The four candidates in the mix to become Swift Current's next MLA took to the Living Sky Casino Event Centre last night where they shared their views with voters.

The provincial byelection is Thursday in Swift Current as well as Kindersley and Melfort.

Each candidate - Everett Hindley of the Saskatchewan Party, Stefan Rumpel of the NDP, Aidan Roy of the Liberals, and Maria Lewans of the Green Party - had the floor at the event put on by the Swift Current Chamber of Commerce for 10 minutes to begin the night before answering questions from the public.

Topics such as a carbon tax, healthcare, and education were among concern to citizens, as well as the final queurie of the night, which asked what each candidate would do to make reconciliation with First Nations a top priority for the government.

The common theme among the candidates was the need for people to work more closely together.

Everett Hindley

Saskatchewan Party candidate Everett Hindley

Hindley, who served as executive assistant for Brad Wall (who retired this winter from his roles as Swift Current MLA and Saskatchewan premier), spoke about some successes in the province.

"There's some outstanding stories out there. Look at the Living Sky Casino where we are right now - a great First Nations business here in our community that's provided some economic impact for Swift Current and has just been a great story.

"What our government has done is we focused on some investments, for example into the Saskatchewan Indian Institute of Technologies, that's got a very successful track record of training of First Nations individuals. We've got folks like Chief Darcy Bear at White Cap Dakota who has a hugely successful First Nation there with very low, next to zero unemployment there. Those are some of the successes and we need to focus on those and work together with our First Nations partners to do what we can."

NDP candidate Stefan Rumpel

For Rumpel, changing how reserve schools receive funding is key.

"I think it's important to understand that if we continue down the path that we're going, where there's a very strong us-versus-them mentaility, we're not going to move forward together. And we're missing out on a great opportunity for our province.

"If we can move towards true reconcilliation, we can activate a portion of our population that unfortunately has been kept out of our economy, so we have an opportunity to really build an economic force in our province if we can break that cycle. And to do that there has to be conversations about things like the funding gap in education. Reserve schools are funded from the federal government, and they're at 60 per cent to the dollar of our provincial schools. How can things get better when they are left behind in that moment? We need to close that gap, and our party believes we close that gap because it's our people in our province, and then send the bill to Ottawa."

Liberal candidate Aidan Roy

Roy said more education about treaties is part of the answer.

"First thing to recognize is that now more than ever we have seen that treaties become more common in law, so ultimately we need to be more educated about what treaties are, about reconcilliation, and also be more apathetic."

Green Party candidate Maria Lewans

Lewans was critical of a lack of understanding between cultures, and of people noticing differences instead of similarities.

"I think a lot of racial tension was rooted in a lot of propaganda, so we have to cut through that. There's been a lot of reconciliation about what happened, which is good. I don't think a lot of people are getting the message, and I don't think people who are hearing it are really hearing it and taking it in.

"This goes back to, I think a lot of that judgement and getting people for their own self, getting people to love each other and it starts with getting people to love themselves. I think we have to focus on personal growth; maybe healing circles; getting people to meet each other. Some people, there's this fear of the unknown - like maybe they've never met somebody of the opposite race or whatever. So getting them in circles and getting people talking, maybe other businesses could do this in their workplaces. We got to be creative on what ways to do this. But I think it's important that people get out and meet each other and see that they're just people struggling through life. We're all the same."

While serious issues were addressed, there was also some humour sprinkled into the mix.

Each candidate was asked what they would change about their party if they had to change something, and Rumpel's retort was that he'd have more of them, so they could have a stronger voice and be more effective as the opposition. Roy's response also received a lot of laughs, as he said he'd change the party name, as they "simply get too much flack for it" (because of people associating them with the federal Liberal Party).

Stay tuned to Swift Current Online as we'll have more on last night's forum and the byelection itself.