WATCH ABOVE: Kathleen Wynne talks about her “feud” with Prime Minister Stephen Harper
TORONTO – It seems Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne still isn’t on Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s good side.
Toronto’s newly minted mayor John Tory had a face-to-face meeting with Harper at his request in Mississauga Thursday evening despite the prime minister having not met Ontario’s premier for close to a year.
Harper was just outside Toronto on Thursday for a pre-budget roundtable discussion with the Retail Council of Canada in Mississauga, but no meeting with Wynne was scheduled.
“We had a good chance to have an in-depth discussion on SmartTrack,” Tory told reporters at city hall Friday morning. “We also discussed employment, jobs and housing and the economy in general.”
The “productive” meeting occurred just two weeks after Tory was officially sworn into office.
“I have my job to do as mayor of Toronto,” Tory said. “I’m going to work very hard to maintain two excellent relationships with the provincial and federal government.”
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Tory tweeted Thursday night that he had a “positive” meeting with Harper and “looked forward to many more discussions.”
The meeting took place on the same day Wynne called out Harper for refusing to meet with her and urged an end to the strained and distant nature of their dealings.
READ MORE: Wynne asks Harper for first face-to-face meeting in more than a year
That is too long a time between meetings of the prime minister and the premier of Canada’s largest province, whose relationship should be one of collaboration, not confrontation,” Wynne wrote in a letter she sent to Harper.
The Conservative prime minister and the Liberal premier last met Dec. 5, 2013, and since then both politicians have publicly taken jabs at each other over pension plans, the provincial deficit and infrastructure spending.
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Wynne said in the letter she hopes they can meet early in the new year.
With a file from The Canadian Press
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