The recently elected member of parliament for South Shore-St.Margaret\u2019s will be sworn in this week.<\/p>\n
Rick Perkins defeated incumbent MP Bernadette Jordan to win the seat in September\u2019s federal election.<\/p>\n
Perkins says the process to take your seat in the House of Commons after winning an election is a long one.<\/p>\n
\u201cElections Canada has to certify the results in the riding first, which took about a week. Then they send it off to Elections Canada in Ottawa which takes another week or two. They actually do it by Canada Post,\u201d said Perkins. \u201cThen once Elections Canada have certified the result, they transfer it to the Speaker\u2019s office in the House of Commons who then has a whole process where it has to be published in the Canada Gazette and then they schedule your swearing-in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Perkins will be sworn in this Wednesday.<\/p>\n
In the month since he was elected, Perkins has been busy flying to Ottawa for orientation with other new MPs and setting up his constituency offices in Bridgewater and Barrington.<\/p>\n
Perkins will take over the same space in Bridgewater occupied by his predecessor at 129 Aberdeen Rd.<\/p>\n
He is also establishing a satellite office in the municipal building in Barrington to service constituents in Shelburne County.<\/p>\n
Perkins says often when an outgoing MP is vacating their office, files they had been working on will be destroyed for privacy issues and he doesn\u2019t want anyone to fall through the cracks.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf there were active cases with the previous MP\u2019s office, we are totally unaware of them. So, obviously, encouraging people who had an active case to try and reconnect with the office,\u201d said Perkins.<\/p>\n