Conserve Your Vote for the Green Party

By: Bruce Van Dieten

I want to talk to Conservatives and those considering voting Conservative.

If you’re too young to remember, there was a time — before Stephen Harper and Doug Ford — when the Conservative Party was called the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada. It was the Progressive Conservatives who, under Brian Mulroney, rallied the world to create the Montreal Protocols banning the use of chemicals called chlorofluorocarbons or CFCs.

CFCs are chemicals used in refrigeration that, as it turned out, were depleting the ozone layer of our atmosphere. The ozone layer protects everyone on the planet from the harmful part of the sun’s radiation. Cancer rates rose and an existential crisis was in the making.

The Canadian government led by the Progressive Conservatives created a global consensus to save the world in Montreal and it worked. Businesses learned to adapt, and the ozone layer started repairing itself. Science led the agenda and triggered a global response. It was a good news story for all.

We are facing another existential climate change crisis today.

The root word of Conservative is “conserve”. As such, it should come as no surprise that it was Margaret Thatcher in Britain, along with other conservative-led countries, who led the charge on climate change.

Somewhere along the way, the conversation became politicized.

Take, for example, the carbon tax — a user-pay (partial) solution to pollution. It is an economic first-principle in reducing use and a lever often adopted by conservatives around the world. However, it has been rejected by the current Conservative Party of Canada (CPC).

It is clear there is a significant group of Conservatives who want to continue exploiting the carbon resources we have. The science and, now increasingly, the investment community, oppose this exploitation.

Perhaps you are uncomfortable with the CPC approach. After all, if it holds true that you are concerned about accruing financial debt that will be passed on to your grandchildren, you may be even more uncomfortable with an environmental debt affecting the viability of not only your grandchildren but their grandchildren and their grandchildren’s grandchildren. Is this to be our legacy?

Allow me one more reason to ask you to consider an alternative.

There is a highly respected former Progressive Conservative senator by the name of Hugh Segal. Mr. Segal is a proponent of UBI, Universal Basic Income. He is not the only conservative to support UBI. The Green Party of Canada policy of Guaranteed Livable Income is a type of UBI that has been a part of our platform for decades. There are many conservatives who recognize, as we do, that GLI is the best way to maximize the productive potential of all Canadians by ensuring a basic standard of living.

Perhaps you’re uncomfortable with “Social Conservatism” or the unfortunate dips into the poisoned well of racism that are too commonplace in the present CPC?

If you are wondering if there is a party that is evidence-driven and willing to work with all parties on a basis of good faith, please consider the Green Party of Canada. I know how impossible it is to vote for either the Liberals or the NDP. The Green Party of Canada is a big tent, grassroots party that is not whipped and wants your active participation in both the future of the party and, most importantly, the future of Canada.

Come and join us to battle this crisis.

Bruce Van Dieten is CEO of The Green Party of Canada’s Spadina-Fort York Electoral District Association.