Constituents Seeing Less Of Belanger

Constituents Seeing Less Of Belanger

Monday, June 19, 2006 at 15:06

Athabasca MLA Buckley Belanger says criticism that he doesn’t spend enough time in his constituency is fair.

Some residents in the northern riding say it’s been several months since they’ve seen Belanger in their community.

Belanger says he’s only been able to visit a couple of northern communities in the last five months, and recently had to pull out of attending a couple of high school graduations in his riding.

He says the legislative session is partly to blame, but he says the real culprit is his new role as minister of Community Resources and Employment.

Belanger says it’s the third-largest provincial department, and learning the ropes of his portfolio has kept him in Regina more often than he would like.

Belanger admits that when he was Northern Affairs minister, there was a lot more overlap between his constituency work and his ministerial duties — which kept him in the North more often.