It’s Election Day!*

*Assuming of course, you’re reading this on Thursday, and I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t be because everybody waits with baited breath for the new issue of Echo, right? Right?

After three years, covering four elections, I get a rarefied opportunity to release a column on an Election Day, rather than just before or after. Perhaps you’re reading this on your way to the polls. Perhaps you’re reading afterward. Perhaps Election Day is over and you already know who won. Perhaps this knowledge disappoints you verily. Either way, I think it’s time to articulate my views on elections, why vote every Election Day and why you should do the same.

There were two elections within a year I turned 18, and I voted in both. It was 1997, and the first was that year’s Municipal Election and the other was the Federal Election that elevated the Jean Chrétien Liberals to their second term. Two years after that was the 1999 Provincial Election that returned Mike Harris’ Tories to Queen’s Park, and as a university student at the time, I have to say that that wasn’t the way I wanted things to go.

But you know what I didn’t do? Throw up my hands in exasperation and renege on the notion that democracy doesn’t work. This is an attitude I find all too common: democracy doesn’t work because the outcome we wanted wasn’t achieved. No, democracy works, you just didn’t get what you want. And while I agree that an electoral system that lets the party that achieved only 40 per cent of the popular vote to form a majority government is broken, it’s only because another 40 per cent sit on the bench believing their either too busy or too unimportant to vote.

In the short term, electoral reform is out because no party in power is going to legislate change that will mitigate their own power. But if the 40 per cent that sat out the Federal Election this past spring threw their support behind an independent candidate like, say, Communist Party candidate Drew Garvie, then right now he would be MP for Guelph. Or to go back to last fall’s Municipal Election, where two-thirds of electors sat out exercising their franchise, if even half of those people voted for antique store owner Ray Mitchell or skateboard enthusiast Scott Nightingale, then they would be sitting in the Mayor’s office this minute.

Having said all that, I do understand why people still think that their vote doesn’t matter, but like the man said, with all things, you’ll miss it when it’s gone. That’s why I’d like to propose a simple amendment to election law: If you do not exercise your right to vote in three consecutive elections you should lose that right. Not forever. I’m not quite mean like that, but almost.

My proposal is modest: if you shirk on your vote for any reason, for three elections in a row, at all levels of government, and you decide that you would like to exercise your right to vote in an upcoming election, then you will have to writer a 1,500 word essay explaining why you didn’t vote, and why you’ve decided to vote again. You won’t get marked on it, and if nobody likes your essay you won’t be refused the right to vote, but the point is the effort. You have to put in the effort, and you have to prove that you want it. Like most things in life, the work is its own reward.

Sound harsh? Especially in light of the fact that essay writing was at the bottom of a very long list of things you didn’t like about school? That’s what I thought, and that’s why this idea occurs. So before someone with real authority not bestowed upon them by the publishers of Echo snatches up this idea, then you might want to get off your duff today, find your polling station at wemakevotingeasy.com, and put an ‘x’ beside the name of someone that you’d like to see speak for you in Queen’s Park. Even if they have, in your mind, no chance of winning.

Besides, unless either the McGuinty Liberals or Hudak PCs are returned to Queen’s Park in a minority government, then this will be the last election for us until the year 2014, and let’s face it, if those conspiracy theories turn out to be true, we could all be dead by then. But in all seriousness, to go from four elections in three years to no elections for the next three years, will be a tough adjustment for us happy few politicos. And if voter fatigue is a real thing, I expect to see record turnout for the Municipal Election in 2014.

To get all the scoop post-election and other political stuff, visit my blog, Guelph Politico, at http://guelphpolitico.blogspot.com/

The Candidates Speak!

After a busy couple of weeks covering some anonymous film festival in Toronto, I finally got down to the real process of politicking by interviewing the candidates running for Member of Provincial Parliament of Guelph. Of our riding’s seven declared candidates, here are some words from three who are looking for your vote on October 6th.

You Don’t Know Dyck

Green Party candidate Steve Dyck faces a similar dilemma as he campaigns for Guelph MPP that his Federal counterpart John Lawson did in this past spring’s election. Like Lawson, Dyck follows a candidate with two elections under their belt and a wave of popular support. But unlike Lawson, Dyck hopes to break though and build on Ben Polley’s third place finish in 2007, and he hopes to do that by tackling his party’s core issue, and doing so more thoroughly than the other parties.

