Jack Hundial has his eye set on a Tory prize for Fleetwood-Port Kells.
The former Surrey city councillor is seeking the Conservative MP nomination for that riding as Liberal MP Ken Hardie is not seeking re-election.
“It’s undetermined at this point but there is a call for nominations,” Hundial said of the local Tory contest.
The Trudeau government’s policies on housing and crime in particular have instilled in Hundial a desire to seek federal office as a Conservative.
“Surrey’s always had a complex housing process and certainly the demand’s been high, but you know when we’re starting to see this next generation, that they sort of abandon hope of home ownership,” he said. “I’m tired of the way the economy is going; I’m tired of a government that’s propped-up based on an agreement with the NDP.”
Hundial has lived in the Fleetwood-Port Kells riding for 20 years. The retired Surrey Mountie was elected to Surrey city council in 2018, running with Mayor Doug McCallum’s Safe Surrey Coalition, but split from it in July 2019. A few months later, he and Brenda Locke formed Surrey Connect but he didn’t run in the 2022 civic election.
READ ALSO: Fleetwood-Port Kells Liberal MP Ken Hardie says this term will be his last
Hardie, at age 76, told the Now-Leader last May that he won’t seek re-election.
Hardie has been serving Fleetwood-Port Kells since 2015, when he defeated Conservative incumbent Nina Grewal. The next election is to take place on or before Oct. 20, 2025.
“If this government goes the full distance it’ll be 10 years and one day since I was first elected and I’ll be 78, so that’s, you know, it’s time to hang it up and give the young’uns a chance,” Hardie said at the time.