I believe that almost everyone enters public life to serve their communities, their province and their country. But occasionally, politicians are chastised in public opinion polls for acting in their own self interest rather than in the interests of the people they were elected to serve.

Unfortunately, Nova Scotians witnessed one of these instances when Darrell Dexter and his New Democrats voted against the provincial budget on May 15.

The budget contained overwhelming benefits for Nova Scotia families and seniors and for students. The NDP voted against lowering putting 189.7 million dollars on our debt. Lowering that debt has been, and will continue to be a priority for my government.

Each member of the New Democratic caucus stood in the legislature and said no to lower taxes; no to lower tuition for university students; no to improved home care for seniors; no to a Healthy Living Tax credit; no to a loan program for Nova Scotia fishermen and no to the provision of the drug Avastin for Nova Scotians struggling with colorectal cancer.

Although we don’t always agree on how to do it, I believe members of the NDP share my desire to improve the lives of Nova Scotians. Right now however, the New Democrats want a provincial election.

Last November 22, Mr. Dexter was already signaling his eagerness for an election. Outside the legislative assembly, he predicted that there would be an early election. He told reporters that my government would “be lucky to be around in 2008".

We had a provincial election less than two years ago and I don’t think Nova Scotians want to head to the polls again so soon - not when there are so many positive things happening in our province. Our gross domestic product is up. More Nova Scotians are working and working people are making more money.

The province’s future is more secure because the Atlantic Accords makes us the principal beneficiaries of our offshore resources. Our books are balanced for the seventh consecutive year and we are paying down the debt.

With all this in place, my government has been able to make real progress on our five immediate priorities: protecting the environment, educating to compete, creating safer, healthy communities, improving roads and infrastructure and reducing wait times.

Already there are more police officers on our streets and in our communities. We have legislation in place that will make our province one of the cleanest, most sustainable places in the world by 2020. University tuitions are going down. Our plan to pave 2,000 kilometres of road in four years is on track and we have begun construction on 1,000 new long-term care beds.

My Progressive Conservative government will continue putting the interests of Nova Scotians first. We will continue protecting the programs and services that the people of this province want and need and we will continue to build the New Nova Scotia, a province that is even better than the one we have today.