“I’m so passionate about the issues,” says Dyck who officially kicked off his political career as the Green Party of Ontario’s energy critic on The Agenda with Steve Paikin. “I feel like the Liberals, the Conservatives and the NDP really have abandoned the environment.”

The environment doesn’t get a lot of air in these difficult economic times when jobs and budgets are more worrisome, so how does the Green Party candidate reach voters? “I often don’t speak about the environment, what I mostly talk about is the economy and building an economy that makes sense, and works for people,” explains Dyck. “The Liberals have imported the Green Energy Act from Germany, and when they did that I wanted to applaud. But they imported the technology and left the community out. Renewable energy in Germany is overwhelmingly community-financed, community-based, which allows rate-payers the ability to gain the benefit.”

Fourth Time Around for Garvie

By running again for the Communist Party of Canada in Guelph, Drew Garvie holds up a proud Royal City tradition as the Canadian face of the revolution began here in 1921. Garvie is running for the fourth time for political office in Guelph, his second attempt at the MPP seat after two Federal runs.

Amongst his campaign promises, Garvie, and the Communists, are pledging to do something that, surprisingly, no other party has said that they’ll do: completely eliminate the HST from Ontario’s bookkeeping. “I think what the HST basically is, and the voters of B.C. obviously understood it, the majority of voters see it as placing the burden on them rather than the people who actually have the ability to pay,” explains Garvie.

Garvie also wants to bring attention to another issue that’s not being discussed a lot in the campaign: the demand for an inquiry into police action during the G20 protests in the summer of 2010. “It was the largest crackdown, the largest mass arrest in Canadian history, and it was facilitated by the McGuinty Liberals and the Federal Tories,” Garvie says emphatically. “[They] gave police sweeping powers that they need to go in bust heads, arrest 1,100 people and ended up not charging a lot of them. People were in terrible conditions in ‘Guantanamo North,’ as they called it, and André Marin, the Ontario Ombudsman, has said that this was the biggest compromise of civil rights in Canadian history.”

Schirk is Lovin’ the Campaign Trail

Greg Schirk talks about missing his morning coffee, but he doesn’t seem like it. The Progressive Conservative candidate was the last of the major party candidates to be acclaimed by his riding association, but Schirk says it’s been an easy transition to full-on campaign mode, and he’s ready to help PC leader Tim Hudak form the next government of the Province of Ontario. But first things first: the issues.

For one thing, Schirk maybe campaigning on eliminating Smart Meters and undoing some of the McGuinty government’s deals to create Green energy, but Schirk doesn’t want you to think he’s not environmentally friendly. “Guelph has a reputation for being a green community, and that happened long before the Green Energy Act,” he explains. “It was grassroots driven, it wasn’t top down. You look at this community and I just can’t see us shutting that desire to be a community and contribute to a better environment. When you look at this push from the community, I think it’s going to continue regardless of what legislation is in place.”

Schirk has been busy campaigning and attending events and debates, and says that he wouldn’t mind campaigning full-time. “I’ve got to tell you how much I love doing this,” Schirk says with obvious joy. “This is so much fun. I get to meet so many people, I’ve always liked talking politics, and I’m learning so much, that’s the great thing. And I’m not only learning fro the PC caucus, but from the average person that answers the door.”

To listen to the complete candidate interviews, go to my blog at http://guelphpolitico.blogspot.com where you can listen the complete podcast of my candidate interviews, as well as get all the latest election scoop.

Garvie's Back, Sign Issues and Debate Prep

Fourth Try for Fifth Party Candidate

The day after the writ was officially dropped for the 2011 Ontario Provincial Election, Communist Party candidate Drew Garvie announced his intention to once again run to represent Guelphites.

“Youth and working-people in Ontario are justifiably angry at the Liberal Government for protecting corporate wealth and privilege while real wages and living standards are falling, real unemployment is rising and the real economy is tottering on the edge of another deep recession,” said Garvie in a press release. “But voting Tory to punish the Liberals is like jumping from the frying pan into the fire.”

Garvie first ran in the 2007 Provincial Election, eventually winning .4 per cent of the vote. Running the next fall in the Federal Election, he didn't finish as well with only .13 per cent of the popular vote, but he did however capitalize on that in this past spring's Federal Election, increasing his vote share to .17 per cent. True it doesn't sound like much, but for a so-called third party candidate, literally every vote counts. Garvie’s entry into the race takes the slate up to five, although potential candidates have until 2 pm today (Thursday) to file their nomination papers.

