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Gille Bisson elected MPP for Timmins (updated)

It is the first time that an MPP is elected for the new riding
2018-06-07 Gilles Bisson MH
Timmins MPP Gilles Bisson speaks to supporters after winning his eighth consecutive election. Maija Hoggett/TimminsToday

Gilles Bisson has been re-elected.

After the election was called in his favour, he arrived at his party at the Dante Club surrounded by family and being cheered on by supporters.

This is the eighth consecutive win for Bisson, who is the first MPP for the new Timmins riding.

He said he’s very happy and excited to win another term.

“A lot of people were saying reconfiguration of the riding might be a different thing, I never felt that because I’ve always known what the potential is in Timmins, we’ve always had good support here,” he said.

He acknowledged it is a bittersweet victory, however.

“The sweet part is you like to win, of course this is number eight and it’s a pretty convincing win so that feels very good because it’s people saying ‘yes you’ve done a good job and we’re bringing you back again to do it again.’ Bitter in a sense that we really could have done something different in this province. We could have had Pharmacare, we could have had dental care, we could have had gas price regulation, we could have done something with the hydro system. Instead we played the politics of fear with Doug Ford and the politics of fear and essentially the negative attacks that he had worked, and that’s rather unfortunate,” he said.

With the Progressive Conservatives on track to win a majority government, he said the next four years are going to be different.

“I’ve got good relationships with a lot of the Tories that are there, but Ford is the wildcard in this whole thing.”

Now that he’s earned a seat at Queen’s Park again, he knows what his top priority is.

“Noront, Noront, Noront,” he said, adding he talked to CEO Alan Coutts and Timmins Mayor Steve Black about it recently

“I think Timmins is a natural fit, we’ve got the Ontario Northland, we’ve got a brownfield site that we can go to, we’ve got the gas, we’ve got the hydro, we’ve got everything we need. So that’s going to be the big one,” he said.

He was first elected in 1990 for the former riding of Cochrane South and held the seat for the Timmins-James Bay riding since it was created in 1999.

He doesn't intend to make this election his last.

“I’m doing the whole term and I’m running again. I’m telling you right now, Gilles Bisson will be on the ballot the next election, period,” he declared.