THREE ISSUES - health, education and broken promises - have dominated the current provincial election campaign, almost to the point of excluding everything else.

Lost in the controversy over such things as public funding of faith-based schools and what (if anything) to do about the health "premium" (tax) has been any serious look at provincial transportation policies, beyond some vague promises of new funding that would target the growing gridlocks in the Greater Toronto Area.

Missing, in particular, is any in-depth discussion of the provincial highways system so emasculated by the downloading of the Mike Harris government, a process that has left property taxes as the sole source of revenue for former provincial highways that were deemed to be "primarily for local use."

Thankfully, some pressure for redress may be in store for whichever party forms the government after the Oct. 10 election. Dufferin County Council has asked Trevor Lewis, the county's public works director, to explore ways of requesting the 'uploading' of Airport Road (County 18) along with the downloaded provincial highways 24 and 9, (now County 124 and 109), all of which are clearly not primarily for local use. Mr. Lewis will discuss the proposal with the other affected upper-tier municipalities - Peel, Grey, Simcoe and Wellington.

Funding for roads formed only a minor part of the first of the Dufferin-Caledon all-candidates meetings in Orangeville last week, and then only tangentially in the sense that the sale of 407 ETR was criticized and the issue of gas tax rebates was raised in the context of public transit.

In our view, this is an important issue, and one which deserves clear policy statements from the three major parties (Liberal, Conservative and NDP).

As we see it, any highway shown by origin/destination surveys to be used mainly by traffic from outside the local jurisdiction should qualify for provincial funding, whether or not they are labelled King's Highways.

And if only for the benefit of tourists, they all should have provincial markers.