When the federal Liberal party elects their new leader, the votes coming from the less-populated ridings will be just as important as those from the urban centres.
And candidate Alex Burton is making sure that those smaller communities know he has their best interests at heart.
Burton, a Crown prosecutor based in Vancouver, stopped in Prince George Thursday afternoon to meet with a handful of red-Liberal residents as part of his already six-week long cross-country bus tour promoting his leadership run.
Though his name isn't as well known as the headline-grabbing contender Justin Trudeau, Burton said he threw his hat into the ring because he didn't find anyone "who's actually going to do things I think the Liberal party should be doing."
"If you want something done, you have to be willing to step up and do it," he told the group assembled in a George Street law office.
As president of the Vancouver-Kingsway riding association, Burton said he believes the Liberal party needs to be built from the ground up and that the party and potential candidates need to be immersed in their community long before voters are planning to head for the polls.
He also said the party can't just focus on where it has historically been successful, but that it needs to look outside the metropolitan areas.
"We need to rebuild the party everywhere, and particularly in Western Canada," he said.
In an open letter to fellow Liberal Ottawa South MP David McGuinty - who resigned his cabinet post as energy and natural resources critic Wednesday following disparaging remarks about Alberta politicians - Burton expresses his disappointment in the comments.
"It is important that all Canadians, including Western Canadians, are free to bring their unique perspectives to Ottawa," Burton wrote, adding that those from the west also believe in reaching out. "It is in this spirit that I'm inviting you to join me on my tour as I continue my journey across this great land. It is my hope that by taking this step we will have an opportunity to better connect Ottawa and its important place in the country with the views of Western Canadians on the ground."
Among the unique perspectives is Burton's from his work prosecuting organized crime. He said he would not place legalizing marijuana among the top 10 priorities he has for the party.
"I'm not a candidate who going to stand in front of you and say 'legalize marijuana,'" he said, but added he does not want his own kids to end up in jail if they happened to experiment with smoking at a party.
When asked about his stance on the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline project, Burton said the current proposal is a non-starter. But he said there are examples of pipeline projects already in the province and across the country and that the no-pipeline attitude is unreasonable.
"It's not a helpful contribution to how we're going to deal with oil and gas in this country," he said, pointing to a need for a policy change and the need for a conversation about how Canada can be a world leader in the industry.
"David Black's idea [building an oil refinery in Kitimat to process the raw bitumen flowing from Alberta] may not be the ideal, but at least he's starting the conversation," he said.
The party will elect the the successor to Michael Ignatieff - who stepped down following a failed 2011 run - next April. So far Burton is running against Trudeau, former MP and leadership hopeful Martha Hall Findlay, Ontario lawyers Deborah Coyne and David Bertschi, former president of the B.C. branch of the Liberal Party David Merner, economist Jonathan Mousley and retired Canadian Forces officer Karen McCrimmon.