Fun fact: the Communist Party of Canada was actually founded just outside Guelph in 1921. Of course, “just outside Guelph” is relative because what was outside of Guelph 90 years ago is now way inside the city limits. Some may say Garvie’s being a nuisance, but to the rest of us he’s keeping up a proud Royal City tradition. Welcome back to the race, Drew.

Sign Language

A bit of controversy to kick off the election as the Liz Sandals campaign put up election signs on Tuesday afternoon, several hours before the writ was official dropped for the start of the campaign. This is a bit of a murky area because while limitations for fundraising for a campaign are very well defined, advertising your campaign with the placement of signs is not. “Our read of Elections Ontario is that there is not a distinction,” between pre-writ and post writ advertising with signs, Sandals told the Guelph Mercury. She added that the reason her campaign didn’t put out signs earlier is out of respect for the public. “It’s more a case of respecting the public’s tolerance for wanting to look at signs, as opposed to any particular legal rule,” she said. An Elections Ontario official said that elections signs can appear anytime before the writ so long as the campaign can identify who paid for the signs.

Opening Arguments

The first all-candidate meet of the election happened last Thursday at the main branch of the Guelph Public Library. Liberal Liz Sandals, NDP James Gordon and the Green Party’s Steve Dyck were each in attendance, while the PC’s Greg Schirk and Communist Drew Garvie were unable to attend.

Not surprisingly, one of the major issues discussed was library funding, a hot button for library-lovers given Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s recent efforts to cut the municipal library budget in that city. Gordon was quite adamant in his support saying, “Investing in libraries and cultural activities brings money to a community. It’s not ‘throwing money at a problem.’ Libraries are income generators.”

Gordon then promised to cut the wait time for the construction of a new library in half saying that 10 years is too long a time to wait. But Sandals rebutted that while libraries are a good thing, the library funding isn’t really a matter for the provincial government. Dyck, meanwhile, wanted to talk about the provincial budget and getting Ontario out of the red, which means not much room for new spending. “The Green party would hold the spending in all ministries except health care,” he said. “We can’t tax more and we need to get our debt in line. So we’d have to hold the spending for now.”

Look for several debates and candidates forums in the next couple of weeks. Two of the biggest ones will be the University of Guelph debate on September 28th, which will feature questions from students, and the Guelph Chamber of Commerce debate, which took place this past Tuesday, but will probably be repeated ad nauseum on Rogers TV.

Meet the Other Candidates Pt. 2

Last week, I talked to Communist Party of Canada candidate Drew Garvie, but there is another far-left candidate in this campaign: Marxist-Leninist nominee Manuel Couto. Couto has run in the last four Federal elections in Guelph, including the present race. And that’s just about all the info I’ve been able to find for Mr. Couto. His contact information is notably absent from the CBC and the Globe and Mail candidates’ pages and a request to the MLPC’s media department for contact info went unanswered.

The party itself has a strongly worded platform which follows three key tenants. First is the need to invest more money in social programs and “Stop paying the rich,” which includes nationalizing all banks and financial institutions amongst its plans. The second point is to reform Canada’s electoral system with an emphasis on equality, the hereditary rights of Aboriginal periods and respecting Quebec’s right to self-determination, up to and including the right of secession. Finally, the MLPC intend to “modernize” our foreign policy, meaning a withdrawal from NAFTA and other free trade agreements, a withdrawal from NATO and NORAD, and to demand the democratization of the UN.

Kornelis Klevering meanwhile says that issues surrounding the use of marijuana are on the minds of many of the people he talks to, and being the Marijuana Party candidate he’s focused on bringing those issues to the forefront. “Every time there’s a federal election, or a by-election, someone has to come out and remind everyone that this is an unacceptable situation in a free and democratic society,” says Klevering, who also likes to be called Brother Kase, referring to the continued criminalization of cannabis.

Klevering says that his party’s goal is the complete end to “the prohibition against marijuana,” although past proclamations of decriminalization from the Liberals and the NDP is a step in the right direction, he adds. But Klevering says it’s more than simply the right to smoke, but the stigmata against the plant extends to the potential benefits of hemp-based products. “You mention marijuana and all of the sudden, everything else is tainted,” Klevering explains. “So hemp for bio-mass, or hemp seed oil as a health product, all that doesn’t stand a chance because there’s a stigma against marijuana. People are talking about a Green Shift, well we want a Green Shift too and that includes hemp.”

