Thunder Bay—Atikokan

Thunder Bay—Atikokan stretches from the city of Thunder Bay westward through a vast expanse of boreal shield country to the town of Atikokan near the Manitoba border. The riding had been a Liberal stronghold since its creation in 1999, held for fifteen years by Bill Mauro, until NDP candidate Judith Monteith-Farrell upset him by a razor-thin 81-vote margin in 2018. Monteith-Farrell entered the 2022 campaign as a one-term incumbent seeking re-election in a riding where the opioid crisis, healthcare access, and the resource economy dominated local debate.

The Progressive Conservatives, who had not held the seat in its modern form, saw an opening as Doug Ford’s party made inroads across northern Ontario. The contest became a three-way race between the NDP incumbent, a long-serving rural municipal leader running for the PCs, and a first-time Liberal candidate.

Candidates

Kevin Holland (Progressive Conservative) — Holland served as mayor of the Township of Conmee, west of Thunder Bay, for over three decades, having first been elected to council in 1991. He was also the operations manager of a family-owned business that manufactures custom emergency vehicles and commercial truck bodies. Holland held leadership roles including First Vice-Chair of the Rural Ontario Municipal Association and director of the Ontario Association of Police Services Boards.

Judith Monteith-Farrell (NDP) — Born and raised in Thunder Bay, Monteith-Farrell worked for twenty-five years as a union representative for the Public Service Alliance of Canada before entering politics for the first time in the 2018 election. During her term as MPP, she served as the NDP’s critic for Natural Resources, Forestry and Mines, and was active in community organizations including the United Way Board and Friends of Quetico Park.

Rob Barrett (Liberal) — Barrett held a Master’s degree in Social Work from Lakehead University and had been an executive director at several community service organizations in Thunder Bay, including a local employment service, a family counselling centre, and an emergency shelter. He was a first-time political candidate.

Eric Arner (Green Party) — Arner ran as the Green candidate in the riding. David Tommasini ran for the New Blue Party, Dan Criger for the Ontario Party, and Kenneth Jones for the Northern Ontario Party.

Local Issues

The opioid crisis was the most urgent issue facing Thunder Bay during the 2018–2022 term. The Thunder Bay District Health Unit reported 118 suspected opioid-related deaths in 2021, giving the region a higher per-capita overdose death rate than any other public health unit in Ontario, and even higher than Vancouver. The city had only 25 detox beds for drugs and alcohol, and paramedics saw opioid-related calls soar from roughly 20 per month to as many as 100 in some months. The toxic unregulated drug supply, poverty, and unstable housing were identified as major drivers of overdose risk.

Healthcare access was a persistent concern across the riding. Residents in Thunder Bay and the smaller communities stretching to Atikokan faced doctor shortages and long emergency room wait times. The provincial government announced an expansion of addictions services in Thunder Bay in March 2022, including new treatment and withdrawal management beds, but many residents and frontline workers argued the investments were insufficient to meet the scale of the crisis.

The resource economy, particularly forestry and mining, remained central to the riding’s identity. Employment in the forestry sector had been declining for years, and communities west of Thunder Bay depended heavily on natural resource extraction. The need for economic diversification and infrastructure investment, including road maintenance on Highway 11 and broadband access in rural areas, featured prominently in candidate debates.