To the Editor, 

 

“The Climate Crisis: Where’s the Action?”  I am looking forward to Elizabeth May’s presentation in Minden on  Thursday, Aug. 25  but there is a simple answer to the question posed.  Action in Canada is stuck in the morass of winner take all politics.  Imagine where we would be if the Green Party had been fairly rewarded with representation according to the votes it received when it was first created. I put this to Elizabeth May in a recent email and received the following answer.

“I receive a much larger volume of correspondence (postal and email) than the average MP. My office replied to over 400,000 pieces of correspondence 2014. All emails are reviewed on a regular basis, however due to the high volume of emails my office receives, I may not be able to respond personally to each one.”
That is another reason for fairer representation of environmental ideas. A significant number of people across the country are interested in them but only one person is available in the Green Party to respond. Another reason? In the last federal election the Green Party only polled about 3.4 per cent of the votes cast country wide, down from previous elections.  People who look for environmental solutions have abandoned the Green Party in discouragement and our political conversation has suffered.
So let’s get on with correcting this problem our electoral system has created for us.

 

Jim Milne