Rounding out the local roster is John Turmel, an independent candidate running in his 67th election. It’s been a slow year for Turmel as compared to 2007 where he ran in three races: a Provincial by-election in Burlington, a Federal by-election in Outremont and the Provincial election in Brant last October. His impressive number of elections fought and lost has earned him a place in the Guinness Book of World Records. Turmel has also adopted several epitaphs over the years; he’s referred to himself as The Engineer, The Gambler, The Banking System Engineer, Bank Fighter Extraordinaire, TajProfessor, and Great Canadian Gambler.

Turmel is an advocate for "Local Employment Trading Systems" (LETS), which Wikipedia describes as "interest-free barter arrangements." Under this system, money is eliminated, and people can use the "Time Standard of Money" to work off their loans or just about any other type of debt you can think of. Turmel was a candidate in the by-election, but decided to stick with Guelph telling the Brantford Expositor, "It's so undemocratic in Brantford […] I may probably go where I have a chance to participate." This comment was in reference to a debate sponsored by Rogers Television in Brant last fall, where he was removed by police after demanding to be allowed to speak.

For more information on the election, up to and including Election Night, visit my blog at http://guelphbyelectionbeat.blogspot.com/

Meet The Other Candidates

One of the late comers to this election cycle is Drew Garvie, who’s running again as the Communist Party nominee following his bid in the 2007 Provincial Election. The recent University of Guelph grad has a very specific goal in running for Federal office. “I hope to really shed light on how important this election is and what it means to the future of Canada, especially if we’re facing a Harper majority,” Garvie says. “People need to know what their real agenda is and how far down the road of no return that can really take us with their regressive policies.”

More specifically, Garvie says that he wants to return Canada to a place of leadership in the environment and international action in peacekeeping. He adds that the issue of our country’s involvement in Afghanistan has been seriously downplayed in this election and he wants to bring it back to the foreground. He also has harsh words for the tenor of this election, which Garvie says have involved issues that have no bearing on the lives of Canadians, like the Maxine Bernier affair. “You hope to kind of shift the debate from the inane, media coverage and issues that aren’t really important,” he adds.

It’s not often we get a Libertarian Party candidate here in Guelph, but Philip Bender intends to bring his unique point of view, in terms of what kind of government we need, to the forefront in this election. “I have no pretense of winning,” he says. “I put my name forward to try and stimulate some thought about our political process, to give an alternative viewpoint and not just from a single issue, our issue is governance.”

This is Bender’s third campaign after running in the last two provincial elections. He explains that one of the reasons he runs is to provide libertarians, who have hard time finding someone to vote for, a focal point for politically like-minded people to come together. Bender notes that current approaches to various issues prove that the solution is less government, not more. Trade barriers, which create blocks on prosperity, are one issue that needs a more libertarian overhaul and he argues that healthcare, as it is now, constitutes a monopoly.

“People are concerned about their jobs, their livelihood, and they’ve unfortunately put their faith in government,” Bender explains, “I’m still hard pressed, in many endeavours, to find an example where a government solution has provided a good answer to a problem.”

If you haven’t heard of the Animal Alliance Environment Voters Party, that’s okay, seeing as how they’re brand new. According to their local candidate, Karen Levenson, under Federal law, political groups can’t lobby during an election, so if the AAEVP wanted to keep animal rights issues in the limelight, they had to become a formal political party. “Why is it that no politician can feel enough compassion to do something about the horrible conditions that the majority of animals in our country live?” Levenson asks.

Levenson says that’s matter of politics, especially in the case of the annual seal hunt. “They know that any party, any politician, that goes against the seal hunt they will lose votes and lose their seats in the sealing provinces.” More locally, trapping is a big issue for Levenson and the AAEVP, and they’re pushing hard for an outright ban on trapping because of the ease in which pets and people, even children, can get caught in a trap. “Fifty per cent of the homes in Guelph have companion animals, and yet people don’t seem to realize that the Federal policies that are created do not protect their animals,” she says, adding that she includes farm animals in that statement. “Animal issues are human issues; we need animals to survive.”

For more information, news and updates on the election, visit my blog at http://guelphbyelectionbest.blogspot.com/