So we are headed to a vote Oct. 21, to elect the next edition of Canada’s federal government.
In the next month leading up to the vote we will be inundated by efforts to get people voting for one political party, or another. Locally in the Yorkton-Melville riding it is anticipated at least five parties will be running candidates, although the official list as of this writing sits at only three-confirmed; Conservative Party of Canada, Green Party, and the new People’s Party of Canada.
It will be up to each of us, as eligible voters, to wade through the rhetoric of political campaign advertising, and the vehement positions of many who turn to social media to make their voices heard, to determine which party has the best vision for our country.
Overlaying the need to delve beyond the media sheen to get at the heart of party policy is a need to determine which among the local candidates can get our local issues heard within their own caucuses, and of course in Parliament itself.
It is not always about towing party lines like automatons on an assembly line. There are times when the local constituency needs will run counter to a party’s overall platform, and our local representative should have the intestinal fortitude to stand up for the constituency over the party itself at times.
Those are difficult things for voters to ascertain, but we each should make the effort over the coming weeks.
Then on Oct. 21, we each need to get out and vote.
Sitting at home and not taking part in the democratic process does little to help fashion the future Canada we want.
It is interesting, as just prior to sitting down to write this week’s editorial the new season of the long-running Canadian television series Murdoch Mysteries aired. The underlying theme of the episode was the efforts of women to garner the right to vote.
“Women’s suffrage in Canada occurred at different times in different jurisdictions and at different times to different demographics of women. Women’s right to vote began in the three prairie provinces. In 1916, suffrage was given to women in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta. The federal government granted limited war-time suffrage to some women in 1917, and followed with full suffrage in 1918. By the close of 1922, all the Canadian provinces, except Quebec, had granted full suffrage to white and black women. Newfoundland, at that time a separate country, granted women suffrage in 1925. Women in Quebec did not receive full suffrage until 1940,” details Wikipedia.
That is just more than 100-year ago that women faced the uphill climb to vote alongside men.
And as this election will happen only three weeks ahead of Remembrance Day, we shouldn’t forget either how many Canadians died in wars that in large part were fought to maintain our freedom so that something as important as casting ballots in elections was maintained.
Thinking about such Herculean efforts in the past surrounding the desire to vote and keep that freedom, getting out on Oct. 21 is something that is not only about securing a future we desire, but it honours those who came before us to ensure we have that right today.
