as keeping his eye on the federal party’s leadership campaign, which should heat up some time in the new year.
Whether the lawyer will return to Kamloops’ ballots in the future remains to be seen. Sundhu, who finished second in the 2015 federal election, about 3,000 votes shy of Conservative incumbent Cathy McLeod, looks back on his run for federal office and said it’s too early to rule out another campaign.
“I don’t get too far ahead of myself,” he said. “We’ll see where my personal life is and how I feel when the next federal election rolls around and how things look politically.”
As the federal party looks to pick a new leader in the new year, Sundhu said it’s important the New Democrats take back ground they lost to the federal Liberals.
“[The Liberals] kind of walked into NDP territory for the purpose of the campaign — but what I would say is Liberal, Tory, same old story. They campaigned from the left and governed from the right,” Sundhu said.
One year into a Liberal majority government, Sundhu hasn’t been impressed with the party’s practice of holding cash-for-access fundraisers, which in some cases have seen business people pay $1,500 a head for access to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. The Liberals’ commitment to its campaign promises have also been lacking, he said.
Sundhu, who was part of local efforts to hold town hall meetings and consultations on electoral reform, said the Liberals are “waffling” on their commitment to doing away with first-past-the-post voting.
Sundhu noted an online survey that sorted respondents into categories such as “innovator” was criticized for being leading and overly simplistic, while the minister in charge of the file, Maryam Monsef, rejected a Commons committee’s report that recommended a referendum on a voting system.
“I think the sheen will wear off,” said Sundhu of Trudeau’s coming political year. “I think there was a really significant honeymoon period because people were fed up with the Harper government and wanted a change, and the image that the Liberal government did create was very different.”
When not on the campaign trail, Sundhu is focused on his law practice, which saw him making the trek to Tanzania earlier this year for his work with the International Criminal Court. He also works on the Haida Gwaii court circuit.
