Why I want the next group of politicians to come from the arts.

I want an author for Minister of Education.

I want someone who loves our own story to tell it.

I want someone who knows our true history to write it.

I want someone who loves our Newfoundland and Labrador culture to promote it.

I want our Ode to Newfoundland to sung on high by our youth.

I want Labrador to be included in that Ode

I want young Newfoundlanders and Labradorians to see themselves in the books they read.

I want the rules to be more about what you know, rather than who you know.

I want people from this province to be the most education people in the country.

I want Canadians to hear the word Newfoundlander and Labradorian then automatically think: Hardworking and educated.

I want to read loudly from my books on the mainland and not be criticized for my accent.

I want to change the term ‘politician’ to ‘fighting Newfoundlander’ so they don’t forget their purpose.

I want a painter for Minister of Culture and Tourism.

I want them to vividly capture the landscape and blur the line between photo and painting.

I want a sculpturer for Minister of Immigration.

I want them to carve out what the future of our culture looks like.

I want a photographer to be Minister of Children, Seniors, and Social Development.

I want them to have the ability to capture the soul of a child in foster care or a senior who must choose between staying warm and staying fed.

I want them to look at those photos every day and remember what they are there to do.

I want a tattooist for Minister of Finance.

I want them to write a plan for our future in permanent ink for all to see.

I want to be able to pull up the sleeve of government and read that plan when they tell me it never existed.

I want an illustrator for Minister of Fisheries, Forestry and Agriculture.

Someone who can lay out the topography of the land and show us the past, present and future.

I want a textile artist for Minister of Health and Community Services.

I want them to weave and hook until they make sense of a system that makes people sick.

I want a graphic designer for Minister of Justice.

I want them to create visual concepts that communicate ideas that inspire, inform, captivate and reform rather than run a broken system that only teaches people how to be better criminals.

But first, I want an author for Minister of Education.

An author who can inspire young people to stay in the education system, and keep them out of the justice system. To keep them away from the health care system, take them away from the foster care system, keep our culture ingrained in their DNA and bring people back to our natural resources.

I want the youth of this province to stay and make a life here.