The former U.S. Embassy on Wellington Steet – once earmarked to become a national portrait gallery – is set to become an election flashpoint between Ottawa Centre candidates.
There has been no definite plan for the building since the Conservative government took office in 2006 and Scott Bradley, Liberal candidate for Ottawa Centre, says the building’s vacancy is unacceptable.
“I don’t know that you’d go to Washington, stand at the Capitol and look across the street and see a beautiful, old, empty building.”
The building was being renovated by the Liberal government to house the portrait gallery.
Due to rising costs and objections to the original plans, the Conservative government halted the renovations and considered housing the portraits in a different Canadian city, something Bradley says took away from ensuring Ottawa as a truly a national capital.
Though the government cancelled the project entirely this September, Heritage Minister James Moore said on CBC’s Q last Thursday that the government wants to establish a national portrait gallery when economic conditions make it more plausible.
However, Kaivash Najafi, assistant to NDP MP Paul Dewar says Dewar will fight for the return of the gallery project in the meantime and expects it will be a prominent issue in the looming federal election, for which a Conservative candidate has not yet been chosen.
“Right now, [the former embassy] represents the emptiness of Conservative cultural policy,” says Najafi. He and Bradley both say the current government doesn’t care enough about the arts, culture and institutions that are important to the people of Ottawa Centre and of Canada.
“What we’ve seen with the portrait gallery is a reflection of the belief that you can get away with taking things out of Ottawa,” says Bradley. “I think it’s indicative of a lack of respect for institutions and what it means for us to be a national capital.”